Total Quality Management: Anti-Union Trojan Horse or Management Albatross?

This article examines a co-operative union-management approach towards Total Quality Management (TQM) by recourse to a case study from the auto components manufacturing sector. Its purpose is twofold; first, it suggests that in contrast to much critical thinking, under certain conditions TQM need not undermine trade unions. Indeed, it is argued that a more moderate trade union stance towards TQM, in some circumstances, may prove to be a more effective form of resistance than a militant one. Second, the article provides insights into the ways in which TQM reinforces existing power relations, hierarchical structures, organisational bureaucracy and inequality, rather than transforming them as TQM pundits contend. The argument, however, is not that TQM simply enhances management control in a unilinear fashion. This is because it not only poses dangers for trade unions, but also presents management with dilemmas and contradictions. TQM is understood, therefore, to be part of the continuing and complex effort by management to balance control and consent within employment, the dynamics, and outcomes of which, are uncertain and need to be empirically examined.