Corporate consciousness

A sense of unity that regular workers, mainly permanent employees, have with the company they work for. It is also called a sense of belonging to the company, and is a term that is contrasted with class consciousness and union consciousness among workers. In the narrow sense, it can also refer to a worker's loyalty to the company, or the idea that a worker's employment and livelihood are guaranteed by the survival and prosperity of the company.

For workers, a company is a place where they enter into an employment contract, work, receive a salary and other income, and maintain their livelihood. Therefore, the financial condition of a company is often directly linked to the working conditions and employment itself of the workers, and workers are conscious of their existence as one with the company to some degree, such as "the worker exists because of the company" or "the union exists because of the company," or they tend to prioritize corporate activities over their own lives and the union. Terms such as "corporate warrior" and "company man" are typical examples of this.

This type of corporate consciousness is rare in Western countries, where individualism is thorough and cross-company unions such as industry-specific unions and occupation-specific unions are dominant, but is more prominent in Japan, where enterprise-specific unions are dominant. In particular, among workers at large Japanese companies, there is a strong sense of "dual affiliation," in which a sense of unity with the company and a sense of unity with the union coexist and blend together, which is one of the characteristics of the Japanese workforce.

The reasons why this corporate consciousness is fostered among Japanese workers include:
(1) The existence of a Japanese-style employment system (seniority-based labor-management relations) including the practice of lifetime employment and seniority-based wages and promotions,
(2) The ideology of managerial familyism since World War I and the development of the industrial patriotism movement during World War II based on the concepts of "labor and management as one" and "labor for the country"
(3) In Japan, the labor market is closed off at the company level, and labor unions are essentially company-based unions that are in collusion with or integrated with management organizations, making it difficult to maintain the independence of workers and unions.
(4) Enhancing corporate welfare and encouraging a sense of belonging and loyalty to the company through human relations as part of employers' labor policies.
Some examples include:

In particular, when it comes to the introduction of human relations, employers have sought not only to accept the introduction of advanced technology and improve labor skills (techniques), but also to embrace mental factors, and have sought to instill a corporate consciousness among workers by using slogans such as "loyalty to the company," "defending the company," "labor-management unity," and "participation in management" to instill and encourage productivity improvements.

There are many approaches to understanding the issue of corporate consciousness, but fostering corporate consciousness is a positive psychology for employers in that it increases workers' loyalty to the company, mobilizes workers to improve productivity, and is a stabilizing factor in long-term labor-management relations. On the other hand, when understood from the perspective of labor unions, it not only weakens the class consciousness of workers and hinders their unity, but also leads to union divisions and the transformation of unions into company unions.

Overcoming this corporate mentality, which is based on the mentality of labor and management sharing a common destiny, has long been considered a major challenge for the Japanese labor movement, and labor unions have pointed out that this can be resolved by transforming into industry-specific unions, that workers should become independent from capital and management, and that efforts should be made to improve workers' own sense of rights.

Incidentally, it was nothing other than the Japanese employment system that fundamentally supported workers' corporate consciousness and loyalty to their companies. Workers were able to become "corporate men" because they had the security of lifetime employment and were guaranteed or expected seniority-based wages and promotions within the company, i.e., advancement in one's career. However, since the 1990s, with the advent of the age of economic globalization and the spread of "market economy" advocated by the United States, companies have been exposed to fierce competition for survival. For this reason, companies have sought to concentrate management resources and build efficient and profitable structures, and while they have engaged in layoffs and wage cuts in the name of so-called "restructuring," they have also hired non-regular workers such as temporary workers and announced a shift to a performance-based wage system and a total labor force system.

The implementation of such rationalization policies in companies is in effect destroying the Japanese employment system, and as workers' expectations and trust in their companies fade, corporate consciousness is also greatly shaken.

At the same time, there has been a trend among workers, particularly those in their 30s and 40s, to break away from corporate mentality in recent years. Not only do they protest against so-called "equality of results," but they also affirm merit-based and performance-based systems and demand wages commensurate with them, and there is a growing tendency for them to strive independently for career development or to change jobs in search of better treatment. For example, according to a survey by the Japan Institute for Labor Policy and Training, 43.7% of men and 54.9% of women are considering changing jobs because they value better conditions or aptitude (Survey on personnel treatment systems and occupational attitudes under structural adjustment, 1998).

Amid fierce "market competition" between companies in the global economy, corporate consciousness is rapidly fading due to a combination of factors such as the virtual collapse of the Japanese employment system within companies, the government's policy of increasing employment fluidity and diversification of employment types, a decrease in labor union membership due to layoffs, and a decline in trust in enterprise unions.How to build an equal and independent relationship between employers and employees within companies has become a challenge for both labor and management.

[Kenji Yoshida]

"A Study on Corporate Belonging Theory" (1978), edited and published by the All Japan Management Federation's Human Ability Development Center; "The Economics of Job Change" (2001, Toyo Keizai Inc.), edited by Takenori Inoki and the Research Institute for Integrated Living.

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

おもに本工・正社員などの常用労働者が勤務先の企業に対してもつ一体意識。企業帰属意識ともいわれ、労働者の階級意識や組合意識に対比される用語。狭義に、労働者の企業に対する忠誠心や、労働者の雇用と生活は企業の存続と繁栄によって確保されるという考え方をさす場合もある。

　労働者にとって企業とは、雇用契約を結んで労働に従事し、給与その他の所得を得て生活を維持する場である。したがって企業における経営状態は、労働者における労働条件や雇用それ自体と直結する場合が多く、「会社あっての労働者」「会社あっての組合」など、なんらかの程度で労働者が企業との関係において自己の存在を一体的に意識するか、企業活動を自らの生活や組合に優先させて行う態度がみられる。「企業戦士」とか「会社人間」などのことばは、このことを典型的に示すものである。

　こうした企業意識は、個人主義が徹底し、産業別組合や職種別の組合など企業の枠を超えた横断組合が支配的な欧米諸国においては少なく、企業別組合が支配的な日本において顕著にみられる。とくに日本の大企業の労働者においては、企業への一体感と組合への一体感の両者が並存して調和する「二重帰属型」の意識が強く出ていて、一つの特徴をなしている。

　日本の労働者にこのような企業意識が醸成される理由としては、
(1) 終身雇用の慣行、年功賃金・昇進など日本的雇用制度（年功的労使関係）の存在、
(2) 第一次世界大戦以来の経営家族主義的なイデオロギーや、第二次世界大戦中における「労資一体」「労働報国」を理念とした産業報国運動の展開、
(3) 日本では労働市場が企業ごとに封鎖され、労働組合も企業別組合として事実上、経営組織と癒着ないし一体化していて労働者と組合の独立性が保持しにくい、
(4) 企業福祉の充実や、労務政策の一環として使用者側からのヒューマン・リレーションズ（人間関係論）における帰属意識の重視と企業忠誠意識の鼓舞、
などがあげられる。

　とくにヒューマン・リレーションズの導入においては、使用者側は、先端技術導入の受け入れや労働スキル（技術）の向上だけでなく、精神因子までも包摂することを求め、生産性の向上を内発させ、促すものとして、「愛社心」「企業防衛」「労使一体」「経営参加」などのスローガンをたてて、労働者に企業意識の浸透を図ってきた。

　企業意識の問題をどう理解するかについては多方面からのアプローチがあるが、企業意識の醸成が、企業に対する労働者の忠誠心を高め、生産性向上に労働者を動員し、労使関係においても長期にわたって安定要因になるという点では、使用者にとって好ましい心理である。他方、労働組合の視点で理解した場合、労働者の階級意識を弱め、その統一を妨げることに作用するだけでなく、組合分裂や御用組合化のきっかけとなる。

　このような労使の「運命共同体」的な心理を基礎とする企業意識の克服は、久しく日本労働運動における大きな課題とされ、労働組合サイドからは、産業別組合への脱皮のなかで解決されるとか、労働者の資本・経営からの独立とか、労働者自らの権利意識の向上に努めるべきである、などの課題が指摘されてきた。

　ところで、労働者の企業意識や愛社精神を支えていたのは基本的に日本的雇用制度にほかならない。労働者に終身雇用という安心感があり、企業内において年功賃金・昇進＝立身出世が保障ないし期待されるからこそ、労働者は「企業人間」になりえたのである。ところが1990年代以降、経済におけるグローバル化の時代を迎えて、アメリカが唱導する「市場主義」が展開されると、企業は生き残りをかけた激しい競争にさらされた。このため企業は、経営資源の集中を図って効率・収益体質の構築に努め、いわゆる「リストラ」の名による解雇や賃金カットの一方で、派遣労働者など非正規労働者を雇い、賃金も成果主義や総量労働制の賃金制度への移行を打ち出している。

　このような企業における合理化政策の実施は事実上、日本的雇用制度を崩すものとなっていて、労働者の会社に対する期待と信頼が薄れるなかで、企業意識も大きく揺らいでいる。

　同時に、労働者の側においても、近年はとくに30～40歳代の中堅の労働者に企業意識からの脱皮を目ざす動きがみられる。彼らは、いわゆる「結果平等」に異を唱えるだけでなく、成果主義や実力主義を肯定してこれに見合う賃金を要求する一方、自立的にキャリア開発に努め、あるいはより高い処遇を求めて転身を図る傾向が強まっている。たとえば日本労働研究機構の調査によれば、よりよい条件や適性を重視して転職を考えている労働者は、男性で43.7％、女性では54.9％にも及んでいる（『構造調整下の人事処遇制度と職業意識に関する調査』1998年）。

　グローバル経済下における企業間の熾烈(しれつ)な「市場競争」のもと、企業における日本的雇用制度の事実上の崩壊、政府による雇用流動化政策や雇用形態の多様化、解雇に伴う労働組合員の減少、さらには企業別組合に対する信頼感の減退などと重なって、企業意識は急速に薄れており、企業において使用者と労働者の対等で自立的な関係をどう構築するかは労使双方の課題となっている。

［吉田健二］

『全日本能率連盟人間能力開発センター編・刊『企業帰属意識論の研究』（1978）』▽『猪木武徳・連合総合生活研究所編『「転職」の経済学』（2001・東洋経済新報社）』

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