Flexible production process where production happens at dispersed locations is known as:
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 4
The correct answer is Option (4) → Post-Fordism
Option (1) Structural adjustment — Incorrect. Structural adjustment is a policy of economic measures that a government commits itself to when it takes loans from international institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF). These adjustments usually mean cuts in state expenditure on the social sector such as health, education and social security. It is an economic policy, not a way of organising production.
Option (2) Fordism — Incorrect. Fordism is the opposite: the mass production of goods at a centralised location, in one large factory.
Option (3) Taylorism — Incorrect. Taylorism, or ‘Scientific Management’, breaks all work into its smallest repetitive elements, divides them between workers and times them with stopwatches. It is a way of controlling work inside a workplace, not of spreading production over many places.
Option (4) Post-Fordism — Correct. Instead of mass production at a centralised location, we have moved to a system of flexible production at dispersed locations (post-Fordism). Nike’s shoes were made in Japan, then in South Korea, then in Thailand and Indonesia and later in India: production moves wherever labour is cheaper, which leaves workers vulnerable and insecure.
NCERT (2025-26): “Globalisation and a New International Division of Labour … Labour costs grew in South Korea, so in the 1980s production widened to Thailand and Indonesia. Since the 1990s we in India produce Nike. However, if labour is cheaper elsewhere production centres will move somewhere else. This entire process makes the labouring population very vulnerable and insecure. This flexibility of labour often works in favour of the producers. Instead of mass production of goods at a centralised location (Fordism), we have moved to a system of flexible production at dispersed locations (post-Fordism).” “…The process of liberalisation also involved the taking of loans from international institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF). These loans are given on certain conditions. The government makes commitments to pursue certain kind of economic measures that involve a policy of structural adjustments. These adjustments usually mean cuts in state expenditure on the social sector such as health, education and social security.…” |