The production of bicycles in Britain and the United States
recently suffered severe setbacks. The renowned American Schwinn
brand was downgraded to the mass market by its new owners following
bankruptcy, and Britain's Raleigh came close to closure because of
high debts and poor returns, saved only by a last-minute management
buyout. In both cases, market share and credibility were lost to
newer, more innovative firms, as well as to a recentering of the
global bicycle industry in the Far East.This book reflects on such
changes by setting them within a sociological and historical
context. It focuses on the British bicycle industry in the interwar
years and in the 1980s and the 1990s--periods characterized by
modernization of production and of industrial organization, by
changing relations among players in the industry, by new
developments in labor relations, and by changes in interactions
between markets and product design. In particular, it traces the
fortunes of the Raleigh Cycle Company from its beginnings as an
innovative young firm, through massive expansion of its products
and markets and the assimilation of many of its competitors, into
further innovation amid market contraction and management inertia,
and finally into a phase of global restructuring that has
transformed and reduced its role within the industry.The book
explores the complex ways in which product design, production
methods, industrial organization, and the cultures of cycling have
interacted to create a succession of sociotechnical frames for the
bicycle. At the same time, on an activist level, the book promotes
a participatory politics of bicycle technology and a less
car-centered view of personal transportation.
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