The Coloniality of Data Work in Latin America

TL;DR

This paper analyzes the Latin American data work market through a decolonial perspective, revealing persistent global labor divisions, platform constraints on workers, and ideological reinforcement from the Global North.

Contribution

It offers a decolonial analysis of Latin American data work, highlighting structural inequalities and ideological influences in the global data labor market.

Findings

Global divisions of labor persist with requesters in advanced economies and workers in the Global South.

Platform configurations constrain workers' agency in annotation tasks.

Ideologies from the Global North legitimize and reinforce global labor market inequalities.

Abstract

This presentation for the AIES 21 doctoral consortium examines the Latin American crowdsourcing market through a decolonial lens. This research is based on the analysis of the web traffic of ninety-three platforms, interviews with Venezuelan data workers of four platforms, and the analysis of the documentation issued by these organizations. The findings show that (1) centuries-old global divisions of labor persist, in this case, with requesters located in advanced economies and workers in the Global South. (2) That the platforms' configuration of the labor process constrains the agency of these workers when producing annotations. And, (3) that ideologies originating from the Global North serve to legitimize and reinforce this global labor market configuration.