Hyundai is falling behind its Japanese and Western rivals

THE OFFICES of the Asan car suppliers’ union resemble a bygone era. Walls are decorated with fading photographs of past protests. Cigarette smoke wafts from the foyer, where workers in overalls lounge on battered sofas enjoying a break between shifts. Most are well into middle age. Do Sung-dae, the union’s boss—shock of grey hair, horn-rimmed glasses, waistcoat heavy with pins supporting various causes—is locked in a struggle with Yoosung Enterprise, a parts-maker that employs its members in Asan, an industrial city south of the capital, Seoul.