the technostructure is a economic Théorie of the American economist John Kenneth Galbraith, which was exposed in its work the New industrial State (1967).

The theory of technostructure among the other economic approaches

Context of the development of the theory

Galbraith was one of the members of the brain trust of Roosevelt for the installation of the New Deal as from 1933. At the time, a small intellectual elite made up of academics conceived a new organization of the US economy to leave the crisis of 1929 and which broke with the guns of the liberalism of the 19th century.

These new principles consisted of the intervention of the federal state which replaced the companies to start again the economy: financial aid with the unemployed, subsidies at the farm prices, great work by the means of ad hoc federal agencies, (e.g. the Tennesse Valley Authority for the irrigation work of Middle-West) etc the launching of the Victory Program in 1941 which made that 80% of the federal budget were devoted to the armament, still increased the role of the state and its civils servant who became thus the clients of the companies in the place of the market.

In 1947, the launching of the Marshall plan continued this dash: federal agents were mobilized to evaluate the needs for the rebuilding in Europe, to set up the financings and to take part in the realization of the projects. Little by little, the complexity of the economy, the constitution of multinational groups and the practices born since 20 years modified the nature of American and European capitalism. The direction of the large companies generally escaped the families from the founders, to pass between the hands of graduate technocrats of the university, engaged for their competences, as well in the private sector as in the apparatus of state.

Why technostructure?

The technostructure is a stage in the development of the large companies characterized by an increase in the collective capacity of the technicians and executives, with the detriment of the owners; these technocrats rather impose little by little their choices on their customers than to be with their listening. This change is due, on the one hand with the historical context describes supra, namely the Crisis of 1929 and the Second world war and on the other hand, with the simple effect of dilution of the capital of the companies between the various heirs, more with each generation. It is about a contemporary phenomenon of the reversed Filière, phenomenon also theorized by Galbraith. This die consists in for more the large companies imposing the purchase of certain products to the consumers by the means of publicity. That creates an increase in the rigidity of the company and a loss of the listening of the Consommateur.

One of the most spectacular examples of this change is the walkman : this product was imagined, wanted, designed and developed by Akio Morita, emblematic the owner of Sony because it wished to listen to these favorite airs of music… on its golf course, the weekend. A rather aggressive advertizing campaign created a request in the consumers and made of this product a symbol of the Eighties.

Critical and decline of technostructure

However, the laws of the market remain still valid, in particular when one compares auto industries Japanese woman and American. More still than the quantity of work and the level of the wages, these rules of the liberal economy explain how the Japanese, concerned automobile companies of the consumer and of the details of the production, succeeded, in spite of a cultural obstacle, with better seizing than the companies Occident ales, the evolution of the tastes of the customers. The group Toyota became the first automobile world company while remaining faithful to the simple laws of the market.

Some exception notable remain like the companies Ford or Rockefeller which remains controlled by the founders families. In Europe, the group FIAT remains under control of the family Agnelli, the Peugeot-Citroen group, under that of the family Peugeot, but in this last case, the chairman is always external with the family, which represents a good synthesis between technostructure and family capitalism!

The principal criticism of technostructure is that its raison d'être was more to extend its capacity and to remain rather than to increase the size and the profits of the companies which it directs. At the end of the Eighties, under the influence of the School of Chicago, animated by the economist Milton Friedman, one attends a return in strength of the shareholders to control the companies and theses néolibérales in economy.