The fordist city: this was the next stage in the development of cities and was based around the idea of Fordism. Knox and Pinch define fordism as ‘a system of industrial organisation established by Henry Ford at the beginning of the twentieth century for the mass production of automobiles.’ He was also responsible for the development of the assembly line method early in the 20th century. The result of this was that workers did relatively simple tasks and were aided by specialised machines. This approach enhances production so much so that manufacturers are able to cut the cost of products and produced standardised products available for mass consumption. An Example of this is Henry Ford’s Car. This system alongside the widespread availablilty of credit led to a revolution in production (Knox and Pinch, 1982). ‘After the second world war, however, there emerged a system which, for a quarter of a century , seemed to create a relatively harmonious relationship between production and consumption’ (Knox and Pinch, 1982)
Mass production existed with the devlopment of the very earliest industrial cities but Fordism helped to consolidate the classic landscape of ‘smokestack’ cities. This time period was underpined by the government policy which was known as keynesianism, this was based on the work John Maynard Keynes. He was an economist that argued that the government should spend the times in the recession to create more demands for private goods and services and hence increase consumption.
The urban development associated with the fordist movement was that of building large-scale plants and also an increase in infrastructure. As a result of urban planning and improving infrastructure, more roads were built and due to the affordabiltiy of the car by the middle and upper class people in society, suburbanisation began. Surbanisation is a term used by many to describe the current social urban dynamic operating within many parts of the developed world and is related to the phenomenon of (Wikipedia, 2005) and is suggested by Harvey that this was responsible for the beginning of commodity fetisishm; ‘the obsession of people with the acquisition of consumer goods’ (knox and pinch, 1982). Suburbanisation increased consumption in a number of ways; more automoblies were needed to commute large distances into the city, domestic consumer products such as televisions and washing machines were needed for the new suburban dwellings and also individual consumption increased as a result of households competing with each other due to commodity fetisishm. However, consumerism also influenced urban development, there was a demand to live in the suburbs and so developers needed to create houses and the relevant infrastucture to meet this demand. Therefore, the consumption that arised through consumer culture due to comodity fetisishm influenced urban development and vice versa.
A Manchester example of this was the emergance of Trafford Park. Ernest Hooley purchased it in August 1896 for the sum of £360,000. Hooley immediately created the Trafford Park Estates Company and set about developing it as an "industrial estate" - then a radically new concept. This was an out of town industrial estate and was successful due to the close proximity to the Manchester Ship Canal and the Manchester Port. The land was originally parkland with deer, with Trafford Hall as its centre; it was destroyed by fire in 1940. Manchester Council gave Hooley permission to develop the land and this encouraged decentralisation to occur further in the city of Manchester. Well-established companies such as Kellogg’s used Trafford Park as their European headquarters and are still manufacturing there now and ICI built its first purpose-built factory for the mass production of penicillin. By the outbreak of the Second World War, Trafford Park had so grown as to acquire the status of a borough in its own right. At its peak (around 1945), the Park employed over 75,000 workers. (Pacione)
The fordist system however was not always idealistic, as in the case of Henry Ford’s production plants. In the case of Manchester the industry was mainly cotton, which didn’t pay great wages and as a result women, ethnic minorities and other marginalised groups were economically excluded.
The fordist sytem ran into trouble, this was most probably related to a declining productivity and there were a number of factors that contributed to this. It is difficult to determine which factor had the biggest influence, however there are some which are related to consumption behaviours, as identified by Knox (1982):
- Market saturation of mass-produced goods
- Increasing consumer hostilty to uniform, poor-quality goods
- System rigidity in the face of increasing consumer and market volatility stemming from the high capital costs of establishing complex production lines under the influence of Fordism
There has been responses to the problems created in the fordist city, tese mostly included changes to the working practices, the organisation of the industry and the structure of the society as a whole. From these changes emerged the post-fordist city.
‘The post-fordist city is characterised by a production landscape that has experienced the decline of old manufacturing and ‘smokestack’ industries and the rise of new computer based technology and flexible decentralised labour processes and work’ (Jayne,2005). In Manchster, the out of town industrial estate Trafford Park has continued to grow throughout the years, and had offset many of the worst effects of depression on employment in Manchester. Many new service industries had moved in as well as light engineering and cleaner hi-tech industries. Manchester, especially Trafford Park Industrial Estate became dominated by the needs of multinational corporations and global processes of capital production and many foreign businesses were attracted to Trafford. By 1933 over 300 American firms had bases in Trafford Park. With widespread laying-off of textile workers in the two decades after the Great War of 1914-18, Manchester came to depend more than ever on its distribution infrastructure to meet consumer demand and as a base of the economy. Consumption in the era of the Post-Fordist city was related to a fragmented niche market and there was the promotion of consumption cultures that promoted the concept of individual taste and distinctions occurred due to the lifestyle that consumers chose, however these mainly excluded the working class. Extensive suburban development continued to occur and throughout many cities across the world there was great diversity amongst the industries that emerged and it therefore conservative political regimes were those responsible for shaping the cities development. (Pacione)
Deindustrialization is the process by which a or moves from a -based to a , and is marked by an increase in . An examples of deindustrialization include: particularly the city of Manchester in the . Previously Manchester was the global center of textile manufacturing but was subject to a long period of decline culminating in the 1980s, as the industry shifted to countries in , and . In this time the Post-Industrial City emerged and this is a city dominated by services. Trafford Park was hard hit by the decline of the Manchester Ship Canal and the closure of the Port of Manchester in the 1960s and 1970s reflected the depression in the Park's fortunes. Trafford Park, as a result began to see a steady trickle of industry away from it, so that in February 1987 the Trafford Development Corporation was hastily brought into existence in an attempt to stem the outflow and to attract new business to the region. Trafford Park, Manchester - the world’s first industrial estate – was transformed thanks to the work of Trafford Park Development Corporation. During eleven years of successful regeneration, TPDC attracted 1,000 companies, 28,299 new jobs and £1.759 billion of private sector investment. There has been a complete turnaround, as the M62 and M60 motorways now fulfil a similar function to those provided in the fordist and post-fordist era’s; the Park has once again found itself connected to the rest of the world. Today there is a distinct sense of revival to Trafford Park and the key aspects of the development process have been passed on to development corporations across the city. Not only was the Trafford Park Development Corporation successful in attracting manufacturing and high-tech industries but it also achieved in attracting leisure and retail industries. The prestigious new award winning has been built on the site of the old derelict docks; the now stands defiantly facing the Lowry; the retail and leisure park built at Dumplington - all signs of regeneration and new life back to the former deer park at Trafford. All these places provide spaces, facilities and goods for people to consume. (Cloke et al, 1999)
Despite the industrial decline in Manchester, its central business district was to organisations and development corporations’ important fixed capital in terms of land and buildings. Harvey suggested that the process of revalorising the city centre was based on a re-emphasis on the importance of centrality and also the attempt to mobilise culture to lure back the capital into the city centre. This lead to the creation of a post-modern city in which the city is orientated around consumption, this is supported by Featherstone (1991):
‘A new significance was attached to the reorganising city centres around consumption rather than production, in which the emphasis was on consumer goods and leisure time activities that incorporate high levels of design, style and fashionable cultural imagery.’
For Manchester, the IRA bomb in its Arndale Centre in 1996 accelerated this process. Out of that tragedy grew a resolve and an urgency to refashion the centre of the city and this was mainly through the work of Manchester Development Corporation and Manchester City Council Strategic Plan 2002-2005. The central government also played a role in the redevelopment when it set aside £1million of European Union finance and set in place a master plan for the redevelopment of the City Centre. They have also provided £150,000 to support an international urban design competition, which was launched just one month after the bombing, and which provided a cohesive plan for rebuilding. In terms of consumption one of the ways in which gentrification physically manifests itself is via the appearance of exclusive designer boutiques and stores selling expensive goods. ‘The most extreme example of the gentrification of consumption in Manchester was the replacement of the Corn Exchange (which housed various market stalls selling everything from military memorabilia, to second hand records, comics and knives) with the Triangle (which sells nothing but luxury goods from champagne, to Calvin Klein underwear to nail manicures)‘ (Massey, 2005). A key feature of the development of the city of Manchseter into a post-modernism city is that the public and private sectors work in partnerships inorder to develop the city and provide a provision of services. The revitalisation of cities has not been without some critisism and they accuse property developers and multi-national corporations of creating standardised consumption and entertainment spaces. These include shopping centres and leisure complexes such as the Arndale Centre and the Printworks, in Manchester. The realtionship that the post-modern city is a result from is that of the influence on consumption in providing a patern in which corporations have exploited in order to develop the city and attract capital back into the central business district.
Consumption underpins the images, sounds, smells and sights of the contempory world. These terms for many theorists, the increasing and differentiated consumption opportunities have become the defining characteristics of 21st Century life.
In the case of Manchester it is clear that the city has experienced the same shifts as many cities: from an industrial to post-industrial economy, with a decline in manufacturing and more importance placed on the role of the cultural economy. Governments regulate and control consumption on several levels; they are responsible for allowing people access to collectively consumed services through the provision of healthcare, education and housing. (Cloke et al, 1999). The government are also partly responsible for the mass consumption of products that occurred in the fordist era, through the development of the city to compete in the industry worldwide. However it is also important to consider the effects of Henry Ford on the influence on consumers as he was the pioneer of affordable goods, this alongside the banks ability to give credit made goods more affordable to all. Suburban development also increased consumption with the development of decentralised industry and living. Commodity fetishism developed and people would compete socially to purchase the ‘best’ consumer goods. (Knox and Pinch, 1982). It hasn’t however always been that development has influence consumption, as in the case of the post-industrial city development took place around the basis of consumer needs. Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Shopping Centres, Markets and Leisure Parks all became spaces of consumption. Consumption habits changed from that of mass consumption to an individual level of consumption in which people have created an identity for themselves through purchasing hand-made and original goods. ‘Consumption has become so engrained in both political and institutional visions, planning and policy regimes and our everyday lives that consumption is not simply about goods and services but is central to our vision of the city, the very idea of a city.’ (Jayne, 2005)
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