Showing papers on "Deskilling published in 1991"

Patterns of Skill Change: Upskilling, Deskilling or the Polarization of Skills?:

Abstract: The debate about the long-term direction of skill trends has occupied a central place in economic sociology, but there has been a virtual absence of relevant representative data. This paper draws o...

Patriarchy, Technology, and Conceptions of Skill:

Abstract: Much of the debate over the deskilling of work has assumed that skill is simply technically derived. Here it is argued that this is a partial view and that the categories for evaluating skill definitions are gender-biased. An adequate understanding of gender inequality at work must take account of both the ideological aspects and the material components of skill. The centrality of men's control of technology to their power in the workplace is discussed. The article concludes that social relations are expressed in and shape technologies themselves and that patriarchal relations are integral to this process.

“BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE”:: Women's Professional Organizations in Nursing and Class, Racial, and Ethnic Inequalities

Abstract: Surveying job segmentation within nursing, this article analyzes attempts by professional registered nurses and nursing educators to resist the deskilling of nursing In so doing, they have reinforced race and class segmentation within nursing The article concludes with a discussion of class, race, and gender stratification and suggests that resistance to deskilling may reinforce inequalities among women

Productivity, the Workforce, and Technology Education.

Abstract: While the United States was once the premier leader in industrial strength and influence, countries previously unable to compete with the United States in both technological and economic arenas have made drastic changes in the way they develop and produce goods. Through modernization of their factories and by using innovative organizational systems, these so called non-industrial countries have begun to compete with the industrial giants on their own turf. New competition from countries such as Japan, Korea, and Brazil is having a dramatic impact on the economic, political, and educational systems within the United States. Examples of the results from this new competition include rising trade deficits, an increasing budget deficit, slow productivity growth, stagnant real wages, and a declining share of world markets (Young, 1988). All of these trends constitute a threat to the American standard of living. Unless changes are made to increase the competitive ability of the United States on economic and technological grounds, the quality of life in this country is certain to fall. In response to the competitiveness problem, this country must strive to develop a highly skilled, adaptable workforce that develops and uses technology. This effort would result in a renewed competitive advantage through improved technologies and innovative, creative, and highly educated workers; something which may be the United States' biggest strength. This approach is not without its drawbacks. New technologies are likely to replace many workers which could result in higher unemployment. Advances in technology could also lead to a deskilling of the workforce which may result in a wider gap between the workers who develop new technologies and those who use them. To return the United States to its former competitive status, improvements must occur in the productivity of the workforce. Technology education has a unique role to play in improving the productivity of the future workforce (Technology Education Advisory Council, 1988). In addition to providing students with the opportunity to interact with technological systems and proc-

Flexibility, Surveillance and Hype in New Zealand Financial Retailing

Abstract: The banking industry has been a major source of evidence for debates ranging from class analysis and proletarianization to deskilling and the feminization of work. The literature generated in these...

Competence, Control, and Work Redesign: Die Angestellten in the Federal Republic of Germany

Abstract: A tendency toward deskilling and deeper fragmentation of white-collar work emerged in the Federal Republic of Germany during the 1960s and early 1970s, fueling Marxist claims that skilled office and administrative workers faced increasing proletarianization. The authors' research on commercial and technical employees in large industrial enterprises suggests that deskilling tendencies were, in fact, a short-lived, exceptional phenomenon. Since the late 1970s, West German employers have increasingly adopted a skill-based modernization policy that shapes work in terms of high trust relations and responsible autonomy. This outcome is more than an employers' creation, however, for skilled administrative employees have used their occupational qualifications as a means of influencing the process of work redesign. In general, our findings point to nationally specific systems of vocational education as a factor that shapes emerging patterns of work redesign and work culture.

Expert Enhancement and Replacement in Computerized Mental Labor

Abstract: What happens to professional and technical work when it is computerized? Exploratory analysis of case studies indicates that when expert systems are used to enhance the work of professionals, some tasks of medium- and low-skilled support personnel are integrated into the work of highly skilled experts. Technical workers are thus at risk of having their jobs automated as part of the computer enhancement of professionals. When computerization replaces expertise, job opportunities for medium-skilled personnel shrink and barriers to upward mobility through on-the-job experience are reduced Entry-level professionals or even technicians with computers can perform tasks formerly done by experienced professionals. But working conditions do not promote the development of expertise and professional judgment among these workers. Thus it appears that routinization, deskilling, and automation are not only the problems of manual laborers in the information age; professional workers are also at risk, in complex ways.

AUTOMATED TECHNOLOGIES, INSTITUTIONAL ENVIRONMENTS, AND SKILLED LABOR PROCESSES: Toward an Institutional Theory of Automation Outcomes

Abstract: This article explores how new computer-directed technologies affect skilled-abor processes. The extent of corporate organizations’ embeddedness in institutional environments that prescribe a deskilling/managerial-control program as the most rational is argued to constrain management's capacity to implement the types of shop-floor programs required for optimal production outcomes. Corporations extremely dependent for vital resources and markets upon environmental agents committed to deskilling/managerial-control prescriptions, with production decision centralized in a corporate-level, finance-oriented management attuned to these prescriptions, tend to pursue deskilling/managerial-control courses of development when implementing new technologies even at the cost of optimal production outcomes. Comparative analysis of the G. E. Lynn plant's numerical control experience with British Telecom's experience with an automated telephone-exchange technology develops this thesis. The merits of the institutional theory championed here are contrasted with those of Kelly's (1989, 1990) union avoidance thesis. Ideal types that describe and predict divergent, generalized courses of shop-floor automation are proffered.

Socialization of Prospective Principals as Instructional Leaders in the Era of "School Reform": Anticipatory Deskilling and Reskilling in the Process of Becoming a Principal.

Abstract: The role of Texas school principals has been redefined to include instructional leadership for the planning, operation, supervision, and evaluation of educational programs. This study examined how principal trainees at the College of Education of the University of Houston (Texas) were preparing for their redefined role. It investigated the socialization of prospective principals as instructional leaders. As part of this socialization, anticipatory deskilling and reskilling in the process of becoming a principal were of interest. The ethnographic research involved interviews with 10 principal trainees and faculty, field research in university courses, and analysis of official documents. Findings suggest that sot'etimes trainees encountered messages in both the formal and hidden curriculum of their midmanagement certification program which stressed instructional leadership as rule following, and other times as creative application of broad-based knowledge. Most of the trainees reported the anticipation of instructional leadership as rule-following behavior. Three trainees contributed to the deskilling of their leadership roles by not intending to raise questions about the mandates of what principals are supposed to do or about the given cl,:riculum. Comments made by several trainees spoke to how intensification (an aspect of deskilling) produces instructional leadership as rule-oriented behavior. Theoretical implications and recommendations for policy and practice are discussed. (Contains 36 references.) (JDD) ************************-4**************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made. from the original document. ***********************************************************************

Recruitment Strategies and Managerial Control of Technological Staff

Abstract: There has been extensive debate in recent years about managerial strategies and new forms of labour control (for example see Littler, 1982; Wood, 1982). Discussion concentrated initially on managerial attempts to control the labour process. It highlighted strategies of deskilling and emphasised the homogenisation of the workforce and different forms of conflict and co-operation at work (see Braverman, 1974 for example). In the early 1980s the focus of debate shifted to discussion over how companies were restructuring to cope with recession and a changed political-economic climate. There has been a growing interest in fragmentation, both the breaking down of companies into smaller profit centres and the rekindling of subcontract relationships. Relations in the labour market therefore became increasingly relevant to the debates over managerial strategies for the control of white-collar, and in this case, technological workers.

The Social Context of Democratic Authority: A Sympathetic Response to Quantz, Cambron-McCabe and Dantley.

Abstract: As a former president of a teacher's union and as a political/educational activist, there is no doubt in my mind that I would have supported most of the changes in the education of administrators that the authors of "Preparing School Administrators for Democratic Authority" describe. I have all too many vivid memories of discussions with principals and "the central office" that ultimately were reduced to the infamous accountant's bottom line or to "authority," not to what was ethically justifiable, socially critical, or even educationally wise. In fact, it is not an unimportant fact in my own intellectual and political development that I spent many years of my life as a teacher in a decaying old industrial city largely teaching children of color whose condition of extreme poverty was even then hard to imagine. These conditions have got worse; so bad, in fact, are they that they place under severe threat the very claim that this society is democratic at anything other than the level of rhetoric. Let me begin my comments here with an all too brief assessment of the current situation, since a positive response to Quantz, Cambron-McCabe, and Dantley's arguments is dependent on one's understanding of the social conditions impacting on schools. What is happening in American society that should give us reason for serious concern? There is a crisis in education and the larger society. Seen from below, it is evidenced in the increase in poverty, in the defunding of the educational and social programs that took many years to win and that are still crucially necessary, in the attempts by rightist groups to impose their beliefs upon others, and in the widespread deskilling of jobs as industries engage in capital flight by moving their plants to other nations, thereby destroying whole corn-

Human-centred by design? The adoption of CAD in the UK

Abstract: The appropriate forms of organisational arrangements to accompany the introduction of integrative technologies such as CAD and their implications for operator skills and work organisation have been hotly debated. For some, CAD represents yet another example of a technology being used to deskill a previously higly skilled occupational group, whilst for others it is a technology which allows a break with the deskilling trend, raising the possibility of much human-centred forms of work organisation. This paper examines the introduction of CAD in six UK organisations and highlights the need for strategic, but at the same time more skill-based, approaches. The prospects for the development of such an approach in the UK are briefly evaluated.