McDonaldization
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McDonaldization The process by which the principles of the fast-food restaurant are coming to dominate more and more sectors of American society as well as the rest of the world Seen in education, work, criminal justice, health care, travel and leisure, dieting, family, religion and virtually every other aspect of society George Ritzer’s Analogy of McDonaldization •Efficiency •Calculability •Predictability •Control George Ritzer’s Analogy of McDonaldization •Efficiency: best means to an end, optimum method 1 George Ritzer’s Analogy of McDonaldization •Calculability or Quantifiability George Ritzer’s Analogy of McDonaldization •Predictability through standardization George Ritzer’s Analogy of McDonaldization •Control of humans, both workers and consumers, by use of technology: •strict training, narrow tasks, close supervision •limited menu of choices, few options, and controlled environment •remove or distance humans from the process entirely 2 Advantages of McDonaldization Wider range of good and services available to more people in more places Able to get what you want instantly and conveniently Goods and services are far more uniform and consistent Far more economical People have less time efficiency helps Advantages of McDonaldization McDonaldized systems offer comfort and stability in a rapidly changing world Easy to compare competing products which empowers the consumer Some things benefit from closely regulated and controlled system (like weight loss) People are likely to be treated similarly Innovation diffuses more rapidly Popular things move from culture to culture rapidly The Irrationality of Rationality Rational systems are not less expensive (externalities) They force people to do unpaid work They are often inefficient for the consumer/client Dehumanizing Alienating 3 Max Weber's Model of Bureaucracy How to maximize technical capacity and efficiency 1. Criterion for personnel selection & advancement: •technical merit to perform task •guards against nepotism and other personal biases Max Weber's Model of Bureaucracy How to maximize technical capacity and efficiency 2. Specialized division of labor: •divide, simplify, standardize task •develop narrow, complex expertise Max Weber's Model of Bureaucracy How to coordinate numerous diverse tasks & people 3. Written rules (formalization) •handles expected work •generates forms 4. Hierarchy of authority: •handles exceptions to rules •presumed to be most knowledgeable 4 How to motivate personnel to pursue organizational goals 5. Impersonality •personal likes/dislikes obscure objectivity •smooth substitution of personnel 6. Incentive system based on money: •generalized, impersonal, expedient 7. Delimited rights and duties: •authority vested in "offices," not in persons How to establish and change goals 8. Separate policy and administration: •bureaucrats do not set own goals •outsiders make policy (Board of Directors) 5 Three Critiques of Bureaucracy Structural-functional theory: the dysfunctional side of bureaucracy Bureaucratic features designed for efficiency can be dysfunctional. •Efficiency or red tape? •Efficient for whom? Customers as unpaid workers. •Goal displacement •Predictability and standardization can be dehumanizing •Impersonality masked by "false fraternization": •Increasing homogenization, stifling creativity, imagination, individuality Conflict theory: deskilling the workforce •Babbage principle: divide complex skills into simpler routinized tasks •Hire cheaper, unskilled labor, increases capitalist profits •increases management's control over the production process •Three components to deskilling: 1. Dissociation of labor process from skills of worker 2. Separation of conception from execution 3. Management's monopoly over knowledge of labor process •Workers lose control over production, and over own labor •Linked to McDonaldization: introducing non-human forms of control •Deprofessionalization •Three uncertainties in evaluating extent of deskilling: Does capitalist's pursuit of profit necessarily lead to deskilling? Does deskilling occur across all jobs, occupations, and industries? Can deskilling create new, highly skilled intellectual jobs? •Issue turns on the concept of "skill": Much formal education taken for granted in today's workplace Average skill levels have improved 6 Symbolic interaction: increasing organizational surveillance •Physical setting of bureaucracy helps define organizational situations •Hierarchical and physical position can coincide: the "top floor,""upstairs" •impact of visibility •Indirect forms of control, supervision and surveillance; invisibility, inability to verify, automation •Files, records, case histories, work evaluations •supplemented by electronic surveillance--"dataveillance“ •Information is consolidated and integrated •Shift in use of personal data: From suspicion leading to an investigation, to routine investigation leading to suspicion Is Bureaucracy Outmoded? "Reinventing Government" •reforming the Federal Civil Service system created 100 years ago •designed to curb abuse through rules, limitations on authority •assumed most workers are clerks with limited education? •causes system to choke on rules and procedures •allows bureaucrats to abuse authority, possess "secret" knowledge 7
