Colonial Industrialization and Labor in Korea: The Onoda Cement Factory

Harvard East Asian Monographs #181

by Soon-Won Park

This book is a study of labor relations and the first generation of skilled workers in colonial Korea, a subject crucial to the understanding of modernization in twentieth-century Korea. Born in rural Korea, these workers confronted both the colonial experience and the modern workplace as they interacted with Japanese managers and workers.

223 pages, Hardcover

First published August 31, 1999

Reviews

[Ivan]

A precise and thorough study of the advent of modernity and the transformation of the Korean society from a feodal and agricultural to an industrial one. The shocking point is: after the liberation of the Korean peninsula in 1945 there was only one cement production engineer in the whole Korean nation. Talk about "glass ceiling".

[Benemint]

Very useful information. Read Ch.1 for basic facts regarding labor issues in colonial Korea. But overall there is veeery little effort to present raw data and anecdotes in a readable way. It feels like the book is still a manuscript.