The Work Ethic Part Four

In the previous parts of this essay I charted a progression from where work was regarded as unacceptable for a free man, something fit only for slaves, to acceptability in the Middle Ages, to a way of serving God in the reformation, to a sign of God's pleasure to something valuable in its own right. I also noted that the economic and other upheavals in the 1500s gave rise to a theology that blamed the poor for their situation, thus absolving the deity of responsibility, and that it is plausible that Protestant theologians, consciously or otherwise, developer this theology in order to gain support from the political and business interests they needed in order for their ideas to gain acceptance. I also noted that attitudes to the unemployed in the 1500s were very similar to those of the British Conservative Party in the time Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister.

The intertwining of the Work Ethic and Big Business did not end there, it accelerated with Capitalism, and employers exploited the Work Ethic to a point where the Ethic itself was threatened.

Feudalism, which preceded capitalism, was a system whereby landowners provided protection to those who lived on their property, in return for service. In medieval times is was believed sinful to try to work in a field other than the one in which you were born, but the protestant dignification of work and affirmation of the right to choose one's work eroded this constraint, and Feudalism slowly died out. The emerging Capitalist system found work good, at least for many small businessmen. As a result hard work became a social norm. the Work ethic spread throughout Europe and became embedded, without the religious underpinnings, in Western Culture. Benjamin Franklin's writing show that by the 18^th Century diligence in work, scrupulous use of time, and deferment of pleasure had become a part of the popular philosophy of work in the Western world.

One thing did not change. The rich did not have to work and as in Classical Greece and Ancient Rome, gentility was another word for leisure. Of course, when one has a fortune, even when one can employ people to work for you, there is a need to work to check your workers, but this can be trivial. In America the first colonists were able to follow the rule that leisure was the only life fit for a free man, but the later Protestant sects arrived and began to destroy this idyllic situation. Despite the growing American idolisation of work, work did not impact as regularly and mechanically as it did when mechanised factories (capitalism) arrived. Farm workers had days where work was impossible, as did shopkeepers and others. The Work ethic at that time was not so much to work hard all the time, but to do one's work as well as possible: It was more a mindset than a pace of life.

Capitalism allowed employers to measure time working, and to free them from the constraints of weather and season that allowed some leisure for workers. Employers viewed workers as commodities and needed to squeeze every last drop from them. The Work Ethic was a valuable tool for this.

It was not all easygoing for the work worshippers. A central theme of the Work ethic was that one could improve ones position through hard work. The Factory and Assembly Line eroded this. It was hard work without a chance of advancement. At the start of the 19^th Century most US manufacturing was done at home. By the end almost all of it wad done in factories and mills. Skill and craftsmanship were replaced by faceless discipline. A similar fate overtook the Greek soldier in the transition from bold hero carving their way through the enemy, as described in the Iliad, to faceless member of a Phalanx. Efficiency was gained but something intangible was lost, even if the growth of team spirit was a partial compensation. Similarly in the last half century the IT worker has moved from solitary worker to team member. Occasionally someone manages to show that the brilliant maverick can outperform the crowd, but not often. The change was summarised just after the British railway system was nationalised. Before then the engineers loved their jobs and would often work on the engines in their own time. Afterwards one manager was quoted as saying he did not want craftsmanship and skill, only people who did what they were told.

The factory system deprived workers of satisfaction and also of the promise of economic reward: Overproduction led to job insecurity. This threatened the work ethic and led to worker discontent that seem to have been seen as laziness. As a result a heavy handed paternalistic management style known as Scientific Management arose. Eventually this became unfashionable and alternative theories arose. These theories did not however transform the adversarial relationship between workers and management.

Cyberspace made work more fun and people worked harder because they were enjoying their work. At the same time many older workers, steeped in the work ethic retired by the 1908s. Younger workers entered the workplace, less permeated by the Work Ethic, who did not consider work as virtuous and were less convinced it would pay off.

At the same time as work became more like play, there is a trend to emphasise the value of play and increasing recognition of the personal and social costs of excessive work, in the form of reduced productivity and increased errors as workers turn into zombies drugged by lack of sleep, burnout and damage to relationships.

Perhaps it is time to return to a work ethic that values craftsmanship over speed, professionalism over workaholism, and stresses not working as hard as possible, but working as well as possible, work smart over work hard and realises that for any job involving brainwork time away from the work is at least as valuable as time on the job.