Mcdonaldization In George Ritzer's Journey To Combat Mcdonaldization

At the end of chapter six, George Ritzer lists suggestions for those of us who wish to combat McDonaldization, a term he coined himelf, and the topic of this essay. Ritzer warns the reader to not fall victim to the, “mindless trap,”(Ritzer 158) of Mcdonalized systems. He writes that, “a major motivation behind writing this book is to alert reader to the dangers of McDonaldization and to motivate them to act to stem its tide”(Ritzer 161). Despite McDonaldizations great momentum, natural limits and personal interests provide barriers to it. Ritzer feels that the struggle itself, to combat Mcdonaldization, is ennobling. In this essay I will attempt to accomplish three objectives. First, I will relate Ritzers study to max weber’s theory of rationalization. Second, I will describe the

• People are able to acquire what they want or need almost instantanuesly and get it far more convientelty.

By observing these advantages one could clearly see how the demensions of Mcdonaldization: effeciency, predictability, calcuability, and control are used in the production process. But on the contrary, the irrationalities that exist are less obvious to the untrained eye. Maximum effeiciency has potential to limit human action and skill. Predicability has potential to limit inovation and creativity. An over exageration on quantity, when concerning calculability, could potentially effect a good or service’s quality. Finally, through the application of nonhuman tecnologies, control is being dehumanized. Ritzer writes, “Rational systems inevitably spawn irrationalities that limit, eventually compromise, and perhaps even undermine their rationality” (Ritzer 123). He goes on to say that rational systems are often