Fordism Detailed and Referenced
‘Fordism’
in Warner, M. & Poole M. (eds.)
International Encyclopaedia of Business and Management - Handbook of Human Resource Management
FORDISM 1. Overview 2. Introduction 3. Fordism as a Labour Process 4. Fordism as Socio-economic System 5. Post-Fordism 6. Conclusion
1. Overview
At its very simplest level, Fordism refers to the production methods utilised by Henry Ford in his car assembly plants at River Rouge and Highland Park in Detroit in the first two decades of the twentieth century. In these plants, Ford further developed both the American System of Manufacturing, consisting of the use of single purpose machinery; manufacture of standardised products; and the interchangeability of parts, and Taylorist scientific management. However, the most innovatory aspects of the Ford plants were the introduction of the moving, mechanised assembly line, the use of the firm’s sociology department to control worker behaviour and the introduction of the ‘Five-Dollar’ day. The application of Fordist techniques is not a universal phenomena but can only occur under certain social and economic conditions such the presence of mass consumption, Keynesian economic regulation and widespread State economic intervention.
1. Introduction
It is difficult to over estimate the importance to the process of manufacturing the innovations and changes introduced at Ford’s Detroit factories between 1910 and 1915 and their later incorporation into the business practice of organizations throughout the Western world. By producing the Model T and ‘diffusing of the techniques’ of mass production, ‘Fordism’, a concept which encompasses both the Ford production system and its parallel system of labour relations, may be said to have ‘changed the world’. (Hounsell, 1984: 218).Whilst it may be the case that the introduction of Japanese production techniques is restructuring the labour process in major industrial sectors such as that of automotives
in Warner, M. & Poole M. (eds.)
International Encyclopaedia of Business and Management - Handbook of Human Resource Management
FORDISM 1. Overview 2. Introduction 3. Fordism as a Labour Process 4. Fordism as Socio-economic System 5. Post-Fordism 6. Conclusion
1. Overview
At its very simplest level, Fordism refers to the production methods utilised by Henry Ford in his car assembly plants at River Rouge and Highland Park in Detroit in the first two decades of the twentieth century. In these plants, Ford further developed both the American System of Manufacturing, consisting of the use of single purpose machinery; manufacture of standardised products; and the interchangeability of parts, and Taylorist scientific management. However, the most innovatory aspects of the Ford plants were the introduction of the moving, mechanised assembly line, the use of the firm’s sociology department to control worker behaviour and the introduction of the ‘Five-Dollar’ day. The application of Fordist techniques is not a universal phenomena but can only occur under certain social and economic conditions such the presence of mass consumption, Keynesian economic regulation and widespread State economic intervention.
1. Introduction
It is difficult to over estimate the importance to the process of manufacturing the innovations and changes introduced at Ford’s Detroit factories between 1910 and 1915 and their later incorporation into the business practice of organizations throughout the Western world. By producing the Model T and ‘diffusing of the techniques’ of mass production, ‘Fordism’, a concept which encompasses both the Ford production system and its parallel system of labour relations, may be said to have ‘changed the world’. (Hounsell, 1984: 218).Whilst it may be the case that the introduction of Japanese production techniques is restructuring the labour process in major industrial sectors such as that of automotives
References: Brenner, R and Glick, M (1991). ‘The Regulation Approach: Theory and History’ New Left Review 188, July/August 1991. (Theoretical critique of regulation theory, particularly the work of Aglietta) Gramsci, A (1978) ‘Americanism and Fordism’ in Hoare, Q Noon, M and Blyton, P. (1997) The Realities of Work London: McMillan (Analyses of skill, gender, practices of ‘making out’ and emotional labour in the contemporary workplace) Phillimore, A.J Thompson, P and McHugh, D (1995) Work Organizations: A Critical Introduction London: Macmillan (Standard textbook on the development of different forms of working practices) Warner, M Williams, K., Cutler, T., Williams, J. and Haslam, C. (1987) ‘The end of mass production?’, Economy and Society, 16 (3): 405-439. Womack, J., Jones, D. and Roos, D. (1990) The Machine That Changed the World New York: Macmillan. (Prescriptive and atheoretical account of the Toyota production system and its application across all sectors of industry).