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The Industrial Development of Nanotechnology and Its Likely Implications for Labour

  • Chapter
Global Economic Crisis and the Politics of Diversity

Part of the book series: International Political Economy Series ((IPES))

Abstract

New technologies have deep implications for labour: they transform relations between work and labour markets, including the nature and organization of work, skill requirements, job creation, and employment. Debates on the effects of new technologies on work and labour markets can be traced back to classical economists who witnessed labour substitution by machines and the abrupt disappearance of some trades during the first industrial revolution (Woirol 1996). Adam Smith (1994 [1776]) held that technology makes goods cheaper, generating more demand and then allowing the economy to reabsorb any technologically displaced labour — a perspective known as compensation theory. Karl Marx (1990 [1867]) was less optimistic. He viewed progressive unemployment as a result of the ever-increasing fixed capital-to-labour ratio that characterizes capital accumulation. Regarding changes in the labour process, Smith explored the effects of the increasing division of labour and the contraction of skills on specific activities. Marx analysed the labour-process changes arising from the progressive mechanization of production at the dawn of industrialization, showing that technology contributed to decrease production dependence on human labour through the division and deskilling of labour.

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Authors
  1. Noela Invernizzi
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Simon Fraser University, Canada

    Yıldız Atasoy (Professor of Sociology) (Professor of Sociology)

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© 2014 Noela Invernizzi

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Invernizzi, N. (2014). The Industrial Development of Nanotechnology and Its Likely Implications for Labour. In: Atasoy, Y. (eds) Global Economic Crisis and the Politics of Diversity. International Political Economy Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137293688_5

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