Restructuring the Capitalist Labour Process: Some Lessons from the Car Industry

Raphael Kaplinsky

Cambridge Journal of Economics, 1988, vol. 12, issue 4, 451-70

Abstract: This paper examines the evolution of the capitalist labor process. The inherited Fordist structure involves the specialization and deskilling of work, the standardization of output, and the application of F. W. Taylor's top-down managerial approach. Through a case study of the Japanese car industry, a new form of capitalist work-organization is described, involving multitasking and multiskilling two-way flows of information, worker responsibility for quality, and flexibility. There is a strong contrast between inventory control in both forms of work-organization. The paper also considers the transfer of the new labor process to other countries. Copyright 1988 by Oxford University Press.

Date: 1988
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