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A number of popular commentaries in recent years have contended that the emergence of an advanced, platform-oriented digital economy marks the end of capitalism as such. This paper evaluates these claims from theorists such as Mckenzie Wark and Yannis Varoufakis. Ultimately the paper suggests that a more useful and plausible alternative to them is to be found in the Regulation School assertion that 'platform capitalism' constitutes a new 'regime of accumulation': a successor to 'Fordism' and 'post-Fordism'. The paper explains the historical origins of this approach, arguing for its continued usefulness and its compatibility with important recent developments in institutional, technological and media sociology. It explains the compatibility of an approach characterising 'platform capitalism' as a new regime of accumulation with a range of other perspectives on both 'platformization' and contemporary capitalism, and discusses both recent changes to popular music culture and broad trends in populist politics in recent decades as exemplifying cultural, social and political features of platform capitalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I look at the relationship between human olfaction, digital platforms, and everyday media practices in contemporary capitalist contexts. In the first section, I map what I describe as interfaced anosmia, or the absence of smell from mundane media devices. This absence is especially glaring given how olfaction uniquely lends itself to certain mediated forms of affective modulation. In the second section, I look at the platformization of the luxury fragrance industry, across three sites of analysis to reveal how, despite the conditions of interfaced anosmia, smell has already been shaped on and by platforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article deploys the material metaphor of "flat surface" to read the unexpected cross-modal affinities between amateurish cover design and professional storytelling in Chinese web novels. Canvassing the ways visual and verbal artifacts put into play metaphoric associations with "flat surface," this essay interprets the popular fascination with flatness as a symptom of China's alignment with ubiquitous computing in its transition to a post-Fordist cultural economy when the world is increasingly conceived as a flat horizon. The author first exhibits a selection of spoof covers and argues that their willful indulgence in two-dimensionality is an antidote to the uncanny similarity of illusionist covers born out of what Mario Carpo calls "mass customization" in the digital era. Then the author turns to examine the web novel Zhuixu 赘婿 (Matrilocal Son-in-Law) by Fennu de Xiangjiao 愤怒的香蕉 (Angry Banana), a highly acclaimed alternate history fiction with a curiously lousy cover, focusing on how Angry Banana's cover designs and narrative storytelling convey the flattening effect. The author attributes the fascination with flatness to the rise of post-Fordism in China's cultural economy by demonstrating how the protagonist in Zhuixu succeeds in flattening "all under heaven" (tianxia 天下) by way of nonhumanizing his existence and weaponizing an internet of things (IoT) while embracing a post-Fordist network of work, life, and governance. Finally, the author furnishes a few more examples to suggest the broader trends toward flatness in Chinese web novels and concludes by discussing the critical edge of the metaphor of flatness in its applicability to post-Fordist cultural analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Profil súèasného výtvarného umenia / Contemporary Art Magazine is the property of Kruh Sucasneho Umenia Profil and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

IntroductionThe prevalence of modern consumption in recent years is a significant phenomenon and an environmental factor that has influenced both society and politics. Although modern consumption has been somewhat addressed in sociological research in Iran, it seems there is no serious research about its impact on politics and power. In this respect, the current study adopted the perspective of political sociology in order to analyze the impact of modern consumption on the broader domains of politics and power in Iran. The purpose of the research was to examine the sociopolitical consequences of modern consumption in contemporary Iran, shedding light on the underlying logic of current sociopolitical developments. This approach could offer a series of analytical possibilities to understand the dynamics of transformation and change in Iran’s sociopolitical landscape today, and particularly to identify the latent potential for protest in Iranian society.Materials and MethodsThis study used Peter Wagner’s sociology of modernity and Jean Baudrillard’s ideas about consumer society as the theoretical framework. Moreover, it relied on the insights drawn from Pierre Guiraud’s semiotics as the method of analysis. The integration provided a theoretical foundation and an appropriate research method. The method of semiotics was used to explore the signs of modern consumption in contemporary Iran and its implications. In this context, the analysis situated the phenomenon of pretentious consumption in relation to the third wave of modernity.Results and DiscussionAccording to the findings, the prevalence of consumption, as a seemingly minor aspect of lifestyle and daily life in Iranian society, has led to the commodification of social relations and politics. This has contributed to reinforcing the welfare aspects of the state in Iran, thereby both weakening the possibility of authoritarianism and making the legitimacy of the political system increasingly dependent on consumption. While consolidating Iran’s position on the margins of the global division of labor, this phenomenon may also facilitate identity fragmentation, foster a sense of relative deprivation, and give rise to new variants within social movements. Therefore, despite the ongoing prevalence of modern consumption in Iran, not only does the prospect of development remain uncertain, but the deepening sense of relative deprivation—especially considering the identity-related impacts—may further increase the ruptures in Iran’s sociopolitical developments. In this context, the potential for protest in Iranian society is likely to persist.ConclusionTo manage the consequences of modern consumption, efforts should focus on making its costs real. The government should only support the necessary consumption of society, focusing on essential needs and basic goods. Moreover, eliminating visible and hidden subsidies can help realize the true costs of modern consumption. Additionally, revitalizing intellectual and cultural spaces—such as promoting free thought, establishing intellectual forums, and encouraging cultural activities—can be an effective way to manage the consequences of modern consumption in Iran. There is an inverse relationship between the growth of intellectual and cultural activities and the growth of commodification. Promoting intellectual and cultural activities can help slow down the pace of commodification. Another important step is to restore the dignity and status of traditional, yet qualified, intellectual and cultural authorities. Less influenced by commodification, these figures typically embody intellectual, cultural, and educational values, so they can help cultivate virtues in society. This in turn can counteract consumerism and commodification. The media, particularly radio and television, play an irreplaceable role in this effort. They should focus more on promoting values such as work, effort, and bio-culture, rather than purely bio-economic concerns. The government should also shift its position in Iran’s socioeconomic system as the dominant owner and exclusive holder of privileges. It is recommended that future research explore other aspects of modern consumption in Iran, particularly the underlying causes of its prevalence, as well as the potential political developments that could arise due to modern consumption.

Copyright of Leviathan: Zeitschrift für Sozialwissenschaft (Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG) is the property of Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper analyzes three labor documentaries released from 1989 to 1991, which depict the United States' assumed transition from a Fordist to post-Fordist economy. Feminist textual analysis focuses on the depiction of workplaces and gender roles in Roger and Me, American Dream, and Fast Food Women. The analysis demonstrated that discourses of epochal change in the context only held true if one looked at a slice of the U.S. labor market largely dominated by White men. Focusing on feminine sex-typed labor demonstrated the worst elements of industrial Fordism remained in post-Fordist workplaces. Long-standing sexual divisions of labor were unambiguously repeated in post-Fordist work and intensified in a discussion of the family wage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Agora (0211-6642) is the property of Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Servicio de Publicaciones and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Mülkiye Dergisi is the property of Mulkiye Dergisi and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

According to Lipovetsky and Serroy, beauty has risen to a new ontological requirement: the aesthetic phenomenon has expanded beyond its traditional boundaries, influencing reality and above all the economic dimension. The result has been an art market in which the aesthetic work responds to unprecedented hierarchies of value and the author finds himself assuming professional postures fueled by innovative deontologies. This contribution intends to investigate the transformations that the aesthetic job undergoes within the late capitalist and post-Fordist logic through a close reading of Michel Houellebecq's La carte et le territoire. In the novel it is possible to observe the professional attitudes of three different artists: the photographer and painter Jed Martin, the fictional writer Michel Houellebecq and - through a metanarrative refraction - the narrator Michel Houellebecq. All three face the professionalization of the artistic activity oscillating between the poles of a dialectic that is difficult to resolve between artisanal and industrial work, creativity and methodicalness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores how the adoption of management ideas is conditioned by wider macro-level mentalities that are not company based but that instead reflect professionally or nationally rooted ways of managing. Drawing from studies on professional mentalities and practices, we study Finnish top executives working in globally operating multinational corporations in the metal and forestry industries, showing how, starting in the 1980s, they adopted new management practices during the rise of globalisation, market liberalisation and post-Fordism. Altogether, a traditional engineering mentality strongly conditioned the dissemination of new management ideas, which needed to adapt with the existing mentality. As a result, we find three ways of management idea dissemination: (a) new ideas had to fit in with the old business elite mentality, (b) new ideas were side-lined and belittled by the old mentality and (c) new ideas were smuggled into management by reframing and widening the old mentality. By extending Guillén's work on elite mentalities, the study contributes to the research on management ideas by exploring the role of societal macro-level mentalities in management learning, highlighting their role in times of societal transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Mülkiye Dergisi is the property of Mulkiye Dergisi and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Ireland's economy is currently characterized by two phenomena: a highly globalized growth regime predicated on multinational corporate profit-shifting, and a domestic economy (concentrated in the capital, Dublin) experiencing severe housing crisis. This paper links these two phenomena together, and argues that they be considered as evidence of the emergence of a new accumulation regime, in which a specific mode of integration within the global economy both favours the emergence of, and embeds, particular patterns of domestic rent exploitation. To demonstrate this the paper combines a new synthesis of French régulation theory, as modified to account for transnational dynamics, with an updated reading of Gramsci's analysis of (pre-Fordist) rent exploitation, applying this framework to redefine Ireland's growth model as an emerging transnational accumulation regime of rentier character. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Max Weber has left a 100-page long text that played a main role in his argumentation on the particular development of Europe in contrast to especially Asia. Main difference, according to Weber, is the development of a 'local society' where freedom and the association of free citizens laid the ground for a democratic society. In the reception of this text, a critical view on main assumptions on the 'European city' has been dominant. In particular, the notions of conflict and inequality have not been integrated into his argumentation. Nevertheless, some sociologists even today, see Weber and his text as a kind of starting point to understand the social and political construction of urban societies in Europe. Firstly, a critical introduction into the core ideas of Weber on the city will be presented. Subsequently, the article discusses whether the 'European city' can still be regarded as a meaningful term to explain the process of urban restructuring taking place today. Although not rejecting the Weberian notion of the city, it will be highlighted that his understanding of 'urban society' leaves out recent processes of the post-Fordist restructuring of space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At a time when corporate sponsorship of contemporary art has become increasingly widespread, allowing sponsors to enhance their brands and receive return on investment in the shape of tax breaks and publicity, business has maximized this association by also capitalizing on what it perceives as the work ethic and entrepreneurial skills of the art world. The art world has indeed become a benchmark of production and management for the business world which praises its ever-youthful energy, its inventiveness, hipness, and sense of freedom, its flexible working hours and short-term or zero-hour contracts. Following the success of the creative industries, private companies have been keen to embrace this post-Fordist work model and link it to the global neoliberal market economy. This article looks into the way different performance artists have engaged with a corporate environment, but also more generally at the way art has navigated new relations with its economic context in recent years. And since performance management is largely the result of the export of American business models to Western Europe since World War II, it makes sense to look for the roots of this phenomenon on that side of the Atlantic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Relevance. The paper examines the transformation of the nature of employment and working life in the framework of the formation of a new technological and resource space in the post-Fordist era. The analysis of changes in the socially significant qualities of mass participants in economic relations (employees and employers, entrepreneurs) is given. New characteristics of the subjects of post-Fordist labor are determined, which other actors must take into account when constructing their expectations and labor interactions, with regard to employees` new social and role specifics. The aim of the study is to present the evolution of views on the nature of transformation of the character of employment and working life when changing technological paradigms based on the identification of competing theories, taking into account the established new labor practices that are characteristic of modern capitalism. The main research method is the systematization, analysis and generalization of scientific theories of Russian and foreign authors. The results of the study are a critical analysis of the individual interpretative abilities of the Fordist worker, which do not yet have a market value, which determine his opportunistic behavior and the growth of production costs. On the contrary, the post-Fordist worker, being involved in the information flow and exchange, has new resource characteristics, reduces his labor activity to a means of self-affirmation, as well as temporary and casual employment, and is ready for change. The conclusions are that the lack of a clear differentiation of the new social role of the post-Fordist worker leads to contradictions in social and labor relations and requires social security. The scientific community needs to make more efforts to study the autopoietic aspects of the quality of working life. In the post-Fordist era, the concepts of «social» and «state» are becoming less and less reliable for ensuring the quality of people’s working life and its population diversity, which puts forward on the current agenda, on the one hand, the entrepreneurialization of everyday, and not just economic life, and, on the other, responsibilization of individuals in the process of complicated and unstable interactions.

Precarity has been consolidated as a central concept in theoretical and political discussions around labour market(s) and labour relations and conditions. Moreover, it has strongly been linked with specific sociodemographic groups, prominently with youth. Both theory and empirical evidence have suggested that precarity functions as a necessary step towards integration in the labour market, as a kind of indispensable rite of passage to labour adulthood. Nevertheless, despite its resonance, precarity remains a fuzzy buzzword that needs to be further problematized and evidenced. Focusing on a specific case study, that of Greece, we try to unfold a two-fold approach: to define and measure precarious forms of labour at the level/scale of the labour market as a whole and to detect and disentangle the role of age in specific sectors of economic activity where precarious labour is more prominent than in others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Filozofija i Drustvo is the property of University of Belgrade, Institute for Philosophy & Social Theory and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Cuadernos del Centro de Estudios de Diseño y Comunicación is the property of Cuadernos del Centro de Estudios de Diseno y Comunicacion and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Even though flexibility, insecurity and precarity characterise much of today's work, the promise of self-realisation through work remains as powerful as ever. Following Weeks' work on the post-Fordist work ethic and Hochschild's research on feeling rules, this article analyses how young women negotiate the post-Fordist work ethic and its emotional obligations. Drawing on interviews with 39 young women studying in the care and media fields in Finland, the article proposes the conceptualisation of post-Fordist feeling rules as a way to capture how young women become workers by managing contemporary work's emotional requirements and contradictions. This article adds to the sociology of youth and labour in the post-Fordist era by foregrounding the role of feelings in the production of youth as workers and unpacking the post-Fordist work ethic's gendered, industry-specific and emotional dimensions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Praktyka Teoretyczna is the property of University of Wroclaw and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article weaves together the ascendancy of financial markets and the field of critical criminology. It argues that critical perspectives such as crimes of the powerful and crimes of globalization may benefit from analyzing financialization as a key economic and cultural transformation in today's capitalism. The analysis of financialization is made through the literature that addresses the economic transformations of capitalist accumulation, thus framing finance capital in the post-Fordist regime of production. By using this perspective, this article develops the argument that the cyclical speculative waves of finance are not a congenital pathology of capitalism but its very mode of governmentality. Overall, this article claims the analytic potential of financialization studies to deepen our understanding of the social and environmental harms produced by powerful corporations and financial institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quality control tools such as certification are the critical infrastructure of sustainable tourism that facilitate triple bottom-line outcomes. Prior scholarship investigates tool adoption, but examination of discontinuance is absent. Using Diffusion of Innovations Theory, we investigate the diversity of discontinuance among practitioners in a destination by tool type, discontinuance manifestations, and influential attributes. Semistructured interviews revealed selective tool discontinuance and salient influence of relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, and observability attributes. Conventional replacement and disenchantment discontinuance manifestations were augmented by emergent induced, episodic, and recalibration forms and organized along an original typology from pure discontinuance to retention. Findings suggest practitioner alignment with "post-Fordist" sustainable tourism. Implications for tool counterdiffusion are assimilated into ongoing discourses of sustainable tourism theory and practice. Prospects for tool-specific attributes also emerge, for the first time, and when paired with those theoretical can inform an entirely novel realm of supply-side tool design; practical applications are illustrated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The future is not what it used to be. A new strain of futurism has taken over the stage of global science-fiction: one whose understanding of the future cannot be distinguished from its understanding of the present. Gone are the days when extraterrestrials in shiny, extravagant outfits mastered fascinating technologies that flirted with magic. Characters in Charlie Brooker's Black Mirror (2015–2020) dress like us, and the dystopian technology they put up with is, for the most part, a technology that has existed for years. Armando Iannucci's imagining of a space cruise for rich people in Avenue 5 (2020) overlaps with Elon Musk's actual plans of sending wealthy tourists to the moon, while Albert Robida's visionary téléphonoscope (1879) amounts to a sad reminder of our everyday Zoom call. Is not the current COVID-19 crisis the blueprint to the ultimate post-apocalyptic script? Spanish filmmaker Juan Antonio Bayona noted in a recent interview that Steve Soderbergh's Contagion (2011), originally labeled as a sci-fi movie by IMDB, is now a drama according to the same internet portal. Science is not fiction anymore, which means at least two different things: that science has lost the power to convey the kind of awe that may be later turned into fiction, and that fiction seems to be unable to inspire a narrative of scientific or—broadly speaking—human progress. How can we retrieve the emancipatory value of progress in good old futuristic sci-fi when the future coincides with the present? What should cultural production look like to help us imagine an alternative to financial capitalism in the face of the impossibility of utopia? The answer, I will claim, resides in Franco Berardi's concept of "futurability". This paper explores the limits of this concept by reading side by side Javier Olivares' and Pablo Olivares' The Ministry of Time (2015) and Oriol Paulo's Mirage (2018). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Hacettepe Law Review is the property of Hacettepe Law Review and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The socio-economic phenomenon of post-Fordism strengthened the growing Japanese economy since the 1970s. However, the economic recession in the 1990s led to the birth of the precariat in Japan. A country known for permanent employment and long-term stability was replaced by policies that enabled a new class of temporary workers. These vulnerable part-time employees, also called freeters, are victims of anxiety and social pressure. They led a life of insecurity and hopelessness. This ontological vulnerability prevalent in modern workplaces has profound repercussions on gender relations and identity formation and attempts to resist and expose these hegemonic powers shape the central theme in Sayaka Murata's deadpan comedy Convenience Store Woman (2018). The protagonist Keiko, a freeter herself, struggles to live up to the societal expectations of marriage, motherhood, and a stable career. The workspace, which the protagonist of the novel considers as her safest place despite being a forcibly normalised environment, could not hold its illusion of stability for long as it becomes a precarious space of crisis. Precarity experienced under post-Fordist capitalism forces institutionalised forms of recognition where the performances of identities are regulated and constructed to ensure survival. The textuality of the workspace in the novel parallels the world outside of it, making the convenience store a microcosm for the capitalist world after globalisation. With Judith Butler's studies on gender performativity and precariousness, and textual analysis of the novel, the authors of this paper study how anxiety-ridden precarious living conditions can also become a foundation for alternative performances troubling gender categories, thereby transcending the narrow social scripts rooted in exclusion and inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Central Asian Journal of Art Studies is the property of Central Asian Journal of Art Studies and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The purpose of this article is to analyze the problem of non-professional creativity in contemporary self-help literature. Creativity, an element of work organization in the post-Fordist era, has been the subject of many critical analyses. I focus on creativity as it appears in everyday life, with the support of an examination of self-help handbooks that refer to far-east traditions, at the same time being critical of the Western lifestyle. Self-help literature is viewed here as a tool aiding the neoliberal governmentality of society. I am most of all interested in how contemporary discourse on non-professional creativity promotes technologies of autonomy aimed at the production of responsible and self-sufficient individuals. I argue that creativity is today a key mechanism of governance. It is not limited to the professional sphere but is playing an increasing role in our private lives. It is used to produce more elusive and flexible forms of self-governance than more openly repressive forms of power (based on top-down order and control).