Micro - electronics and employment revisited

Technological developments in the micro-electronics industry have not passed unnoticed by multinational enterprises, governments, trade unions, consumer unions and international agencies. Many researchers have made dire predictions concerning the effect of the new technology on employment. Often these predictions have ignored the more indirect, and sometimes positive, effects of the technology. In this new ILO study, based on an extensive review of the literature in this field, Raphael Kaplinsky looks at both the direct and the indirect effects of micro-electronics, and attempts to show how various aspects of the micro-electronic revolution are linked with patterns of employment. The author focuses on the effect of the new technology on employment and on the quality of working life in industrialised countries and in the Third World. He also examines the prospects and problems of Third World economies in developing their own electronics sectors and applying the new technology to their productive sectors.