Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-mwx4w Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-01T09:14:05.820Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Advanced Manufacturing and Mexico: A New International Division of Labor?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 October 2022

Harley Shaiken*
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Much of the intense debate over the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has focused on the number and kinds of jobs that Mexico could gain and the United States could lose as a result of more extensive economic integration (Faux and Lee 1992; Hufbauer and Schott 1993; Lustig, Bosworth, and Lawrence 1992; Weintraub 1993). This debate has raised the related issue of the nature of Mexico's industrial capability, a topic that predates NAFTA and will remain central regardless of the final outcome of the treaty. This article will explore that capability by focusing on a key question: Is Mexico a potential site for high-tech production or does its comparative advantage lie in labor-intensive low-tech operations?

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © 1994 by the University of Texas Press

Footnotes

*

Research for this article was supported by a contract from the U.S. Congress Office of Technology Assessment as part of the U.S.-Mexico, Technology, Trade, and Investment Project.

References

Altshuler, Alan, Anderson, Martin, Jones, Daniel, Roos, Daniel, AND Womack, James P. 1984 The Future of the Automobile. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Google Scholar
AMIA (ASOCIACION MEXICANA DE LA INDUSTRIA AUTOMOTRIZ) 1988 La industria automotriz de México en cifras. Mexico City: AMIA.Google Scholar
AMIA (ASOCIACION MEXICANA DE LA INDUSTRIA AUTOMOTRIZ) 1992 AMIA Bulletin, no. 313 (January).Google Scholar
Baker, Stephen 1992 “Detroit South, Mexico's Auto Boom: Who Wins, Who Loses.” Business Week, 16 Mar.:98.Google Scholar
Blecker, Robert 1992 Beyond the Twin Deficits. Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Carrillo V., Jorge 1989Reestructuración en la industria automotriz en México: políticas de ajuste e implicaciones laborales.” Working paper. Tijuana, B.C.: Colegio de la Frontera Norte.Google Scholar
Carrillo V., Jorge, AND Micheli, Jordy 1990Organización flexible y capacitación en el trabajo: un estudio de caso.” Working paper. Mexico City: Friedrich Ebert Stiftung.Google Scholar
Dominguez Villalobos, Lilia, AND Grossman, Flor Brown 1990Nuevas technologías y división internacional del trabajo: el caso de la industria maquiladora de exportación.” In Subcontratación empresas trasnacionales: apertura y reestructuración en la maquiladora, edited by Arechiga, Bernardo Gonzales and RamÍRez, JosÉ Carlos. Tijuana: Colegio de la Frontera Norte.Google Scholar
Faux, Jeff, AND Lee, Thea 1992The Effect of George Bush's NAFTA on American Workers: Ladder Up or Ladder Down?” Briefing paper. Washington, D.C.: Economics Policy Institute.Google Scholar
Florida, Richard, AND Kenney, Martin 1991Transplanted Organizations: The Transfer of Japanese Industrial Organization to the United States.” American Sociological Review 56, no. 3 (June):381–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
HARBOUR AND ASSOCIATES 1992 The Harbour Report: Competitive Assessment of the North American Automotive Industry, 1989–1992. Troy, Mich.: Harbour and Associates.Google Scholar
Hufbauer, Gary Clyde, AND Schott, Jeffrey J. 1993 NAFTA: An Assessment. Washington, D.C.: Institute for International Economics.Google Scholar
Johnson, Chalmers 1988Japanese-Style Management in America.” California Management Review 30, no. 4. (Summer):35–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koike, Kazuo 1990Skill Formation on the Shop Floor in Contemporary Japan.” Paper presented at the “International Symposium on Workforce Quality: Perspectives from the U.S. and Japan,” sponsored by the U.S. Department of Labor and the Japanese Ministry of Labor, Washington D.C., 7–8 November.Google Scholar
Koike, Kazuo, AND Inoki, Takenori 1990 Skill Formation in Japan and Southeast Asia. Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press.Google Scholar
Krafcik, John F. 1988Triumph of the Lean Production System.” Sloan Management Review 30, no. 1 (Fall):4152.Google Scholar
Leos, Mauro 1993Mexican Auto Industry Outlook under NAFTA, 1994–2003.” Paper presented at the Seventh Conference of the Society of Automotive Analysts, Mexico City, 11–14 May.Google Scholar
Lustig, Nora, Bosworth, Barry P., AND Lawrence, Robert Z., EDS. 1992 North American Free Trade: Assessing the Impact. Washington, D.C.: The Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Maartens, Marc E. 1990Automobiles: U.S. Perspective.” In U.S.-Mexican Industrial Integration: The Road to Free Trade., edited by Weintraub, Sidney, F., Luis Rubio, and Jones, Alan D. Boulder, Colo.: Westview.Google Scholar
Micheli, Jordy 1990The Recent Development of the Car Industry in Mexico: Two Strategic Issues.” Paper delivered at the Tenth International Automotive Industry Conference, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 14 April.Google Scholar
Middlebrook, Kevin J. 1989Union Democratization in the Mexican Automobile Industry: A Reappraisal.” LARR 24, no. 2:6993.Google Scholar
Middlebrook, Kevin J. 1991The Politics of Industrial Restructuring: Transnational Firms' Search for Flexible Production in the Mexican Automobile Industry.” Comparative Politics 23, no. 3 (Apr.):275–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robertson, David, Rinehart, James, AND Huxley, Christopher 1991Team Concept: A Case Study of Japanese Production Management in a Unionized Canadian Auto Plant.” Manuscript.Google Scholar
Saavedra, Gustavo 1993The Mexican Government's Perspective on NAFTA.” Paper presented to the Society of Automotive Analysts, Mexico City, 11–14 May.Google Scholar
Sanderson, Susan Walsh 1987Automated Manufacturing and Offshore Assembly in Mexico.” In The United States and Mexico: Face to Face with New Technology, edited by Thorup, Cathryn L. New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction.Google Scholar
Shaiken, Harley 1990 Mexico in the Global Economy: High Technology and Work Organization in Export Industries. La Jolla: Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies, University of California, San Diego.Google Scholar
Shaiken, Harley, AND Browne, Harry 1991Japanese Work Organization in Mexico.” In Manufacturing across Borders and Oceans, edited by Szekely, Gabriel. La Jolla: Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies, University of California, San Diego.Google Scholar
Shaiken, Harley, AND Herzenberg, Stephen 1987 Automation and Global Production: Automobile Engine Production in Mexico, the United States, and Canada. La Jolla: Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies, University of California, San Diego.Google Scholar
U.S. BLS (UNITED STATES BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS) 1993International Comparisons of Hourly Compensation Costs for Production Workers in Manufacturing, 1992.” Report no. 844 (April). Washington, D.C.: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.Google Scholar
U.S. ITC (UNITED STATES INTERNATIONAL TRADE COMMISSION) 1993The U.S. Automobile Industry Monthly Report on Selected Economic Indicators.” Publication no. 2479 (March). Washington, D.C.: U.S. ITC.Google Scholar
U.S. OTA (UNITED STATES OFFICE OF TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT) 1992 U.S.-Mexico Trade: Pulling Together or Pulling Apart? Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Weintraub, Sidney, ED. 1993Free Trade in the Western Hemisphere.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, no. 526 (March):924.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilson, Patricia A. 1989 Maquiladoras and Local Linkages: Building Transaction Networks in Guadalajara. Working paper. Austin: Graduate Program in Community and Regional Planning, University of Texas.Google Scholar
Wilson, Patricia A. 1992 Exports and Local Development: Mexico's New Maquiladoras. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Womack, James P. 1991Positive Sum Solution: Free Trade in the North American Motor Vehicle Sector.” In The Strategic Sectors in Mexican-U.S. Free Trade, edited by Delal Baer, M. and Erb, Guy F. Washington, D.C.: Center for Strategic and International Studies and the US. Council of the Mexican-U.S. Business Committee.Google Scholar
Womack, James P., Jones, Daniel T., AND Roos, Daniel 1990 The Machine That Changed the World. New York: Rawson Associates (Macmillan).Google Scholar