The New Old Economy

American manufacturing is in obvious crisis: the sector lost three million jobs between 2000 and 2003 as the American trade deficit shot to record highs. Manufacturers have increasingly decentralized productive responsibilities to armies of supplier firms, both domestic and abroad. Many have speculated as to whether or not manufacturing is even feasible in the United States, given the difficulties. Josh Whitford’s book shows that discussion of this shift, in the
media and in the academic literature, hits on the right issues – globalization, de-industrialization, and the outsourcing of production in marketized and in network relationships – but in an overly polarized way that obscures as much as it enlightens.