Paper short abstract:

For years, one of the most controversial issues in Japanese labour politics has been the "diversification of employment forms". This paper asks whether this process lead to political polarization in and explores the evidence in the context of policy as well as voter preferences.

Paper long abstract:

For years, one of the most controversial issues in Japanese labour politics has been the "diversification of employment forms" (koyou keitai no tayouka). Although it seems now to be widely accepted that non-regular work can have problematic social and economic consequences for such workers, the political implications of continuing diversification have so far received only scant attention in the context of Japan. Since regular and non-regular workers differ considerably with regard to their access to social security, seniority pay and career prospects, it could be expected, in line with European models of employment dualization, that policy preferences of workers also diverge. Indeed, there is growing evidence for deepening partisan divisions on issues such as temporary agency work (roudou-sha haken, also called worker dispatch) or the role of law when it comes to setting minimum working standards. While the main opposition party, the Democratic Party (DP, minshin-tou) has long been advocating for stricter rules and rule-setting through legislation, the ruling party, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP, jimin-tou) has been emphasizing instead targeted spending and "educating" employers about desired practices. This paper asks whether this development can be taken as evidence that employment form diversification does indeed lead to polarization in the context of Japanese labour politics. For this purpose, it explores the evidence for polarization both in the context of policy as well as voter preferences.

Furthermore, it analyses whether recent initiatives by the Abe government to promote better working conditions for non-regular workers, including higher pay and equal treatment, are evidence of the LDP changing its position due to the changing shape of employment in Japan. If correct, this would suggest that employment diversification is not leading to polarization but, on the contrary, bringing different groups of workers closer together.