초국적기업의 구조조정과 초국적 각축장: 한국지엠 구조조정 사례 연구

This article deals with the restructuring process of GM Korea in 2018 on the basis of approach to emphasize the politics and power of subsidiaries in the study of transnational corporations. To this end, I analyzed the systemic, micro-political, and institutional power of GM Korea as a source of political action of subsidiaries. GM, which has been revived since its bankruptcy in 2009, is revising its managerial objective to focus on profitability rather than sales volume, which is causing global restructuring of subsidiaries around the world. These GM restructuring policies have caused to conflicts and negotiations between the state and the parent company and between the union and the parent company. In the process of restructuring, the power of GM Korea has weakened overall. The weakening of each power is attributed to the weakening of the hierarchy in the GM production value chain (systemic power), weakening of the ability to mobilize union members and weakening of the government-union partnership (micro-political power), and the weakening of management intervention devices (institutional power). Although restructuring has weakened the subsidiary power of GM Korea, this process has also raised the significance of subsidiary power and evoking the political nature of transnational corporate relations and its implications.