"We are Motor Men": Management culture and consciousness in the South African motor industry
Date
1992-05-11
Authors
Duncan, David
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Abstract
This paper is part of a research project on the history of the motor industry in South
Africa from the 1920s to the present. The broader study looks at all aspects of the industry,
from government policy, through foreign and local investment, to the organisation of
production and labour relations. It takes in both the assembly sector (or, as they prefer to be
called, the vehicle manufacturers) and the components sector (the parts manufacturers).
Research in the social sciences has tended to be polarised between analyses of
resistance against the apartheid regime and studies of the state itself. Where academic
treatises have broached the topic of industry, it has been the owners of the means of
production, the capitalists themselves, who have constituted the focus of attention. This
essay deals mainly with the next rung in the business ladder - the senior and middle
managers who actually run capitalist enterprises from year to year. It attempts a general
survey of the historical development of management culture and attitudes in the motor
industry. A later paper will compare and contrast these attitudes with those of shop floor
workers.
Description
African Studies Seminar series. Paper presented 11 May, 1992
Keywords
Automobile industry and trade. South Africa. Management