Fordism

Categories: Production and manufacturing | Ford | Sociology | Economics and finance stubs

The expression Fordism goes back to Henry Ford, who significantly improved mass production methods and developed (with several employees) the assembly line method of manufacturing early in the 20th century. Ford Motor Company taught English and skills to the workers who immigrated from South or East Europe based on this idea.

The term may refer to the methods of running the plant, but also may refer to some of Ford's idiosyncratic social views:

• It may refer to the idea of paying workers enough to enable them to purchase the product they create.
• It may also be applied to the fictional religion-like ideology described in Aldous Huxley's novel Brave New World.
• It often describes the paternalistic "taking care of the worker" - a "family-like" mentality seen first in the auto-industry (Ford). The paternalism could be kindly (providing benefits) or restrictive (for example, Ford discouraged smoking even off premises).

In Ford's time, laborers were relatively unskilled, but they could form unions and these labor unions became very strong because capital was not so fluid.

Most employees in the fordist structure were able to purchase the product they produced - which is in sharp contrast to current 3rd world countries and their production strategies.

Once capital became more fluid globally, we entered the "Post-Fordism" era - in which we saw deindustrialization take place on the global scale. This deindustrialization is seen in the withdrawal of 11 automobile plants from Flint, Michigan, and the opening of 11 new automobile plants in Mexico.de:Fordismus es:Fordismo fr:fordisme he:פורדיזם pt:Fordismo