Fabi
14th June 2002, 00:41
I found this quite enjoyable to prove the people wrong who think that capitalism is inherently effective. have fun reading...
"As an illustration we will use the "Pilot Program" conducted by General Electric between 1968 and 1972.
General Electric proposed the "Pilot Program" as a means of overcoming the problems they faced with introducing Numeric Control (N/C) machinery into its plant at Lynn River Works, Massachusetts. Faced with rising tensions on the shop floor, bottle-necks in production and low-quantity products, GE management tried a scheme of "job enrichment" based on workers' control of production in one area of the plant. By June 1970 the workers' involved were "on their own" (as one manager put it) and "[i]n terms of group job enlargement this was when the Pilot Project really began, with immediate results in increased output and machine utilisation, and a reduction on manufacturing losses. As one union official remarked two years later, 'The fact that we broke down a traditional policy of GE [that the union could never have a hand in managing the business] was in itself satisfying, especially when we could throw success up to them to boot.'" [David Noble, Forces of Production, p. 295]
The project, after some initial scepticism, proved to be a great success with the workers involved. Indeed, other workers in the factory desired to be included and the union soon tried to get it spread throughout the plant and into other GE locations. The success of the scheme was that it was based on workers' managing their own affairs rather than being told what to do by their bosses -- "We are human beings," said one worker, "and want to be treated as such." [quoted by Noble, Op. Cit., p. 292] To be fully human means to be free to govern oneself in all aspects of life, including production.
However, just after a year of the workers being given control over their working lives, management stopped the project. Why? "In the eyes of some management supporters of the 'experiment,' the Pilot Program was terminated because management as a whole refused to give up any of its traditional authority . . . [t]he Pilot Program foundered on the basic contradiction of capitalist production: Who's running the shop?" [Noble, Op. Cit., p. 318]
Noble goes on to argue that to GE's top management, "the union's desire to extend the program appeared as a step toward greater workers control over production and, as such, a threat to the traditional authority rooted in private ownership of the means of production. Thus the decision to terminate represented a defence not only of the prerogatives of production supervisors and plant managers but also of the power vested in property ownership." [Ibid.] Noble notes that this result was not an isolated case and that the "demise of the GE Pilot Program followed the typical pattern for such 'job enrichment experiments'" [Op. Cit., p. 320] Even though "[s]everal dozen well-documented experiments show that productivity increases and social problems decrease when workers participant in the work decisions affecting their lives" [Department of Health, Education and Welfare study quoted by Noble, Op. Cit., p. 322] such schemes are ended by bosses seeking to preserve their own power, the power that flows from private property.
As one worker in the GE Pilot Program stated, "[w]e just want to be left alone." They were not -- capitalist social relations prohibit such a possibility (as Noble correctly notes, "the 'way of life' for the management meant controlling the lives of others" [Op. Cit., p. 294 and p. 300]). In spite of improved productivity, projects in workers' control are scrapped because they undermined both the power of the capitalists -- and by undermining their power, you potentially undermine their profits too ("If we're all one, for manufacturing reasons, we must share in the fruits equitably, just like a co-op business." [GE Pilot Program worker, quoted by Noble, Op. Cit., p. 295]).
As we argue in more detail in section J.5.12, profit maximisation can work against efficiency, meaning that capitalism can harm the overall economy by promoting less efficient production techniques (i.e. hierarchical ones against egalitarian ones) because it is in the interests of capitalists to do so and the capitalist market rewards that behaviour. This is because, ultimately, profits are unpaid labour. If you empower labour, give workers' control over their work then they will increase efficiency and productivity (they know how to do their job the best) but you also erode authority structures within the workplace. Workers' will seek more and more control (freedom naturally tries to grow) and this, as the Pilot Program worker clearly saw, implies a co-operative workplace in which workers', not managers, decide what to do with the surplus produced. By threatening power, you threaten profits (or, more correctly, who controls the profit and where it goes). With the control over production and who gets to control any surplus in danger, it is unsurprising that companies soon abandon such schemes and return to the old, less efficient, hierarchical schemes based on "Do what you are told, for as long as you are told." Such a regime is hardly fit for free people and, as Noble notes, the regime that replaced the GE Pilot Program was "designed to 'break' the pilots of their new found 'habits' of self-reliance, self-discipline, and self-respect." [Op. Cit., p. 307]
"
mainly i want to point at the cooperative i.e. non-hierachiecal order which in fact, in this example as well in as in others, happens to be very effective. i chose this example since GM carried it out and so it doesnt seem too easy to just dismiss it as leftist propaganda...
(oh yeah... here's the source: http://www.infoshop.org/faq/secB4.html#secb43 )
"As an illustration we will use the "Pilot Program" conducted by General Electric between 1968 and 1972.
General Electric proposed the "Pilot Program" as a means of overcoming the problems they faced with introducing Numeric Control (N/C) machinery into its plant at Lynn River Works, Massachusetts. Faced with rising tensions on the shop floor, bottle-necks in production and low-quantity products, GE management tried a scheme of "job enrichment" based on workers' control of production in one area of the plant. By June 1970 the workers' involved were "on their own" (as one manager put it) and "[i]n terms of group job enlargement this was when the Pilot Project really began, with immediate results in increased output and machine utilisation, and a reduction on manufacturing losses. As one union official remarked two years later, 'The fact that we broke down a traditional policy of GE [that the union could never have a hand in managing the business] was in itself satisfying, especially when we could throw success up to them to boot.'" [David Noble, Forces of Production, p. 295]
The project, after some initial scepticism, proved to be a great success with the workers involved. Indeed, other workers in the factory desired to be included and the union soon tried to get it spread throughout the plant and into other GE locations. The success of the scheme was that it was based on workers' managing their own affairs rather than being told what to do by their bosses -- "We are human beings," said one worker, "and want to be treated as such." [quoted by Noble, Op. Cit., p. 292] To be fully human means to be free to govern oneself in all aspects of life, including production.
However, just after a year of the workers being given control over their working lives, management stopped the project. Why? "In the eyes of some management supporters of the 'experiment,' the Pilot Program was terminated because management as a whole refused to give up any of its traditional authority . . . [t]he Pilot Program foundered on the basic contradiction of capitalist production: Who's running the shop?" [Noble, Op. Cit., p. 318]
Noble goes on to argue that to GE's top management, "the union's desire to extend the program appeared as a step toward greater workers control over production and, as such, a threat to the traditional authority rooted in private ownership of the means of production. Thus the decision to terminate represented a defence not only of the prerogatives of production supervisors and plant managers but also of the power vested in property ownership." [Ibid.] Noble notes that this result was not an isolated case and that the "demise of the GE Pilot Program followed the typical pattern for such 'job enrichment experiments'" [Op. Cit., p. 320] Even though "[s]everal dozen well-documented experiments show that productivity increases and social problems decrease when workers participant in the work decisions affecting their lives" [Department of Health, Education and Welfare study quoted by Noble, Op. Cit., p. 322] such schemes are ended by bosses seeking to preserve their own power, the power that flows from private property.
As one worker in the GE Pilot Program stated, "[w]e just want to be left alone." They were not -- capitalist social relations prohibit such a possibility (as Noble correctly notes, "the 'way of life' for the management meant controlling the lives of others" [Op. Cit., p. 294 and p. 300]). In spite of improved productivity, projects in workers' control are scrapped because they undermined both the power of the capitalists -- and by undermining their power, you potentially undermine their profits too ("If we're all one, for manufacturing reasons, we must share in the fruits equitably, just like a co-op business." [GE Pilot Program worker, quoted by Noble, Op. Cit., p. 295]).
As we argue in more detail in section J.5.12, profit maximisation can work against efficiency, meaning that capitalism can harm the overall economy by promoting less efficient production techniques (i.e. hierarchical ones against egalitarian ones) because it is in the interests of capitalists to do so and the capitalist market rewards that behaviour. This is because, ultimately, profits are unpaid labour. If you empower labour, give workers' control over their work then they will increase efficiency and productivity (they know how to do their job the best) but you also erode authority structures within the workplace. Workers' will seek more and more control (freedom naturally tries to grow) and this, as the Pilot Program worker clearly saw, implies a co-operative workplace in which workers', not managers, decide what to do with the surplus produced. By threatening power, you threaten profits (or, more correctly, who controls the profit and where it goes). With the control over production and who gets to control any surplus in danger, it is unsurprising that companies soon abandon such schemes and return to the old, less efficient, hierarchical schemes based on "Do what you are told, for as long as you are told." Such a regime is hardly fit for free people and, as Noble notes, the regime that replaced the GE Pilot Program was "designed to 'break' the pilots of their new found 'habits' of self-reliance, self-discipline, and self-respect." [Op. Cit., p. 307]
"
mainly i want to point at the cooperative i.e. non-hierachiecal order which in fact, in this example as well in as in others, happens to be very effective. i chose this example since GM carried it out and so it doesnt seem too easy to just dismiss it as leftist propaganda...
(oh yeah... here's the source: http://www.infoshop.org/faq/secB4.html#secb43 )