Global village or Global factory
A powerful symbol of the current world economy is that Norton – an iconic British brand dating back to 1902 – is currently owned by the Indian company TVS and is based in India. There is it is involved in the production of the ?BMW – an iconic German brand dating back to ?1923?.
There has to be a balance somewhere between a closed borders, protectionism and nationalism, which feels rather confrontational and hostile to others; and the current global factory model where place and tradition – and probably even the product itself - have no inherent value.
This strikes me as a perversion of the important idea of us all living in a global village. This has been used since the 1970s and is a helpful picture to increase our understanding of our interdependence throughout the world. This sense of us all being joined together in a mutually supportive world community, seeing people in other countries as people like ourselves, is valuable and enriching. It has to be beneficial to everyone to develop an understanding of that we do in our country and what we do as individuals will impact on others; potentially very adversely on poor people living in developing countries.
The global factory model strikes me as a profoundly dehumanising one. A brand name is no more than a piece copyright which does or does not have economic value. It shows no recognition of the humanity of the people who work in a factory, with their social ties of living in the local community and being members of the works sports and social club; human beings who can have pride in their product. The global factory model sees simply a stockpile of raw materials which can be combined to form widgets which can generate income for the shareholders.
Gone are the days when Norton was the centre of the community in ??????????; where the workforce could feel pride at the latest TT win on one of their bikes; where many of the workforce would be able to afford to ride the products of their labour. It is unlikely that many of the Indian workforce could own one of the high end bikes produced in the factory in which they work.
The return to UK for the Norton brand does have the potential for at least some of the pieces of the jigsaw for a wholesome employment being put in place.