ABSTRACT
George Ritzer is recognized as the person who coined the term 'McDonaldization' in the 1980s and through numerous publications spread the concept around the world. Ritzer has cooked up a sociological industry and a popular way of looking at culture. In terms of cultural study, from its origins to the twenty-first century, McDonald's has seemingly landscaped an entirely new world culture. Through its expansion it has established food as a new social and political power broker with consequent communication norms and mores in an increasingly globalized world. It has created its own sign community by a variety of means with its own vocabulary and grammar. McDonaldization is the global force which is affecting all of society in a way not previously explained in the narratives of Post-Fordism and bureaucratization. Ritzer has simply and cleverly McDonaldized Weber's thinking and reduced it to four easily digestible nuggets of thought: efficiency, predictability, calculability and control.
