Employee Relations: An International Journal

Paul Stewart

1998 Employee Relations: An International Journal

doi: 10.1108/01425459810228252

This article is concerned with three key approaches to the implications of Japanese involvement in the UK. It is argued that the paradigms of the so‐called Japanization and lean production schools are inadequate to the task of resolving the sociological implications of Japanese investment and that by contrast what is needed is a critical social relations approach. This will be concerned with the processes of social exclusion implied by new forms of work organization together with the roles of employee collective organizations and identities in these processes.

Harry Scarbrough; Mike Terry

1998 Employee Relations: An International Journal

doi: 10.1108/01425459810228298

Contrasts theories of the “Japanization” of British industry with empirical evidence from established car producers in that industry. Suggests that while the UK car industry has been heavily influenced by Japanese methods, established producers follow policies marked by indigenous influences rather than by any unmediated Japanese effect. Proceeds to explore relationships between processual change in plant‐level work organization and the overarching context of institutions and ideas. Investigates the relevance of the two major theoretical models of workplace change in the motor industry ‐ the “diffusion” and the “bolt‐on” models of change ‐ and their conflicting interpretations of the impact of the Japanese “lean production” approach. Compares models with case‐studies of changing work practices at Rover and Peugeot and suggests that neither model provides a satisfactory account of the patterns of change found. Develops instead a model of change which emphasizes the creative adaptation of production practices within the British context.

Stephen Procter; Stephen Ackroyd

1998 Employee Relations: An International Journal

doi: 10.1108/01425459810228306

In the late 1980s, the idea of Japanization dominated debates about the restructuring of production, work and industrial relations in this country. There was, of course, some evidence to support the Japanization thesis; yet, even at the time of the strongest influence, there were indications that it did not describe what was happening very well. It now seems much more plausible to argue that British manufacturing companies were on a distinctive trajectory of development, which has only passing similarities to Japanese patterns of organization.

Nick Oliver; Rick Delbridge; James Lowe

1998 Employee Relations: An International Journal

doi: 10.1108/01425459810228315

This paper reports the findings of a study into 12 UK and nine Japanese automotive component plants. Compared to the UK plants, the Japanese plants showed a 60 per cent superiority on productivity and a 9:1 superiority in quality. Detailed examination of work structures on the shopfloor revealed that UK plants devolve more responsibility to operators for activities such as quality monitoring and improvement, work allocation and work pace determination than the Japanese plants do. This implies that key aspects of the Japanese model may have been misrepresented in the Japanization debate.

Jonathan Morris; James Lowe; Barry Wilkinson

1998 Employee Relations: An International Journal

doi: 10.1108/01425459810228324

The Japanization debate in the UK has moved considerably since first mooted in 1987. On the one hand academics ‐ advocates as well as sceptics ‐ have questioned its continued usefulness as an analytical framework. On the other, there has been greater sophistication, refinement and clarity on what is being studied, and particularly surrounding aspects of the transferability of the Japanese model. This paper reports on a study of production supervisors in Japanese transplants in the UK, and data from emulating or comparable non‐Japanese owned organizations. It also draws on comparative data from Japan and North America. The study focuses on two industries ‐ consumer electronics and autos ‐ and uses a variety of methodologies.

Chris Smith

1998 Employee Relations: An International Journal

doi: 10.1108/01425459810228333

This article examines the nature of industrial relations and work practices in Japanese firms within an investment cluster in Telford, Shropshire. Telford has the highest concentration of Japanese firms in one site in Britain. The article examines how conditions which were supposedly favourable to the transfer of Japanese production and personnel practices ‐ a new town, offering greenfield investment opportunities within a quiescent industrial relations environment ‐ actually did not facilitate ease of transfer. Rather, we suggest that problems within the labour market, including the very absence of trade unions as a collective voice for expressing workers’ grievances, created conditions unfavourable to the transplantation of Japanese work and personnel practices.

Andrew Mair

1998 Employee Relations: An International Journal

doi: 10.1108/01425459810228342

This article reviews Honda’s strategy to localize operations, organization and employment relations at Honda of the UK Manufacturing (HUM). The management literature describes Honda as an unusually un‐bureaucratic company where individual initiative thrives. However, the production system and organization of work at HUM were found to be very tightly controlled, with little variety of work and individual initiative constrained within strict bounds. This may reflect the relative youth of the plant and the company’s strategy to embed its production system thoroughly before permitting change, or it may suggest that production work at Honda does not fit the usual characterization of the company in the literature. Local management has been given freedom to adapt certain aspects of the organization and employment relations framework to fit the British environment, but with no impact on the direct transfer of the production system.

Máire Kerrin

1998 Employee Relations: An International Journal

doi: 10.1108/01425459810228351

This article provides a descriptive account of the impact of new production methods and the consequences for the internal dependency relationship. The case study examples illustrate the nature of the internal dependency relationship under the new production methods and attempts to assess how this internal dependency relationship interacts with increasing devolved responsibility, problem solving and continuous improvement at source, and the use of increased information at shop floor level. Implications for future management of these dependencies are examined.