© 1995 Oxford University Press
research-article |
Variety, Routines and Networks: The Metamorphosis of Fordist Firms
(Centre de Recherche en Economie Industrielle, Faculté des Sciences Economiques, Université de Paris XIII F-93 430 Villetaneuse, France)
Abstract
This paper is a study of new social forms in the automobile industry emerging from the breakdown of the fordist model of accumulation and the transition toward new configurations of patterns and industrial routines considered at the level of intra- and interfirm relationships. The first section analyzes the set of constraints that automobile makers face and new orientations in the relationships of principal actors, arguing that the classical order of mass production is being replaced by a regime of variety based on new institutional routines and protocols specifically designed to face the constraints of variety. The second section presents new trends in the relations between supplier and subcontractor, and analyzes contractual relationships between firms operating inside the same industry. The third section considers the more innovative protocols in the field of production management that the automobile industry has implemented for facing the just-in-time requirements of the regime of variety. The fourth section concludes by exploring particular features of the variety regime. It describes this regime as a distinct application of the principle of dynamic flexibility in combining economies of scale and differentiation which brings monopolistic into oligopolistic forms of competition. It also points out the central role that just-in-time procedures and protocols play. These methods, the paper sums up, will progressively replace Taylorian and fordist approaches to production.