McDonaldization (of society)

the process by which the principles of the fast-food restaurant are coming to dominate more and more sectors of American society as well as the rest of the world’ (G. Ritzer, The McDonaldization of Society, 1993). The forces behind this tendency, as described by Ritzer, are ‘efficiency’, ‘calculability’ and ‘predictability’, manifest in ‘increased control and the replacement of human by nonhuman technology’. There are contradictions in this process, not least a loss of‘quality’, which has to be counteracted by defining the new products favourably in extensive advertising. But the ‘advantages’ of McDonaldization are such that its principles have spread to many areas, including higher education. For a critique see B. Smart, Resisting McDonaldization,Sa ge, 1999.

Collins Dictionary of Sociology, 3rd ed. © HarperCollins Publishers 2000

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References in periodicals archive

Automated diagnosis can streamline and expand the process, reaching more people in more places -- the kind of "McDonaldization" espoused by Dr V.

India fights diabetic blindness with help from AI

As a result of the increasing addition of New Management approach to the sphere of social services (Steyaert and Gould, 1999; Langan, 2000; Jordan and Jordan, 2000), the professional practice and provision of welfare services relationships, have been affected by information and communication technologies (Humphries and Camilleri, 2002, Harlow, 2003, Webb, 2003, Garrett, 2005, Rafferty and Steyaert, 2007, Harris and White, 2009; Coleman, 2011; Lopez Pelaez y Diaz, 2015), in ways not without controversy (Sapey, 1997; Garret, 2005; Dustin, 2008; Ferguson, 2008; Harris and White, 2009), giving rise to new characterisations of social work such as 'Liquid Social Work' (Ferguson, 2008) or 'The McDonaldization of Social Work' (Dustin, 2008).

E-Social Work in Spain: An analysis of the professional blogs

The trend, already identified in 2000 as the McDonaldization of libraries, seems only likely to continue.

PEOPLE, IDEAS, THINGS, AND PLACES: THE TAO OF NOTES FOR 75 YEARS

Undermining of the right to counsel contributes to "assembly-line" justice (Schulhofer 1986), the "McDonaldization" of criminal justice (Bohm 2006), and the "meet and plead" system (Green 2003, Justice Policy Institute 2011).

The Accused Poor

Mannion and Exworthy describe standardised processing of patients as McDonaldization (a new take on the older concept of Taylorization).

Best of Both Worlds: Comment on "(Re) Making the Procrustean Bed? Standardization and Customization as Competing Logics in Healthcare"

Rossi takes readers through the evolution of scholarly thought on the city-capitalism relationship, touching briefly on everything from world systems theory, to the planetary urbanization thesis, to 'McDonaldization' and 'Disneyfication'.

Cities in Global Capitalism

(1981), 'McDonaldization as a Social Problem: An Illustration.' In Kathryn A.

Market, Regulation and Sustainability

(1998), The McDonaldization Thesis, Sage Publications, London.

Viewing hotel industry through customer oriented bureaucracy

The McDonaldization of Society: An Investigation into the Changing Character of Contemporary Social Life.

Food, Foodways and Foodscapes: Culture, Community and Consumption in Post-Colonial Singapore

McDonaldization, the term coined by sociologist George Ritzer to describe the process whereby society adopts the characteristics of consumer culture, has been especially damaging.

Controversy abounds at home of Big Mac... but it isn't all bad; Media expert Dr John Jewell on the latest controversy surrounding ubiquitious restaurant chain McDonald's

This study is an attempt to identify the underlying cultural obstacles causing the lack of licensing from the perspectives of collectivism and McDonaldization. Hong Kong people are infused with collectivism, resulting in the need to incorporate collectivism in individualism-based counseling.

The cultural obstacles of counseling licensure in Hong Kong