Monopoly capitalism (organizational theory) This article considers the relation between monopoly capitalism and recent hypotheses about long-term changes in skills, as a crucial factor in the production process and employment relationships. The theorist who has been most influential in analysing monopoly capitalism in relation to the labour process is Braverman. His ideas have been discussed in earlier chapters, but essentially he selectively developed certain ideas from Marx on the detailed division of labour and mechanisation in order to identify a dynamic of deskilling as the underlying force governing all forms of work in capitalism. During the phase of monopoly capitalism, this dynamic is based on Taylorism and automation and these processes lead to the decisive transition from formal to real subordination of labour (i.e. a qualitative shift in capitalist control) which did not occur within earlier phases of capitalism.
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Five years after Braverman, Edwards attempted to develop a broader perspective by bringing together the sociological literature and the recent work of labour economists such as Doeringer and Piore. Despite Edwards's indebtedness to Braverman, there are clear inconsistencies between the interpretation of monopoly capitalism in Edwards's Contested Terrain and Braverman's analysis. Firstly, Taylorism is primary to Braverman's argument because of its role in under-mining craft control. But for Edwards, Taylorism and systematic management have a secondary significance. Instead the lessons of Taylorism are incorporated within a model of work organisation which Edwards terms 'bureaucratic control'. Braverman insists on rejecting the concept of bureaucratisation for fear of losing sight of Marxist fundamentals and of class antagonisms by making use of Weberian concepts. Associated with this fundamental difference in relation to managerial strategy are conflicting views in relation to skill trends. For Braverman there is an overall trend of deskilling based on the logic of Taylorism and the implicit design principles embedded within modern machinery and automation. In contrast, Edwards points to a complex process in relation to skill levels and argues that bureaucratic control is not necessarily associated with a mass of unskilled labour:
It seems clear that deskilling has occurred in the traditional craft trades, including the machinists' tradition out of which Braverman himself came. It also seems correct to emphasise the tendency for capitalists to replace high-skill (or more precisely high-wage) labor with low-skill (low-wage) labor whenever possible. Nonetheless, the development of both the forces and relations of production continually throw up new products, new technologies and a demand for re-skilled, especially educated labor as well as deskilled labor. Thus accumulation must be seen as simultaneously deskilling and re-skilling the labor force. Rather than the simple, one-way process that Braverman describes, we must recognize this more complicated, two-way movement.