ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the specific relationship between technology and the organisation of work both within different branches of industry and within different production processes. It examines two firms in the Netherlands, both of which have introduced numerically controlled and computerised numerical control machine tools. But differ in some major respects such as market conditions, complexity of production and work process, plant history and nature of international cooperation with subcontractors: A long-established aircraft factory is engaged in both civil and military production and is, moreover, contributing to the development of space technology. A company that is engaged in the manufacturing of lift-truck attachments and related products such as hose reels and masts for handling materials in all kinds of industries. The world industry of lift-truck attachments is controlled by a handful of Japanese and American companies. The lift-truck attachment factory has been built in one of the eastern provinces of the country in which no prior establishments of the firm existed.
