Based on an industrial relations case study conducted in a British Steel plant in the north east coast iron and steel industry, this book, first published in 1976, is an account of the application of sociological concepts and ideas to the process of social relations between employer and employee, and between all types of workers in industrial organisations.

Part 1. The Concept of Work Control 1. Introduction: Industrial Sociology and Work Control 2. Sociological Theories of Organisation and Behaviour 3. Work Regulation and Social Control: Context and Process Part 2. The Process of Social Control in Work 4. Work Control in Iron and Steel: The Emergent Features 5. Entrepreneurial and Labour Relations: The Strategic Pattern of Work Control 6. Instabilities of Work Control in the Modern Steel Industry: The Emergent Pattern of Industrial Relations After 1967 Part 3. The Meaning of Social Control in Work 7. The Socio-Technical System of a Steelplant 8. Manual Workers and the Process of Control at Ironhill 9. White-Collar Workers and the Process of Control at Ironhill 10. Conclusion