Resilience through resistance: the role of worker agency in navigating algorithmic control

TL;DR

Digital labor platform workers use informal and formal resistance to build resilience against algorithmic control and maintain their well-being.

Contribution

The paper introduces a structured synthesis of worker resistance strategies across multiple platform sectors to understand resilience-building in algorithmic labor.

Findings

Platform workers use informal and formal resistance to counteract algorithmic disruptions.

Workers in various sectors adapt to algorithmic changes through social media and innovative strategies.

Resilience-building is complex as platforms continuously counteract worker resistance.

Abstract

The business model of multi-sided digital labor platforms relies on maintaining a balance between workers and customers or clients to sustain operations. These platforms initially leveraged venture capital to attract workers by providing them with incentives and the promise of flexibility, creating lock-in effects to consolidate their market power and enable monopolistic practices. As platforms mature, they increasingly implement algorithmic management and control mechanisms, such as rating systems, which restrict worker autonomy, access to work and flexibility. Despite limited bargaining power, workers have developed both individual and collective strategies to counteract these algorithmic restrictions.

This article employs a structured synthesis, drawing on existing academic literature as well as surveys conducted by the International Labour Office (ILO) between 2017 and 2023, to examine how platform workers utilize a combination of informal and formal forms of resistance to build resilience against algorithmic disruptions.

The analysis covers different sectors (freelance and microtask work, taxi and delivery services, and domestic work and beauty care platforms) offering insights into the changing dynamics of worker agency on platforms, which have enabled resilience-building among workers on digital labour platforms. In the face of significant barriers to carrying out formal acts of resistance, workers on digital labour platforms often turn to informal acts of resistance, often mediated by social media, to adapt to changes in the platforms’ algorithms and maintain their well-being.

Platform workers increasingly have a diverse array of tools to exercise their agency physically and virtually. However, the process of establishing resilience in such conditions is often not straight-forward. As platforms counteract workers’ acts of resistance, workers must continue to develop new and innovative strategies to strengthen their resilience. Such a complex and nuanced landscape merits continued research and analysis.

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