Amamiya Silk Mill Workers' Women's Dispute Skit: The Cries of 1886 and the Questioning of the 2020s

Amamiya Silk Mill Workers' Women's Dispute Skit: The Cries of 1886 and the Questioning of the 2020s

In June 1886, women workers at the Amamiya Silk Mill in Kofu, Yamanashi Prefecture, protested deteriorating working conditions and holed up in a nearby temple. More than 100 workers abandoned their jobs, and the union eventually relaxed some of its rules, ending the dispute. This is considered the first strike by factory workers in Japan, and is a symbolic case of women workers uniting to improve their own working conditions. At the time, raw silk was Japan's main export, and the silk industry was rapidly expanding under the policy of industrialization and development, and many young women were engaged in low wages and long working hours. In response to the movement of female workers who moved to other factories in search of better conditions, the management imposed stricter regulations, which led to the dispute. Although the Amamiya dispute resulted in only small concessions in the short term, it put a stop to the unilateral control of the industry and became the impetus for
a series of labor disputes in various regions thereafter. In particular, it led to large-scale women's labor movements, such as the Nagano and Okaya Yamaichi Forestry Union dispute of 1927, and formed a trend for women to proactively raise their voices at the workplace. The Amamiya Silk Mill Workers' Dispute is still etched in history as an event that marked the intersection of labor and gender in modern Japan.