Work, no-work and neo/postfordism

Abstract

The socioeconomic and technological changes (such as robotics, reengineering, lean management, lean production,…)that happened in the capitalist formations over the last three decades have had deep impact in the production line organization and in the mass production techniques. Within this context, described as “neopostfordism”, the productive/ reproductive work that has its main ingredients in applied science and in the ways of life transforms itself through this complex articulation of machine systems and flexible hiring. One of the results of these changes has been a social duality such as stable and unstable contracts or left outs (contingent jobs, working poor, structural unemployed).There are different answers to this process. From the ones who hold up that the new economic groups will make up for the unemployment brought in (Castells, etc.) to the ones who reaffirm that the irreversible paradoxical aspect of this process recognizes the right to a fix rent for the left outs (Offe, “free money”, etc.). All in all, what is a must in front of this performance is to build up a critic social (and political) theory according to the postindustrial procedures (cognitive capital, immaterial production…)A new theory to deal with “ludditas” contributions or with the Clastres anthropology ones.