The Point of Production: Work Environment in Advanced Industrial Societies - Softcover

Levenstein, Charles; Wooding, John

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1572304472 ISBN 13: 9781572304475

Publisher: The Guilford Press, 1999

Synopsis

How do science and politics interact in the definition of work- related injury and disease? How is worker safety affected by the overall power relations within society? The world today faces bewildering new choices about technology use, the organization of work, and methods of production. Far from taking place in a vacuum, these choices have life-and-death implications for working people and communities. This book integrates theory, data, and case examples to analyze workplace health and safety battles and the roles of such key players as labor, public health professionals, management, regulatory bodies, and the state. The book examines the point of production--where raw materials are fashioned into products--situating issues of occupational and environmental health within their political, economic, and social context. Providing an alternative to classical economic explanations, the authors also take a fresh new look at the point of production. They critically explore the rationale that guides industrial decision making, and propose ways to ameliorate its human costs.

About this title

About the Author

John Wooding, PhD, is Associate Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Department of Regional, Economic and Social Development at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell. Charles Levenstein, PhD, is Professor of Work Environment Policy at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, Adjunct Professor of Community Health at Tufts University Medical School, and Director of the Harvard Lowell Visiting Scholars in Occupational Health Program. Together, they coedited the 1997 book, Work, Health, and Environment: Old Problems, New Solutions.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

1. The Point of Production
2. The Political Economy of the Work Environment
3. Technology and the Work Environment
4. The Social and Political Context of the Work Environment
5. The Politics of Regulation
6. The Politics of Workers' Compensation
7. The Politics of Occupational Health Science
8. Work Health, and Democracy [T]

Edition details

• Publisher: The Guilford Press
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1572304472
• ISBN 13: 9781572304475
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 166