New Production Arrangements: The Totally Flexible Cage?

Patrick Dawson and Janette Webb
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Patrick Dawson: Graduate School of Management University of Adelaide Adelaide South Australia Australia 5001
Janette Webb: Department of Business Studies University of Edinburgh Edinburgh EH8 9JY

Work, Employment & Society, 1989, vol. 3, issue 2, 221-238

Abstract: This paper examines the management of innovation and change in two different operating units on a single site of a UK Division of a high technology US-owned multinational corporation. The transformation of work in changing from `production for stock' to `production to order' is analysed, and the process of changing established patterns of work (as a brownfield operation), and designing new production arrangements from the outset (as a greenfield operation) are contrasted and compared. The key features of Just-in-Time and Total Quality Control principles are identified and the extent to which they represent real inovations in production is assessed. The paper concludes with a critical discussion of the flexible specialisation debate through reappraising the empirical evidence, and concludes by rejecting the view that modern production arrangements signal the general enhancement of working life through a reversal of the division of labour, increased worker autonomy and greater employee involvement in production.

Date: 1989
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:woemps:v:3:y:1989:i:2:p:221-238

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