The British Worker Question

The British Worker Question (1986) examines the productivity of British workers, drawing upon a wide range of management, trade union and other sources, and spanning the traditional preserves of several other areas and disciplines - economic history, industrial administration, industrial relations and Marxism. It criticises much earlier research for its lack of a grounded sociological analysis of both workers and managements and for its lack of detailed attention to how goods and services are actually produced. The book accords a central place in its analysis of workers and productivity to the role of social organisation and management, matters which both the orthodox and Marxist traditions neglect.

Part 1. The Mould of Opinion 1. Labour Productivity, Ideological Divisions and the Division of Labour in the Social Sciences 2. British Workers, 'Attitudes', 'Effort' and the Economists Part 2. Into Detail: Some Comparative Evidence Re-examined 3. British Workers in the World of Comparative Statics (1) 4. British Workers in the World of Comparative Statics (2) Part 3. Into Context: Productivity, Productiveness and Social Organisation 5. 'The Difficulty' Reconsidered (1): Quantity, Quality, and the Measurement of Management and 'Men' 6. 'The Difficulty' Reconsidered (2): Different Quantities, and Another Side to the Quality of Labour 7. 'The Difficulty' Reconsidered (3): The Social Organisation of Production and the British Context 8. 'The Difficulty' Reconsidered (4): A Closer Look at the Social Organisation of Production in Britain Part 4. The Difficulties Resolved? 9. Enter Mrs Thatcher: The 'Fear and Anxiety' Syndrome 10. The New 'Realism' and Reality: Workers and Management 11. Productivity, Productiveness and Myopia in Britain Today. Three Commentaries on Productivity and the Conventional Wisdom