LP Impacts on the Neoliberal Political-Economic Context

Abstract

Lean production has repeatedly been associated with the development of skills , increasing employee participation levels and enhancing the quality of working lives . However, diverse studies also come out against this perspective and instead identify certain limitations to this approach. This article reflects on both the implications lean production holds for the quality of life of workers and its impact within the context of neoliberalism . Opting in favour of a critical view, we present the innovative principles to lean management, segmented into three major topics: production management techniques , supplier networks and human resource management . Subsequently, we make a critical overview of the lean production implications for organising work and the workplace contexts faced by employees. Complementarily, this article also spans the terms under which the neoliberal political-economic system emerged. We conclude that lean production in itself is not the cause of negative impacts but depending on the management style and the way such practices get implemented. This neoliberal contextual framework underpins the focus on the most contested facets of lean production and how this effectively reflects in an intensification of work , boosting control levels , fragmenting and atomising labour and, on the grounds of worker flexibility , ensuring their availability to work in a variety of situations, on low salaries , with limited expectations in terms of workplace security and working conditions , lower levels of collective worker resistance and highly vulnerable to deteriorations in their standards of living .