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History

University of Windsor

2015

Social History

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At War With The Machine: Canadian Workers’ Resistance To Taylorism In The Early 20th Century, Sean Antaya Sep 2015

At War With The Machine: Canadian Workers’ Resistance To Taylorism In The Early 20th Century, Sean Antaya

The Great Lakes Journal of Undergraduate History

This essay looks at the ways Frederick Winslow Taylor's distinctly modern theories of scientific management (i.e. Taylorism) transformed Canadian workplaces in the early 20thcentury. In particular, it shows how Taylorism negatively impacted Canadian workers' lives, and examines the various ways that workers consequently resisted Taylorist methods. The essay argues that though workers were unable to stop the widespread implementation of Taylorism and its normalization in Canadian workplaces, their resistance to Taylorism still played an important role in unionist and radical political movements which gradually gained important concessions and rights for Canadian workers during the first half of the …