JUST-IN-TIME AND POWER RELATIONS IN THE MANUFACTURING CHAIN

This paper discusses the impact of JIT on the customer-supplier relationship in the Australian automotive industry. It is argued that the gradual restructuring of the automotive components industry over the past several years is in part an effort to accommodate the introduction of JIT into the five major vehicle assemblers. Further, while the power (of production disruption) of the supplier sector is enhanced in the short term by JIT, structural accommodation results in cooperative and integrative, rather than adversarial, competitive business relations. Five areas are discussed: first, a summary of theoretical issues underlying the study; second, an outline of the structure of the automotive components industry in Australia; third, a brief history of the introduction of JIT principles into the components industry; fourth, the changing business relations between vehicle builders and component suppliers; and fifth, some effects of labour disputation in the components sector on the (core) vehicle assemblers since 1985.