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What Machines Can't Do: Politics and Technology in the Industrial Enterprise

What Machines Can't Do: Politics and Technology in the Industrial Enterprise


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About the Book

Virtually every manufacturing company has plans for an automated "factory of the future." But Robert J. Thomas argues that smart machines may not hold the key to an industrial renaissance. In this provocative and enlightening book, he takes us inside four successful manufacturing enterprises to reveal the social and political dynamics that are an integral part of new production technology. His interviews with nearly 300 individuals, from top corporate executives to engineers to workers and union representatives, give his study particular credibility and offer surprising insights into the organizational power struggles that determine the form and performance of new technologies.

Thomas urges managers not to put blind hopes into smarter machines but to find smarter ways to organize people. As U.S. companies battle for survival in an era of growing global competition, What Machines Can't Do is an invaluable treatise on the ways we organize work. While its call for change is likely to be controversial, it will also attract anyone who wishes to understand the full impact of new technology on jobs, organizations, and the future of the industrial enterprise.

Table of Contents:
Preface

1. Introduction
Bridging Determinism and Choice
The Power-Process Perspective
History Matters
Dissimilar Logics in an Organizational Context
Choice, Change, and Worldviews
Understanding Technological Choice and Change
Case Studies in Context
Research Methods
Site and Case Selection
Reporting Findings
Organization of the Book

2. Technology as a Power Tool:
Technological Choice in an Aircraft Company
The Industrial and Organizational Context
The Aircraft Company
Case 1: The Flexible Machining System
Choosing Between Technologies
Symptoms Versus Causes
Bringing Interests to the Surface
Choosing Within the Technology
Finessing the ROI
Pitching the Technology
Implementing the Technology
Symbolic Sensors
Conclusion

Case 2: The Robotized Assembly Cell
Choosing Between Technologies
The Dangers of "Real Engineering"
Going Outside, Not Inside, for Help
Choosing Within the Technology
Preventing a Range War
Least Common Denominator
Implementing the Technology
Epilogue
Conclusion

Case 3: Shop-Programmable Machine Tools
Choosing Between Technologies
Choosing Within the Technology
Implementing the Technology
Conclusion
Conclusions and Implications

3. Between Invention and Convention:
Technological Choice in a Computer Company
The Industrial and Organizational Context
The Technology
Choosing Between Technologies
The Official Story
The Unofficial Story
Between Convention and Invention
Building a Movement
Networking
An External Threat
Product Openings
Choosing Within the Technology
The Great Investment Bake-Off
Implementing the Technology
East Coast: From Slack to Stress
The Temp Solution
Back to Convention
West Coast: Lights On or Lights Out?
Too Much Technology
The Cult of the Expert
Conclusion

4. Collaborative Change:
Technological Choice in an Aluminum Company
The Aluminum Products Company
The Technology
Choosing Between Technologies
Choosing Within the Technology
Implementing the Technology
Up and Running
Hitting a Brick Wall
Communicating Across Boundaries
Conclusion

5. A Contest over Content:
Technological Choice in the Auto Industry
The Auto Company
The Technology
Choosing Between Technologies
Corporate Control
Plant Autonomy
Union-Management Relations
Manufacturing Renaissance and Real Engineering
From Context to Content
Choosing Within the Technology
Contested Technology
A Language of Common Interests
Getting to "Yes"
Implementing the Technology
Owning the Technology
Up and Running
Conclusion

6. Politics and Technology
The Limits ofT echnological Determinism
The Impact of Organization on Technology
Breaking Institutional Molds from Within
How Independent Is Technology?
The Limits of Social Choice
Whose Strategy? Whose Choice?
Class Action?
The Power-Process Perspective: An Elaboration
Purposive Structuring
The Political Hand
Technology Politics
Crossing the Bridge Between Determinism and Choice
The Politics of Innovation and Innovative Politics
Implications for Research and Theory

7. The Politics and Aesthetics of Manufacturing
Politics and Change
The Status of Manufacturing
Design H Manufacturing?
Knowledge and Power
Product and Process Reconsidered
The Search for an Aesthetic of Process

Appendix 1. Talking Technology
Appendix 2. Preliminary Coding Categories
Appendix 3. Definition of Coding Categories
References
Index

About the Author :
Robert J. Thomas is Professor of Organizational Studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is the author of Citizenship, Gender, and Work: Social Organization of Industrial Agriculture (California, 1985).


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Product Details
  • ISBN-13: 9780520087019
  • Publisher: University of California Press
  • Publisher Imprint: University of California Press
  • Height: 229 mm
  • No of Pages: 336
  • Returnable: N
  • Spine Width: 18 mm
  • Weight: 503 gr
  • ISBN-10: 0520087011
  • Publisher Date: 25 Mar 1994
  • Binding: Paperback
  • Language: English
  • No of Pages: 336
  • Returnable: N
  • Sub Title: Politics and Technology in the Industrial Enterprise
  • Width: 152 mm


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