Deskilling and reduced worker autonomy? Lean Construction and neo-Taylorist management systems in Sweden
Övrigt konferensbidrag, 2023
Setting off from labour process theory (Thompson & Smith, 2010), this paper analyses how parallel processes of construction management and LC affect the day-to-day work at construction sites in Sweden. Based on both survey data, qualitative interviews, and construction site visits, we show that LC practices potentially create a dynamic that structures an already fragmented workforce into different segments of skilled and unskilled labour. Among others, this dynamic calls back to the rift between Green (1999) and Howell & Ballard (2000), indicating that the implementation of LC within construction management in Sweden still seems to be largely devoid of organizational, local, and cultural contexts – and reveals a disintegrated labour process. In that vein, we draw on Haakestad and Friberg’s (2017) conceptualisation of a managerial shift from a craftcentred system towards one of neo taylorist principles. This shift implies a change in work practices with an increased work intensity, reduced worker autonomy, and a loss of control of the labour process. As a result, and considering the diversification of the workforce with pre-dominantly posted workers from CEE engaging in low-skill work (because of their relatively low price), we argue that the Swedish construction sector experiences processes of de-skilling, which comprise a separation between mental and manual labour. As site management increasingly controls the labour, the worker’s experience and individual judgement is of less or no importance. Consequently, while LC can include practices that involve workers without breaking the labour process, we indeed show that neo-taylorist principles that follow the combination of LC with construction management can lead to deskilling and reduced worker autonomy in the Swedish context.
Labour
Lean construction
Neo-taylorist management
Foreign workers
De-skilling
Författare
Rasmus Ahlstrand
Lunds universitet
Dimosthenis Kifokeris
Chalmers, Arkitektur och samhällsbyggnadsteknik, Byggnadsdesign
17
Glasgow, United Kingdom,
Ämneskategorier
Byggproduktion
Företagsekonomi