Samuel Bostaph wrote:  
>----------------- HES POSTING -----------------  
>But the English common law was a legal "spontaneous order," as are all  
>common law systems.  
>  
>And, I don't understand Peter's deeming the division of labor in the pin  
>factory part of "a vast hierarchical command system."  The division of labor  
>in any economy is an example of an absolute economic law--more can be  
>produced by employing the division of labor than can be produced in its  
>absence.  It works in a command economy or a laissez faire market economy.  
>  
>Perhaps Peter could explain what he means by "command system."  
  
  
See Steven Marglin's "What do Bosses Do?" The   
misnamed division labor is not an efficient   
production technique, and any "efficiency" it   
gains is lost in the inefficiency of added   
management overhead. I call it misnamed because   
it is really the "specialization" and   
"de-skilling" of labor, which also means that   
labor losses any political and economic power.   
The division of labor simply means that one man   
is a carpenter and another a cobbler. In Smith's   
pin-factory, men who were pin-makers are now   
confined to a few simple tasks, or to one. Smith   
himself backtracked on this and recognized the   
problem in the second edition of the Wealth of   
Nations. Current trends in job design, by the   
way, abandon the specialization of labor in order   
to give wider scope and greater freedom to   
workers, thereby improving productivity while reducing management overhead.  
  
When our work is confined to one or two simple   
operations, then there is little opportunity for   
growth and development. Smith himself came to   
recognize this problem; in the second edition of   
his great work, he added the following qualification to his theory:  
  
"In the progress of the division of labour, the   
employment of the far greater part of those who   
live by labour� comes to be confined to a few   
very simple operations, frequently to one or two�   
The man whose whole life is spent in performing a   
few simple operations� has no occasion to exert   
his understanding or to exercise his invention in   
finding out expedients for removing difficulties   
which never occur. He naturally loses, therefore,   
the habit of such exertion, and generally becomes   
as stupid and ignorant as it is possible for a human creature to become."[1]  
  
This loss of innovative spirit leads to a third   
difficulty. As men cease to be �pin-makers� and   
become instead �wire-pullers� or �sharpeners� or   
one of the other eighteen jobs involved in the   
process, then knowledge of the process is lost   
among the workers. This means, in turn, that a   
new function is required, that of the   
professional manager. When men had knowledge of   
the whole process, then �management� was a minor   
consideration, and any one of the workers could,   
in theory, manage the process; management was a   
negligible expense. But with the loss of   
knowledge, management becomes the decisive factor   
and a huge overhead cost. Any gains in efficiency   
from the division of labor is lost to the need   
for increased management overhead.  
  
Smith placed a dichotomy between minute   
specialization and the crafting of each separate   
pin. But this is a false dichotomy; it was never   
a case of one person making one pin at a time   
versus a group of specialists making thousands.   
Rather, it is a question of the sequencing of the   
tasks, whether by a few craftsmen or by a group   
of specialists. The real efficiencies come from   
properly sequencing the tasks. Thus, a single   
craftsman who draws out all the wire for a batch   
at one time, then straightens the whole batch,   
then cuts the wire, etc., will achieve the same   
efficiencies as does the division of labor.[1]   
The division of labor succeeds not because of the   
specialization of jobs, but because it also   
sequences the tasks. This sequencing eliminates   
the set-up times between tasks, one of the three   
reasons that Smith claimed for the superiority of   
the division of labor. The other two were the   
dexterity that a worker acquires when doing a   
single task and the amount of innovation that   
specialized labor brings to the assembly line.   
The argument for the former is unconvincing; a   
craftsman becomes accomplished at the various   
tasks of his trade without being forced to specialize.  
  
As for the latter argument, innovation brought   
about by specialization, the opposite seems to be   
the case: specialization decreases innovation, as   
Smith himself came to recognize when he noted   
that the specialized worker loses the habit of   
innovation and becomes �as stupid� as it is   
possible for a human being to become.� A   
craftsman might, for example, notice that the   
pulling, straightening, and cutting of the wire   
might be combined, with a few mechanical changes,   
into one operation. The specialist either doesn't   
notice this, or if he does, he fears it because   
it means the elimination of two jobs. This is   
borne out by the history of industry in the 19th   
and 20th centuries, when workers opposed or even   
sabotaged machinery precisely because they   
perceived, often quite correctly, that such   
innovations were not in their best interests. Of   
course, there has been a great deal of innovation   
in industry, but it does not ordinarily arise   
from the division of labor. Rather, it depends on   
the fact that inventors are granted a monopoly   
for a period of time in the form of a patent.[2]  
  
Recognizing the true source of industrial   
efficiency gives us tremendous freedom in job   
design. The division of labor concentrates on   
separation and isolation, reducing the worker to   
a �cog� in the assembly line. It therefore loses   
most of the values that the worker can   
contribute, save for the value of his   
muscle-power. Thus it throws away one of the most   
important assets of a firm.  The separation of   
tasks, on the other hand, allows us to design   
jobs that call for a greater development of the   
worker and hence for more productivity.   
Management overhead can be greatly reduced, and a   
workforce more knowledgeable about the process   
can contribute more in the way of innovations.   
The shop floor workers can be the authors of   
their own jobs. And with such �authorship� comes   
a kind of authority. We can begin, at this point,   
to see the outlines of possible solutions to the problem of low wages.  
  
In short, the "division of labor" is one of those   
"absolute economic laws" which turn out to be,   
upon inspection, absolute nonsense.  
  
  
[1] Ibid.  
  
[1] Stephen A. Marglin, "What Do Bosses Do? The   
Origins and Functions of Hierarchy in Capitalist   
Production," The Review of Radical Political Economics 6, no. 2 (1974): 70.  
[2] Ibid.: 90. Monopolies are not necessarily the   
best way to ensure the flow of inventions. As   
Stephen Marglin notes, �An invention, like   
knowledge generally, is a �public good�: the use   
of an idea by one person does not reduce the   
stock of knowledge in the way that consumption of   
a loaf of bread reduces the stock of wheat. It is   
well understood that public goods cannot be   
efficiently distributed through the market   
mechanism; so patents cannot be defended on   
efficiency grounds.� Two counter-examples to   
patents suffice to make the point. For the first,   
recall the revival of agriculture in the 9th and   
10th centuries, a revival which depended on an   
explosion of innovation, none of which was   
patented and all of which were freely shared. But   
the wealth of the high Middle Ages and the   
expansion of trade and urban life depended on   
these innovations. A second example comes from   
our own time with the success of open systems   
software, such as Linux, where nobody has an   
exclusive right and any improvements to the   
system must be offered free of charge.  
  
  
John C. Medaille