Disintegration – The Slow Birth of a Fad

Considers the phenomenon of contracting out non‐essential services as a process of “disintegration”, in contrast to the fashion for integration and growth in the 1960s. Argues that the identification of core functions is problematic, undermining the concept of disintegration. Concludes that current cost reduction techniques is symptomatic of a brutal attitude to those functions which fail the purchase enquiry test.