Phenomenon of Union Exhaustion: Is There a ‘Third Way’ for Trade Unionism in Hong Kong?

By Ng Sek Hong and Olivia Ip

Trade unions in Hong Kong face challenges to their conventional role, as the economy of the region alters.

With the reversion to China and 'late urbanism', the rise of atypical employment and the increasingly transient nature of the workplace, government and business are struggling with changes, so unions are in a difficult position.

Hong Kong unions have taken strategic moves and seem to be restructuring and evolving a functional role in organising the neighbourhood community as a type of 'third sector' organisation outside and in parallel to their conventional occupational domain.

(Journal of Industrial Relations. vol. 45, no. 3, September 2003)