Technolegal Expulsions: Platform Food Delivery Workers and Work Regulations in Colombia

Abstract

Precariousness of the Colombian urban economy provides an ecosystem for the development and expansion of digital platforms, intersecting informal working relations with digital surveillance. Reconstructing legal obstacles to gaining recognition as legal and formal workers, it is argued that platforms have assembled a techno-legal network which translates discussions about workers’ rights into the less regulated arena of information and communication technologies. The role of ‘regulatory displacement’ is examined to analyse the evolution of digital platforms for food delivery workers. Drawing on a review of the regulation of it and labour, discussed in Congress in 2017–2018, we explore the regulatory expulsions that digital workers experience, analysing this information with a grounded theory approach, in which we have followed discursive patterns that emerge from legal documents. Addressing this strategic use of the law is key to understanding and overcoming obstacles that platform workers face in their attempts to organize in the Global South.

Citizen‐rentier‐ship: Delivering the Undocumented to Labour Platforms in Paris

“…Innovative methods have shown, by geolocating the trajectories of riders, how platforms are playing a role in shaping cities and upper-class neighbourhoods, for example (Gregory and Maldonado 2020). Researchers from Latin America (Miguez and Menendez 2021;Munoz and Martinez 2022) have also explored how platform delivery riders organise, develop various solidarity projects, and contest deregulation and neoliberal models (Vargas et al 2022). Moreover, work in political economy has focused on collective agency, social movements, and grassroots organisations (Cant 2019, 2020; Tassinari and Maccarrone 2020; Veen et al 2020).…”

“…Researchers from Latin America (Miguez and Menendez 2021; Munoz and Martinez 2022) have also explored how platform delivery riders organise, develop various solidarity projects, and contest deregulation and neoliberal models (Vargas et al. 2022). Moreover, work in political economy has focused on collective agency, social movements, and grassroots organisations (Cant 2019, 2020; Tassinari and Maccarrone 2020; Veen et al.…”

Digitrabes em contexto: caracterização e aspectos críticos dos trabalhadores de plataformas digitais em cinco países da Iberoamérica

“…Frente a ello, ambos contextos mantienen en común la rápida expansión del denominado trabajo en plataformas. España encabeza la presencia de este tipo de actividad laboral en términos mundiales (Digital Future Society, 2020); mientras que en Latinoamérica se acude a un crecimiento exponencial (Vargas et al, 2022).…”

National Institutions and Platform Evolution in the European Gig Economy

“…What these case studies on Uber, as well as case studies on other ride-hailing (Heeks et al, 2021) and food delivery platforms (Tassinari & Maccarrone, 2020;Yuana et al, 2020;Sanchez et al, 2022) have in common, is the finding that negative institutional reactions to gig platforms can be related to the lack of legitimacy of these platforms amongst their various stakeholders. Suchman (1995, p. 574) defines legitimacy as the: "generalized perception or assumption that the actions of an entity are desirable, proper, or appropriate within some socially constructed system of norms, values, beliefs, and definitions."…”

“…Many case studies have documented the institutional responses to gig platforms in various countries, particularly in the taxi and food delivery sectors. In many countries worldwide, gig platforms met considerable resistance from a variety of actors (regulatory agencies, taxi drivers, unions, and politicians) leading to a variety of responses (prosecution, court cases, adapted regulations, bans) (Thelen, 2018;Uzunca et al, 2018;Pelzer et al, 2019;Tassinari & Maccarrone, 2020;Yuana et al, 2020;Davis & Sinha, 2021;Heeks et al, 2021;Sanchez et al, 2022;Seidl, 2022).…”