ABSTRACT
The sociological study of work has always played a central part in sociology. It has necessarily done this, given that sociology emerged and developed as a way of coming to terms with fundamental changes associated with industrialisation and the rise of capitalism, as we saw in Chapter 1. Changes in the way work is organised and experienced have been at the heart of the social and historical shifts with which sociology has always engaged. The most significant historical shift has been the rise of industrial capitalist societies. It is a more useful way to characterise the modern form of social organisation in terms of ‘industrial capitalism’ than by prioritising either ‘industrialism’ or ‘capitalism’. It is especially important to recognise that it was a conjunction of capitalist forms of activity and industrial methods of production that led to many of the most significant social changes which have occurred in the modern period of world history. And attempts to develop a socialist alternative to capitalist ways of running industrial economies – a very significant part of twentieth-century history – can only be understood as both reactions to industrial capitalism and as challenges to the dominance of industrial capitalist principles in the world.
