ABSTRACT
This chapter describes some of the major research works of the period, in order to draw attention to the distinctive intellectual moment within which these writings were formed. It explains the emerging opposition between individual and collective cultures which increasingly came to colour these studies. The chapter argues that, rather than contrasting the collective and the individual, and class and non-class and explores their inter-relationship. It suggests that the idea of ‘rugged individualism’ offers one way of doing so. The chapter discusses some possible ramifications of this understanding of work cultures and leads to some brief conclusions. The post-war years saw the emergence of a remarkable wave of sociologically informed studies of work and employment that claimed to represent a bright new future for social scientific research. It can indeed be argued without much exaggeration that the period from 1955 to 1975 was the golden age of British occupational and industrial sociology.
