Labour precarity and new democratic repertories in digital delivery platforms

Abstract

This paper examines the new forms of labour exploitation introduced by delivery platforms and proposes key insights for interpreting the exercise of power in the digital economy. Additionally, it explores the repertoire of democratic counter-conducts that gig economy workers have deployed in Spain and other parts of Europe to counteract the deterioration of their working conditions: practices of ‘savage’ democracy, cooperative associations, and legal struggles for the formalisation of their labour activity. The aim is to apply the conceptual tools from social philosophy and democratic theory to understand one of the most emblematic manifestations of contemporary labour precarity, as well as to dignify the precarious revolutions that attempt to confront it.