Neve Gordon in Indiana
We had just left the headquarters of Arthur Andersen, a consulting and accounting firm that employs more than 50 000 people, as I said to my friend: “The proof is in the cubicle.”
In 1996, short of space, Arthur Andersen had relocated to a nicer building in downtown Chicago. Many of its employees were shunted from rooms into cubicles. This descent from office to cubicle is not unusual: over the past 15 years practically all mid-range corporate workers have been “cubiclised”. Have you ever wondered why cubicles have become so common?
The usual explanation is that they are cost-efficient. The accuracy of this assertion depends on what one means by “cost-efficient”. Is it merely the cheaper material from which they are made, or is something else at work?
The real reason cubicles have become permanent fixtures in the corporate landscape has as much to do with the latent power of their design, which helps control workers’ behaviour. Several years ago French philosopher and historian of ideas Michel Foucault analysed architectural spaces, arguing that certain facilities include subtle physical techniques aimed at producing disciplined individuals.
Foucault’s main focus was on modes of surveillance in prisons, but in many respects the cubicle is a perfect example of a structure designed to assure the control of its occupant.
“Budgetary constraints” have led corporations to move employees into a central space divided by cubicles. Cubicles have no doors, and the worker’s back faces the public. The thin “walls” never reach the ceiling, yet they are usually too high for someone to look over, even when standing.
They are a mechanism of constant surveillance: the worker is never sure who might pass the entrance or listen to a telephone conversation. Permanent visibility is sufficient to render a worker docile.
What is most intriguing and insidious about the cubicle is that there is no identifiable site of control: no boss stands at the door to secure compliance, no executive continually inspects one’s work. No monitor is needed. The mere possibility that someone from a higher echelon will overhear a discussion or notice an employee resting is sufficient to ensure that the corporation’s standards, customs, restrictions and prohibitions are observed.
The novel setting of the workplace is designed to guarantee compliant diligence. There is no public space in which a group of workers can meet spontaneously, or a private space where co-workers can have confidential discussions. The cubicle phenomenon signifies that the white collar worker has been colonised, confirming Foucault’s claim. “Work, work, work” is the message reverberating in the cubicle, and employees follow this command, proving the economic efficiency of the system. Simultaneously, they internalise the values espoused by their masters.
Thousands of workers have been moved from offices into cubicles without a murmur of protest, much less an organised demand for change. The proof of corporate control, I say, is in the cubicle.