Behind the Line: Outside Supply, Mass Production, and the Question of Managerial Expertise in the Model T Era (2010)
Yarnell, Damon A. (Author)
University of Pennsylvania
Cowan, Ruth Schwartz
Publication date: 2010
Language: English
Edition Details: Advisor: Cowan, Ruth Schwartz.
Physical Details: 325 pp.
Today, global industry continues to reconfigure the international division of labor, raising urgent questions about economic security, social justice and environmental sustainability. Although "globalization" and "the networked society" have become catchphrases in both academic scholarship and the popular press, analysts have tended to overlook the specific managerial practices behind the international flow of goods and services. This dissertation traces the history of "supply chain management" to its roots in systems of factory administration that developed in the United States during the early twentieth century. Combining the history of technology, labor history and business history, I document daily life in the factory office, and I examine the development of technical expertise in industrial procurement. Although historians have long recognized the development of mass production as a vital feature of twentieth-century U.S. history, most scholars have focused on the assembly line and shop workers. By emphasizing white-collar labor in the factory office, this dissertation integrates the history of technology with the history of management, reframing the traditional story of concentrated integration in terms of distributed networks and coordination. Several significant findings emerge. First, the Ford Motor Company depended on a vast network of outside suppliers throughout the run of the Model T. This assertion runs counter to established wisdom concerning Ford, but it is supported by recent empirical studies in business history and my own detailed accounts of the working lives of the company's purchasing agents. Second, the U.S. Commerce Department actively promoted a set of managerial techniques designed to encourage mass production. In the case of supply chains, the "visible hand" of mid-level management did not replace the invisible hand of the market without the helping hand of the federal government. Third and finally, robust industrial procurement systems enabled manufacturers like Ford to capture significant external economies, including opportunities for collaborative, inter-firm innovation. Together, the strands of my argument help reframe the history of the American auto industry to the present day, raising important questions about the history of corporate industry and demonstrating that the American system of mass production was as much a political as a technological achievement.
...MoreDescription Cited in Dissertation Abstracts International-A 72/05, Nov 2011. Proquest Document ID: 858361952.
Similar Citations
Article
Greenstein, David E.;
(2014)
Assembling Fordizm: The Production of Automobiles, Americans, and Bolsheviks in Detroit and Early Soviet Russia
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001201851/)
Article
Hochfelder, David;
Helper, Susan;
(1996)
Suppliers and Product Development in the Early American Automobile Industry
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001180023/)
Book
Nelson, A. R.;
Rudolph, J. L.;
(2010)
Education and the culture of print in modern America
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001180015/)
Article
Sovacool, Benjamin K.;
Brossmann, Brent;
(2013)
Fantastic Futures and Three American Energy Transitions
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001320573/)
Book
Yanik, Anthony J.;
(2009)
Maxwell Motor and the Making of Chrysler Corporation
(/p/isis/citation/CBB000954281/)
Article
Michael S. Raber;
(1988)
Conservative Innovators, Military Small Arms, and Industrial History at Springfield Armory, 1794-1918
(/p/isis/citation/CBB549228506/)
Book
Brian McMahon;
(2016)
The Ford Century in Minnesota
(/p/isis/citation/CBB608296828/)
Article
Charles K. Hyde;
(1996)
Assembly-Line Architecture: Albert Kahn and the Evolution of the U.S. Auto Factory, 1905-1940
(/p/isis/citation/CBB618737316/)
Article
Matthew J. Hoffarth;
(2020)
From Achievement to Power: David C. Mcclelland, Mcber & Company, and the Business of the Thematic Apperception Test (tat), 1962–1985
(/p/isis/citation/CBB570355745/)
Article
Kira Lussier;
(2019)
Of Maslow, motives, and managers: The hierarchy of needs in American business, 1960–1985
(/p/isis/citation/CBB530698938/)
Book
Landsberger, Henry A;
(1958)
Hawthorne revisited: Management and the worker: its critics, and developments in human relations in industry.
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001180073/)
Book
Corinna Schlombs;
(2019)
Productivity Machines: German Appropriations of American Technology from Mass Production to Computer Automation
(/p/isis/citation/CBB010027447/)
Article
Uziel, Daniel;
(2006)
Between Industrial Revolution and Slavery. Mass Production in the German Aviation Industry in World War II
(/p/isis/citation/CBB000700570/)
Article
Borg, Kevin;
(2012)
Les sens perdus du garagiste. Comment le savoir-faire a été disqualifié dans l'univers automobile américain
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001200686/)
Book
Wells, Christopher W.;
(2012)
Car Country: An Environmental History
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001320937/)
Essay Review
Parker, Jeremy;
(2010)
Automobility and Apparatuses: Commentary on Cotten Seiler's Republic of Drivers
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001567124/)
Book
Seiler, Cotten;
(2008)
Republic of Drivers: A Cultural History of Automobility in America
(/p/isis/citation/CBB000954031/)
Essay Review
Flonneau, Mathieu;
(2010)
Read Tocqueville, or Drive? A European Perspective on US “Automobilization”
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001567126/)
Essay Review
Seiler, Cotten;
(2010)
Author Response: The Ends of Automobility
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001567127/)
Essay Review
Collins, Martin;
(2010)
Introduction
(/p/isis/citation/CBB001567123/)
Be the first to comment!