McDonaldization, George Ritzer, Max Weber, 4 Principles

(A brief research essay outline)

McDonaldization

George Ritzer defines McDonaldization as 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 of the rest of the world. McDonaldization centres around four main principles namely, efficiency, predictability, calculability and control. Efficiency describes how people have a liking for speed or quick service delivery. Predictability is the factor that ensures that products are the same or are reproducible by the same formula. Calculability refers to the belief that “quantity is analogous to quality” or more is always better than less and lastly control is that which strives for reliability by attempting to minimize the role of humans with non human technology.


Ritzer’s concept of McDonaldization is very similar to Max Weber’s concept of rationalization because both concepts, in analyzing modern day society, describe the replacement of “traditional modes of thinking by an ends/means analysis concerned with efficiency and formalized social control”. Ritzer’s mcdonaldization mainly focus attention on the later part of the twentieth century whereas Weber’s rationalization focussed on the growing impact of the bureaucracy on the society. Both processes of McDonaldization and rationalization seem to favour the dominance over society by substituting human labor with computers, machines and technology.

Several examples of McDonaldization are evident in the modern world. Chain stores, like Walmart, are a good example of the predictability principle. Consumers expect the same goods found in one Walmart to be available at the same price and quality as the next Walmart. Business is run in the same way in all Walmart stores. Drive-throughs at fast food outlets represent the effiency aspect of mcdonaldization because they offer quick service and very little human interaction between the service provider and the consumer. Atm banking is another example of efficiency but can also be used to describe control since computerized service leaves far less room for error than human bank tellers. The calculability principle can as also be found in the restaurants where the BigMac is becoming more popular merely for its size-I also think of the Five dollar foot long sandwiches, or double thick/cheese pizzas. Some aspects of daily life remain somehow untouched by mcdonaldization though, such as writing exam essays, playing baseball, gardening/growing your own fruits&vegetables, “traditional farming”, campfire cooking, tanning in the sun, hand-washing clothes, taking walks/jogging (instead of using a treadmill), air conditioning Vs opening windows -or various other examples where technology has not yet completely taking over.

I think McDonaldization has its pros and cons. I think industry relies on mcdonaldization so much that modern day life depends on this process. I always like to ask myself how many days I could go without using a cellphone, or without looking for information on the internet. Most college research depends on accessibility to the internet, so in such a case mcdonaldization is a blessing. The downside of this is that the internet is affecting verbal/day-to-day interaction between people. Facebook, myspace, Hi-5 and twitter are all examples of a negative side because people are reduced to words on a screen; the joy of facial expression and laughter is reduced to phrases such as “lol” or smileys “J” which ca often be insincere or in bad case misunderstood. No matter what views anybody has on this subject at hand, escaping mcdonaldization is impossible. People are out to get their hands on the latest technology as fast as they can and there’s no stopping or turning around. Generations to come will have no use for a pen or a pencil, the “stone-age” tools of the computerized generation. The whole world depends on mcdonaldization, infact perhaps the largest/only difference between third world countries and first world countries is simply the level of mcdonaldization?