Technological Phases in the
Development of Capitalism
Fordism, Sloanism and Taylorism and
Post-Fordism
W. Robert Needham
Technological changes come
at us as mediums carrying messages,
according to McLuhan and as gales of creative destruction
according to Schumpter.
We are concerned with
technology for it is a material means of production and existence, and it is a
cultural construction and it is a political-economic construction. The notion
of system is integral to this.[1] So it is
important to think of technological systems and their built in values as those
of the economic and social system in which we live. The economic and social
system in which we live is dominated by one bottom line value, profit.[2] In fact unconstrained liberty, inequality and competition figure into this as background
operational values for the economic system. Profit is to be obtained generally
by the control of technical efficiency, as measured say, by output per person,
N/Q, and that implies direct control of labour and indirectly (through labour)
control of society, by those who own and control the means of material
production, or existence.[3]
The Timing of Major Technological
Phases—one specification
|
1. 1750-1830
- The First Industrial Revolution: based around cotton and pig iron
technologies, and generally mechanical inventions; In US 1794 marks Eli Whitney’s patent of cotton gin and, in
making cotton more profitable, led to extension of slave labour. 2. 1830s -
The Early Victorian Period: based on steam power and low cost coal (the First
IR merges with Second IR about 1850) 3. 1880s-1890s
- the Late Victorian Period: based on low cost steel and on engineering based
on steel. Large corporations emerge— U.S. Steel, General
Electric, and Bayer AG added to the list of the railroad companies 4. 1930s-1970s – Fordism: electro-mechanical
engineering, electronics, oil and petro chemicals, auto and truck
transportation 5. 1980s -
Post Fordism:
micro-electronics, bio-technology and new materials. "...computers and
global networks of digital communication, some associated with production,
some with distribution and some with marketing and consumption." (Canada in the Global
Village, Module II, Overview) |
A number of items in the above table require
elaboration. First, the notion of the Industrial Revolution.[4]
The Industrial Revolution meant changes in the social relations between
employees (workers) and employers (capitalists) in the late 18th and early 19th
centuries. There were preceding and accompanying changes in agriculture (the
enclosure system) and handicraft industry (the putting-out system).
The Industrial Revolution meant a generalized factory
system and the factory system made possible the on-site control of the labour
process (including who should work, how long they should work, and how hard
they should work). Later changes in mechanical techniques resulting from
invention and innovations led to constant reorganization of the labour process
and provided even greater control over labour. Wage slavery in industry added
to labour slavery in cotton and wherever else slave labour was practiced.
Taken together these innovations in how things were done around here in
agriculture and in industry worked to dispossess workers of rights of control
(ownership and access to) the means of existence, the production process and
the product of their work leaving them with only the necessity (that is
encumbered by the necessity) to sell their time on earth and labour power for a
wage.
The differentia
specifica of capitalism that it is a system with waged labour as the
dominant mode of production -- in class terms meant the worker had become a
commodity at the beck and call of the capitalist and open to the instability
and alienation of market forces. Though the rhetoric has it that the world is
free and that there are free labour markets, comparatively it was the
capitalist that was truly 'free,' for the capitalist was 'encumbered by
ownership' and all the rights and privileges of control over other people that
this allowed.
The second main feature of the above table are the
concepts Fordism and Fordist. These are attributed to the period 1930s-1970s.
Fordist techniques are normally associated with assembly line methods.
Generally, however, Fordism should be taken to mean a technological and social
control system. Fordism implies large economies of scale, organized corporate
capitalism, mass production, mass consumption, and the so-called building block
industries that are listed under point: 4 in the above table.
“The social
institutions of mass production --- collectively referred to as Fordism ---
began to emerge in the US early in the twentieth century and were at the center
of a decades-long process of social struggle which extended into the immediate
post-World War II era. Cold War ideology played a crucial role in the political
stabilization of Fordist institutions in the US, providing the common ground on
which de-radicalized industrial labor unions could be incorporated as junior
partners in a coalition of globally-oriented social forces which worked
together to rebuild the "free world" along liberal capitalist lines
and to resist the encroachment of a presumed Communist menace globally and at
home. Institutionalized Fordism, in turn, enabled the US to contribute almost
half of world industrial production in the immediate postwar years, and thus
provided the economic dynamism necessary to spark reconstruction of the major
capitalist countries after World War II, and to support the emergence of both
the consumer society and the military-industrial complex in the postwar US.”[5]
Taylorism -- a term that is to be linked to Fordism
-- means capitalist control of production and the employment of labour through
'scientifically' controlled factory and assembly line methods.
“Under Taylor's
management system, factories are managed through scientific methods rather than
by use of the empirical "rule of thumb" so widely prevalent in the
days of the late nineteenth century when F. W. Taylor devised his system and
published "Scientific Management" in 1911.”[6]
Sloanism -- refers to the introduction of annual model
changes, as introduced, for example, at General Motors' Chevrolet plants. For
comparison, the early Ford Motor Company products were of a single model over a
number of years.
“The Great
Depression and a saturated market brought on a decline in car sales. Alfred
Sloan, head of GM in the 30s introduced the concepts of the upgrade and variety
marketing. 1. The ‘upgrade’: Automobiles would change each year (as well as
become more expensive) by introducing new styling and comfort features,
encouraging consumers to trade in their old cars with greater frequency. The
number of standard body types was reduced to three, and emphasis shifted to
appearance. An “Art and Color” division was established within the company,
which introduced such changing features as “the Sculptured Design,” “the
Brightly Colored Body,” and “the Low, Lean Look.” 2. Variety Marketing: the
market was diversified and particular models were aimed at particular classes
of consumers. Sloanism marked the beginning of post-Fordist era, when marketing
began to dominate the process of production. GM’s method of marketing became a
worldwide model by which business could create and nourish demand. Sloanism
continues to be essential to the workings of our late-capitalist economy. In
the Post-Fordist era society is no longer structured in terms of classes that
are determined with respect to labour and production. Now society is structure
in terms of consumer classes, i.e. now it’s not where you work but where you
shop that determines your place within the social structure. The aesthetization of waste: Along with
upgrades and vareity marketing an aesthetization of waste has helps to propel
our economy. Images of disposing, destruction and waste (car crashes, changing
styles). Through media imagery we have been trained to accept and laud waste
and disposal. And thus we readily accept the imperative to throw out what we
have and replace it with the newest version. The ever-mounting glut of waste materials is a characteristic
by-product of modern "consumer society". It might even be argued that
capitalism's continual need to find or generate markets means that disposal and
waste have becomes the spine of the system (Stuart Ewen, All Consuming Images, 1988)” [7]
The annual model change can be seen as the historical
predecessor of what is now referred to in post-Fordist
jargon as flexible production-in which commodities may be customized quickly
with computer assisted techniques. Thus, as the jargon gas it: CIM -- means
Computer Integrated Manufacture; CAD -- means Computer Aided Design; and CAM –
means Computer Aided Manufacture.
The post-Fordist regime of technological change may be
said to be characterized as economies 'of scope' rather than 'of scale.'
Economies of scope imply small size and faster turn around, in production and
delivery -- that is of 'quick time.'
The building block industries of the post Fordist
regime are now those outlined in point 5 in the table. Each of these
technologies implies a massive reduction in labour requirements in both goods
and services producing sectors. But the service sector cannot be expected to
absorb all the people who are released from goods production.
Moreover, micro-electronics will diminish the importance
of geographic separation and problems of time and space; social space and
social relationships will alter as geographically separated people connect with
machines and with each other in almost instantaneous time.
Many people in the close proximity of the geographical
space of large cities will encounter vast social space, be lonely, deprived,
dispossessed and alienated for the want of community 'connectedness' and
purpose.
A Final Comment -- The Broad Sweep
to the Global -- Capitalist --Village:
There is a circular legitimating process that is
supposed to link production and consumption in capitalist economies. This
entails the mass consumption by growing populations of mass produced
commodities. In the production of commodities large union-dominated labour
forces are employed. Occasional instabilities in national systems are, or were
supposed to be, ironed out through Keynesian demand management techniques which
included fiscal and monetary policies and the welfare state.
But the system always requires markets and access to
new markets. (This is a contributing factor to the war economy in the US).
In the simplest of terms, since human needs are easily
met, a system with ever expanding productive capacity always requires new
outlets or markets for its products (or entrepreneurial talents). This
necessity leads to various ideas, the most important of which is that of
centralization of power and control. Then, an idea jump can be made to the
notion that “all wars are trade wars” and that wars are meant to assure access
to and centralized control by the centre of the system over the outlying parts
of the empire. (Back cast through the wars of the last two or three hundred
years to find a rough validation of the assertion).
The next idea jump is to the nation state being the
problem in so far as it fetters and constrains business. The next jump is to
globalization and its ism and that
the people of the earth, in all their diversity, are being controlled and
homogenized (at least the attempt is being made) on terms and values defined by
the corporate sector through economic constitutions such as FTA, NAFTA (and,
they had hoped, MAI) and centre imposed wars on the periphery.
Globalism
and corporatism have the problem of being associated with fascism.
“It was actually Italian philosopher
Giovanni Gentile who wrote the entry in the Encyclopedia Italiana that said:
‘Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is a merger
of state and corporate power.’ Mussolini, however, affixed his name to the
entry, and claimed credit for it.”[8]
The great error of nearly all studies of
war... has been to consider war as an episode in foreign policies, when it is
an act of interior politics...
~Simone Weil
Some Other Sources:
Bernal, J. D.
[1953] (1970). Science and Industry in
the Nineteenth Century. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press).
Hobsbawm, E.
J. (1999). Industry and Empire:
From 1750 to the Present Day, rev. and updated with Chris Wrigley, 2nd ed.,
(New York: New Press).
Kranzberg, Melvin, and
Carroll W. Pursell, Jr. (eds.) (1967). Technology
in Western Civilization, 2 vols., (New York: Oxford University Press).
Landes, David
(2003). The Unbound Prometheus: Technical
Change and Industrial Development in Western Europe from 1750 to the Present,
2nd ed., (New York: Cambridge University Press.
The Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/scottishhistory/enlightenment/features_enlightenment_industry.shtml
The First Industrial Revolution:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial--_revolution
The Second Industrial Revolution:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Industrial_Revolution
Naomi Klien, No Logo: Taking
Aim at the Brand Bullies, — an account of the global effects of Sloanism
and marketing.
Anti-War Quotes: http://antiwar.com/quotes.php
[1] See the PE Table: http://economics.uwaterloo.ca/needhdata/PETable1.pdf
[2] Profit as the Root of All
Evil: The Devil is in the Details:
http://economics.uwaterloo.ca/needhdata/ProfitChart.pdf
[3] If this is the case why on earth do we allow the means of existence to be owned privately?
[4] See Industrial Revolution:
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/modsbook14.html
[5] Mark Rupert, Fordism: http://faculty.maxwell.syr.edu/merupert/Research/Fordism/fordism.htm
[6] Vincenzo Sandrone, Taylorism, F. W. Taylor & Scientific
Management: http://www.quality.org/TQM-MSI/taylor.html
[7] Sloanism;
http://www.yorku.ca/kathy/style/sloanism.html
[8] Thom Hartmann, Reclaiming
The Issues: Islamic Or Republican Fascism?
http://baltimorechronicle.com/2006/090306HARTMANN.shtml