More pessimistic than Francis Sejersted and Andrew Feenburg in her look backward, out of labor history, women's history, German history.
Productivism and Technocracy as "discourses"
Productivism & Technocracy are central towards ends - thus involved in discussion of democracy, control, etc.
Also raise questions about race and gender.
Definition of terms
Some core commitments and understandings, not a rigid definition.
A set of assumptions and beliefs about how economy and society operate, develop. Fluidity, malleability as concepts - explains their pervasiveness in 20th ct. discussion
Exploitation of nature is unproblematic and desirable; unlimited growth is desirable; bigger is better - productive and its maximation are the ultimate goals towards which all other goals are to be subordinated. The only debate is is how they are to be reached, primarily in the language of quantification and science - instrumental rationality
Productivist outlooks tend to prefer division of labor -
Primary obsession is with the factory - begin with parallels that begin within the factory and then imposed on society: body//machine, factory//home.
Increasing overall production are prerequisites for realizing political goals - whether democratic, fascist, communist.
The primary variance is in terms of political goals productivism is supposed to serve.
But productivism has been committed to avoiding or transcending politics - prefer the clarity of science to the ambiguity and messiness of politics and debate.
Has become part of a whole variety of ideologies, movements that have sought to modernize/rationalize economy and society.
Americanism, Taylorism, Fordism, consumerism - whatever is taken as the central characteristic of the 20th century, they each implicate productivism.
P. always assumes Taylorism in some degree, but not reducible to Taylorism. Whether Taylorism is adopted or not, matters to the experience of workers - but either way, the goal of economic efficiency remains.
Ford - the economic hero of the interwar period. River Rouge as a primary model of mass production.
The European view was that Fordism wouldn't work - workers didn't earn enough to buy the mass-produced goods they produced, part of the basic view of Fordism.
What is the American model? the secret of American success in technological innovation and economic achievements?
Productivism central to ideas of rationalization - a rallying term that emerged in Weimar Germany. Proponents of rationalization often disagreed radically regarding the goals of rationalization; did it only go on in the factory - or also in business and trade, in the home? in what kinds of factories?
But all forms of rationalization were committed to increasing the productivity of human work as much as possible.
--
Technocracy is even more difficult. Both a specific movement in various countries, and a tendency in various organizations and movements.
More sweeping claims, different starting point: t. proposed to solve social issues more directly - science-models would be applicable to social analysis, control = social engineering.
Both politics and anti-politics. Central to efforts to attain industrialization - S.U. socialism; but also a way of articulating class conflict, etc. in the West.
Both have trouble with democracy. Productivism, especially in the form of Taylorism, does not allow much creativity, participation, democratic decision-making.
Complicates what technologies might provide more autonomy and democracy. Skilled worker as model excludes the unskilled.
Antithetical to democracy: end-goals are taken to be self-evident and beyond dispute.
P & T claim to harmonize and homogenize; claim to be more efficient than democratic processes - and efficiency itself is more valuable than democracy in the first place.
Yes, they are tendentially elitist, authoritarian, and anti-political - but they are also potentially anti-market and anti-laissez faire.
They can thus exacerbate as well as overcome tensions in capitalism between short-term profit and long-run growth.
Her work focuses on fascination with rationalization, etc. Questions of democracy, etc. were marginal questions. They also appeared not only as instruments of control from above - but also liberating and creating equality.
History
Post WWI - the heyday of P. and T. The era of River Rouge, Magnetakorsk. Social peace through prosperity and a little science.
When Taylorism was publicly debated and adopted. Most widely preached and practiced in the U.S. in the '20's.
Weimar Germans embraced it more out of fear and uncertainty than did the Americans - as lean, efficient means of moving toward a non-consumerist, export-oriented economy. Willing to accept Fordism at whatever price because it seemed to promise economic prosperity - and the factory as a microcosm of society, allows Fordism to appear further as a road to peace.
Magnetogorsk - an embodiment of Enlightenment rationality for some.
For all - the factory is to be the model for home, including sexuality and reproduction (pushed monogamy and discipline).
The tendency of P. and T. towards authoritarianism depends on the state.
She thinks that individual identification with the goals of productivism is a way of finding meaning.
Technocracy became discredited by its association with Stalinism; consumerism took over as a new model of cutting-edge change.
Productivism becomes a pre-requisite for mass consumption.
Productivism is in crisis in America - where much less is being produced.²