With the rise and proliferation of gig economy platforms providing ride hailing, food delivery and other app-based services on-demand in major urban centers of the world, there have been major transformations in work and life globally. Gig platforms have certainly disrupted and redefined the discovery and allocation of casual work through algorithmic management, creating grave concerns for regulating the future of work. Simultaneously, especially in the global South, gig platforms have also emerged as important avenues for gaining temporary paid work and socio-economic mobility for low income individuals, women and migrant workers. Drawing on over five years of ethnographic research with a variety of stakeholders in the gig economy including workers, managers, consumers and regulators, my work shows how platformization produces heterogeneous effects on the lives, livelihoods and productive and reproductive capacities of different individuals in urban India. This talk will draw on multiple case studies of gig work to show these heterogeneous effects and how everyday technology practice also informs platform design in return. I will also offer some considerations for HCI scholars looking to study the effects of emerging technologies in global South settings.
This recording is courtesy of the CHIWork series.
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