Riders United Will Never Be Divided?

Abstract

In this paper Barbara Orth offers an analysis of the ongoing labor organizing effort at the grocery delivery platform Gorillas in the German capital Berlin. She argues that a particular combination of external circumstances and successful organizing strategies enabled a relatively small group of workers to temporarily disrupt a growing billion-dollar business. While the collective actions at Gorillas thus illustrate how local conditions can be successfully leveraged to disrupt a platform's operations from below, the paper cautions against generalizing from the Gorillas experience. Given the unpredictability of venture capital-driven markets¡ it remains a cautionary tale.