ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to review aspects of the continuing debate about the changing character of work in British manufacturing, and particularly to assess claims about a transition from Fordism to post-Fordism. The changing experience of work in manufacturing over the last 20 years must be seen in the context of the United Kingdom's wider political economy. The chapter focuses on three specific sectors which share a history of labour-intensive assembly-line production and a recent record of substantial work reorganisation, namely vehicles, electrical engineering and food and drink. Consumer electricals was built around tightly organised assembly-line production, but was also characterised by continuing experiments in work reorganisation which represent variations around the theme of flow-line mass production. The chapter discusses the car, electricals and food sectors has demonstrated that much of the work reorganisation undertaken in these key sectors of British manufacturing represents new permutations upon an established pattern of assembly-line or flow-line production.
