Akira Yamagishi (山岸 章, Yamagishi Akira, 18 July 1929 – 10 April 2016) was a Japanese trade union leader who served as the first president of the Japanese Trade Union Confederation from 1989 to 1994.
Born in Osaka, Yamagishi began working in a telegram office, and joined the Japan Telecommunications Workers' Union.
[1] Yamagishi concentrated on making international and national links between unions.
In 1989, he was a leading figure in bringing together the public- and private-sector unions in Japan, forming the Japanese Trade Union Confederation (Rengo), and serving as its first president.
He cooperated with LDP defector Ichiro Ozawa to bring about a non-LDP and non-JCP coalition cabinet led by Morihiro Hosokawa in 1993, persuading the initially reluctant socialists to support the coalition.