Labour in a global world : case studies from the white goods industry in africa, south america, ... east asia and europe

Our thanks are due to our colleagues Huw Beynon and Peter Fairbrother at the School of Social Sciences, Cardiff; to Lee Pegler who worked on the early stage of the project; to Tongqing Feng who helped us with our research in China; and in particular to Soonok Chun, who collaborated with us in conducting research in South Korea, which she was unfortunately unable to report on here because of illness. Chapter 8 draws in part on an article on Factory Regimes by Nichols et al in Work, Employment and Society, 18 (4). It also draws on some data from the British Workplace Employment Relations Survey and the help is acknowledged of the WERS Users Sub-Committee and the Data Archive, University of Essex for granting access to restricted and unrestrictive data respectively. We are grateful to the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth and to AB Electrolux for permission to reprint the 1930s Electrolux advertisement in Chapter 2. xi Preface This book had its origin in an earlier study, Global Management, Local Labour: Turkish Workers and Modern Industry, (Nichols and Sugur 2004). As its title suggests, this had been an attempt to investigate the modern corporate sector in one particular developing country, Turkey. Although the book ranged more widely than this, a key objective had been to examine the significance of modern management practices for workers in the developing world. The Turkish study had focused on three industries -automobiles textiles and white goods. After that study had been completed, the opportunity arose to explore further some of the issues with which it had been concerned. With the support of the ESRC, the attempt was made to embark on an explicit comparison between developing and developed economies with particular reference to one of the sectors, white goods, which compared to automobiles and textiles, has been largely ignored by social scientists, and thus to add an interesting comparative dimension to the work which had been conducted before. For this purpose, steps were taken to mount a comparison between the white goods industry in the UK and Australia, on one hand, and Brazil and Turkey on the other. An ulterior motive that informed this research design was that Nichols had discovered, through contact with Rob Lambert, an Australian academic and labour activist, who had been researching a white goods factory in Australia, that the factory employed, among others, immigrants from Turkey -and not only this, but that some of them had recently returned to Turkey where they had spied, for the Australian management, on the management techniques employed and the organisation of production in one on the very factories that had been the subject of the previous Turkish research. There was something about this which made a comparison that involved among other countries, Turkey and Australia, irresistible. Unfortunately, a comparison that included the Turkish and Australian factory was not to be. No sooner had the research begun, than the Australian factory was taken over and closed as part of the rationalisation that has swept the Australian industry in recent years. Moreover, it proved extremely difficult to gain access to any other Australian plant. The only prospect held out to us of conducting fieldwork in Australia came from a company that set the date for doing this so far in advance that it would have out-run the life of the project. The situation in the UK proved to be yet more difficult. After many, many months of trying to gain access, during which some managements refused point blank to even talk to us, and in which, in other cases, xii This book gets behind much generality implicit in the term 'globalisation'. It does so by focussing upon one particular sector, so-called white goods. Such goods - mainly represented here by refridgeration and cooking appliances - are a taken-for-granted part of many people's lives and the study of this sector permits close examination of world-wide similarities and differences in a concrete context. The book is based on original investigations of industry development and the nature of work in the white goods sector in China, Taiwan, South Korea, Brazil, Turkey, South Africa and the UK. As such, it provides a rich source of information on the conditions under which these commodities are produced in different countries. It makes a unique contribution, among other things, to the understanding of the impact of social structure on production relations; the nature of factory regimes; the role of the state in employee relations; the variable nature of trade unions; the diffusion of management methods and what these entail for workers; and more generally on the meaning of work "This book gets behind much generality implicit in the term 'globalisation'. It does so by focussing upon one particular sector, so-called white goods. Such goods - mainly represented here by refrigeration and cooking appliances - are a taken-for-granted part of many people's lives and the study of this sector permits close examination of world-wide similarities and differences in a concrete context. The book is based on original investigations of industry development and the nature of work in the white goods sector in China, Taiwan, South Korea, Brazil, Turkey, South Africa and the UK. It provides a source of information on the conditions under which these commodities are produced in different countries. It makes a unique contribution, among other things, to the understanding of the impact of social structure on production relations; the nature of factory regimes; the role of the state in employee relations; the variable nature of trade unions; the diffusion of management methods and what these entail for workers; and more generally on the meaning of work."--Jacket "This book offers a view of where British workplaces are heading during the first decade of the 21st century. Based on detailed evidence collected from managers at 2000 workplaces, it builds up a picture of the realities of change at work, which is by turns reassuring, alarming and disconcerting. The assessment begins with a review of the four major pressures for change upon organisations, then applies this framework to structure and explains the new trends emerging. These include, on the positive side, the growth of 'intelligent' flexibility, the renascence of corporate careers, and greater freedom from the office. But there is also a darker side, with Big Brother surveillance growing, family-friendly policies spluttering to a stop, a downsizing by no means dead. What then are the overall prospects for British employees? And is British business effectively managing to change? This book provides the authoritative answers."--Jacket Front Matter....Pages i-xviii The World of White Goods — Markets, Industry Structure and Dynamics....Pages 1-22 The View from the UK — Mature Markets, High Imports and Other Problems....Pages 23-56 South Africa, Swaziland and Zimbabwe — White Goods in Post-Colonial Societies: Markets, the State and Production....Pages 57-91 China — White Goods and the Capitalist Transformation....Pages 92-119 Taiwan: The Disappearance of the ‘Golden Tale’ — White Goods in a Changing Global Economy....Pages 120-143 Turkey: The Development of White Goods in the ‘EU Periphery’....Pages 144-172 Brazil: Between Global Trends and National Politics — Restructuring and Workers’ Responses....Pages 173-205 Labour in a Global World — Some Comparisons....Pages 206-238 Back Matter....Pages 239-244 This book gets behind much generality about globalisation to examine the production of relatively familiar commodities such as refrigerators and ovens in different countries. By considering a range of countries - China, Taiwan and South Korea, South Africa, Brazil and Turkey - it makes a substantive contribution to the understanding of the diffusion of management methods, the role of the state in employee relations, the nature of trade unionism and the impact of social structure on production relations. Increased longevity and better health are changing the nature of family life. The book provides unique insights into processes of change and continuity in family lives and the ways in which different generations of men and women make sense of their lives.