Fordism and Mass Consumption Society

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Fordism and Mass Consumption Society

• IPE II Lecture 2
• The French Regulation School

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The Response to 9/11?
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Lecture Outline

• REGULATION THEORY
• TAYLORISM
• THE FORDIST FACTORY
• NATIONAL FORDISM
• INTERNATIONAL FORDISM

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Theoretical Antecedents

• Neo-classical - ahistorical universalism of
  rational utility maximisers
• Marxism - capitalism contradictory and crisis
  prone. But insensitivity to change and variety?
• Institutionalism there is no such thing as a
  self regulating market (Polanyi 1944). Markets
  need social and institutional foundations and
  mediations. Markets are historically and
  spatially situated.

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Guiding Problematic

• Capitalism lacks the capacity to convert the
  clash of individual interests into a coherent
  global system and, is a force for change with
  no inherent regulatory principle. (Aglietta
  1998 49, 62)
• Why do societies founded on competition and
  conflict no lead to chaos?

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Conceptual Lens

• Regime of accumulation - compatibility between
  accumulation and social progress (cohesion?)
• due to the implementation of evolving
  institutional architectures
• Mode of Regulation - systems of mediation to
  temporarily ameliorate the conflicts, tensions,
  imbalances and contradictions capital
  accumulation unleashes and to translate
  accumulation into social and economic progress

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Taylorisation of the Labour process
Frederick Taylor - Principles of Scientific
Management (1911)
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Alienation

• "This work pig-iron handling is
• so crude and elementary in its nature that the
  writer firmly believes that it would
• be possible to train an intelligent gorilla so as
  to become a more efficient pig-iron
• handler than any man could be.
• (Taylor 1911 40)

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The Rise of Fordism

• The Model T Ford

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The Fordist Factory

• Socialisation of actual work - Conveyor Belt
  1913
• Socialisation of wage-nexus - 5 day
• Socialisation of labour representation Outlaw
  Trade Unions, Company feudalism
• Socialisation of reproduction - Moral
  Fortification of Labour

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The Wage-Labour Nexus

• Competitive, when workers' consumption is not
  inserted in capitalist production.
• Taylorian, when the organisation of work enables
  mass production, without this profoundly
  modifying the life style of employees.
• Fordist, which combines the development of
  consumption norms and production norms

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Institutionalisation of Reproduction

• 'The collective is deposited in each individual
  in the form of enduring dispositions such as
  mental structures' (Bourdieu, 1980 29).
• - Sobriety
• - The New Priests? Company Social Worker
• the new type of man demanded by the
  rationalisation of production and work cannot be
  developed until the sexual instinct has been
  suitably regulated and until it too has been
  rationalised (Gramsci 1971 297)

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National Fordism and the New Deal 1933-38

• Generalised mass production economy,
  marginalisation of workshop production
• Keynesian demand management.
• Productivity-led collective bargaining,
  marginalisation of radical workers (function of
  anti-communism, Red scares)
• Advertising culture, Prohibition (US 1920-33,
  USSR 1914-25, Norway 1916-27)

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US Fordism

• Public Works Administration
• National Housing Act
• National Labour Relations Act
• Agricultural Adjustment Act
• National Youth Administration
• Social Security Act
• National Recovery Act

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International Fordism

• 1948 Marshall Plan or Marshall Offensive (van
  der Pijl 1984)
• Reconstruction of Europe
• Keynesian Reflation
• Re-making of European Social Relations in line
  with American priorities (e.g. anti-communism)

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European Fordism

• Keynesian plumbing. Demand Management
• Collective Bargaining
• Welfare State
• Redistributive Tax System
• Unemployment and Pensions guarantee capacity to
  consume

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The Crisis of Fordism

• the slowdown in the growth of productivity and
  the efficiency of capital
• the internationalization of production
• financial globalization
• increase in individualism and the associated
  erosion of solidarity
• and the erosion of the autonomy of nation-states

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After the trente glorieuses

• Post Fordism or
• Global Fordism?