McDonaldization Essay examples -- essays research papers

McDonaldizationAbout septet months ago, I met an American hombre who had arrived at New Zealand upright a few days before. While exchanging oursentiments (I am from Japan) on New Zealand and its culture, the guy told me how he was surprised to see the country is soAmericanised, mentioning McDonalds as one of the examples. Now, in a different sense, this was surprising to me, too. I had neer had the idea that having McDonalds is being Americanised. In fact, McDonalds is nearly every last(predicate) over in the world so thatmany people think it has already be execute part of their own cultures. But then the question arises How did this come to be thecase? Here is a brief outline of its narration (based on Hebert, 1997 McDonalds Corp., 1997 Mclennan, 1996). HistoryIn 1937, McDonalds was founded as a small local eating place by two brothers, Maurice and Richard McDonald in Pasadena,California. In 1948, the brothers then converted their barbecue drive-in with car hops into limited- menu, self-service drive-in, inSan Bernardino, California - the first advent of quick service restaurant industry. It is in April 1955, however, that the realMcDonalds Corporation launched, by a salesman called quill Kroc, who gained exclusive US franchising rights from thebrothers. Starting with Des Plaines, Illinois, McDonalds rapidly all-encompassing its outlets first over the Chicago area, then the US andeventually all over the world, including two largest restaurants in Moscow (1990) and Beijing (1992), both with 700 seats. on that windare currently over 21,000 restaurants in more than 100 countries (and virtually 100 in New Zealand), and the 1996 year-endsystemwide sales reached 31.812 billion dollars, 59 percent of which came from the outside of the US. McDonaldizationThe worldwide business of McDonalds is non just a globalisation of its economy. In his book, The McDonaldization of Society,the American sociologist Dr. George Ritzer (1993, cited by Allan, 1997) contends that it overly represents the attend ofrationalisation - ... the master concept of Max Webers epitome of modern capitalism, referring to a variety of related processesby which every facial gesture of human action became subject to calculation, measurement and control (Abercrombie, Hill & Turner,1988, p.902, cited by Allan, 1997). According to Ritzer, McDonaldization can be understood in terms of the avocation aspects (1) Eff... ...tSince I am not a sociology-major student, my understanding of McDonaldization may not be accurate, and I certainly do not havea clue on whether such phenomena are good or bad. Still, the point I want to make here is clear Our societies are increasinglyreigned by global standards, which profoundly affect the way we think, process information, and move with others. (Yes, I knowthis is a kind of clich in psychology.) Without doubt, McDonalds and its ideas influence part of our lives, and across cultures, wedefinitely share certain commonalities, both materially and psychologically. The only concern that remains, however, is the factthat the standardisation is typically based on the fashion preferred by those who are socially affluent or culturally dominant. In thisregard, the same is true for the internet system. Surely, this technology is a revolutionary tool that not only removes boundariesfrom the realms of our social interactions, but also pushes further the potential of human cognitive development. Nonetheless,information found on the net is the product of people who have access to computers, with inevitable construction of their ownpersonal or social viewpoints.