Managers and Workers: Origins of the Twentieth-Century Factory System in the United States, 1880-1920

by Daniel Nelson

Book Overview

During the early years of this century, the classic factory system of the industrial revolution evolved rapidly into a new, identifiable form that would characterize American and world industry for most of the twentieth century. This transformation, as important for industrial managers, workers, and consumers as the initial creation of the factory, is the subject of Daniel Nelson's illuminating synthesis, updated and expanded to include the scholarship...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 029914884X
• ISBN13: 9780299148843
• Release Date: December 1995
• Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press
• Length: 264 Pages
• Weight: 0.85 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Managers and Workers

In the past scholars often depicted the rise of the factory system as a decisive step in the development of modern economic life, in many cases as a synonym for the industrial revolution. This emphasis, while understandable in terms of the contrast between the handicraft shop and the early factory, now seems less appropriate. If nothing else, the contrast between the large plant of the present day and its nineteenth-century predecessor suggests the need for a revised view. The following essays, accordingly, focus on a subsequent period, when the factory and, above all, "the associating principle" changed significantly. The dominant themes of this process, the substitution of formal, centralized controls and the increasing influence of management over the factory and its labor force, were the bases of the "new factory system," which in turn became the foundation of the modern industrial administration. --- from book's preface.