Reflecting on Noxious Deindustrialisation: From Paradox to Paradigm?

I define noxious deindustrialisation as employment deindustrialisation in areas where burdensome industries are still active. The main driver of noxious deindustrialisation is industrial automation in a context of slow output growth, which raises industrial productivity while expelling workers from industry itself. In fact, insofar as automation is necessary to keep factories competitive, employment deindustrialisation is a necessary condition for keeping industries in place. Noxious deindustrialisation is thus an on-going and self-reproducing process linked to operating factories that need less living labour than they used to. Therefore, noxious deindustrialisation differs from both the toxic legacies of prior production – e.g. long-term contamination of land and water – and the social disruption caused by changing employment patterns – e.g. underemployment and mental health disorders – after the factories have closed.