[Quality of quality: a workers' health perspective]

In Brazil, new forms of labor organization based on the so-called Japanese management model are characterized by the implementation of Total Quality Programs, heavily altering relations in the labor force. Pressures brought to bear by modernity, such as demand for quality, affect workers and result in physical and mental disturbances. A case study focusing on a textile industry in Nova Friburgo, Rio de Janeiro State, aimed at elucidating how such programs are formulated in such a way as to increase product quality without changing quality of life for workers. We detected precarious work conditions alongside sophisticated requirements, including abstraction, internalized control, dissemination of the supplier/client concept, etc., running up against a labor force with limited schooling, thus creating a tense atmosphere with a steady speed-up in the work pace, albeit with no real gains for workers.