MANUFACTURING FLEXIBILITY - A LITERATURE-REVIEW

In this article an attempt is made to classify the vast literature reg arding manufacturing flexibility; the aim is to contribute to the conc eptual systemization of the debate, whose richness plays witness of th e abundance of themes and the difficulty of obtaining a unitary and un ivocal framework. The literature on manufacturing flexibility is analy sed according to a scheme which considers six different aspects: (1) d efinition of flexibility, (2) request for flexibility, (3) classificat ion in dimensions of flexibility (the authors group the various classi fications proposed according to different logics: horizontal, vertical , temporal, by the object of the variation, mixed), (4) measurement of flexibility, (5) choices for flexibility, (6) interpretation of flexi bility.