Labour unions emerged in Japan in the second half of the Meiji period, after 1890, as the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization. Until 1945, however, the labour movement remained weak, impeded by a lack of legal rights, anti-union legislation, management-organized factory councils, and political divisions between “cooperative” and radical unionists. The labour movement went through a process of reorganization from 1987 to 1991 from which emerged the present configuration of three major labour union federations, along with other smaller national union organizations.