The Making of the Good Bad Job: How Algorithmic Management Manufactures Consent Through Constant and Confined Choices

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Cameron, Lindsey D.
• 署名单位: University of Pennsylvania; Institute for Advanced Study - USA; University of Pennsylvania
• 刊物名称: ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE QUARTERLY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0001-8392
• DOI: 10.1177/00018392241236163
• 发表日期: 2024
• 页码: 458-514
• 关键词: ALTERNATIVE WORK; GIG WORKERS; Autonomy; PARADOX; LABOR; arrangements; systems; forms; call

摘要

This research explores how a new relation of production-the shift from human managers to algorithmic managers on digital platforms-manufactures workplace consent. While most research has argued that the task standardization and surveillance that accompany algorithmic management will give rise to the quintessential bad job (Kalleberg, Reskin, and Hudson, 2000; Kalleberg, 2011), I find that, surprisingly, many workers report liking and finding choice while working under algorithmic management. Drawing on a seven-year qualitative study of the largest sector in the gig economy, the ride-hailing industry, I describe how workers navigate being managed by an algorithm. I begin by showing how algorithms segment the work at multiple sites of human-algorithm interactions and how this configuration of the work process allows for more-frequent and narrow choice. I find that workers use two sets of tactics. In engagement tactics, individuals generally follow the algorithmic nudges and do not try to get around the system; in deviance tactics, individuals manipulate their input into the algorithmic management system. While the behaviors associated with these tactics are practical opposites, they both elicit consent, or active, enthusiastic participation by workers to align their efforts with managerial interests, and both contribute to workers seeing themselves as skillful agents. However, this choice-based consent can mask the more-structurally problematic elements of the work, contributing to the growing popularity of what I call the good bad job.