Digital, Class, Work

Abstract

Explores the changing nature of digital labour and work both before and during the Covid-19 pandemic Describes and categorises different types of labour, work and the digital Develops theoretically a class perspective, based in critical theory, on contemporary digital labour processes Provides one of the first systematic accounts that analyses and explores the impact of COVID-19 on the digital labour process Includes numerous academic case studies, media reports, policy and government reports, data from global institutions like the IMF, OECD, ILO, and UN; trade union analysis; research from activist organisations; and policy think tanks Maps out degrees of digital exploitation and oppression in the digital workplace before and during the pandemic This book examines class relations through numerous empirical case studies, reports, and other sets of data before and during COVID-19. It is divided in four distinctive work processes – the global ‘productive’ digital work process, which comprises areas like manufacturing; ‘unproductive’ commercial digital work, which comprises sectors like the creative industries, retail and services; digital gig work practices; and the state and public work sectors. Roberts maps class relations in these work processes to three types of digital work: digital labour (or, what is commonly known as platform labour); digitisation of labour (the application of digital technology to everyday work practices); and digitised labour (when automation and smart machines replace ‘real’ workers in an organisation). Situating the analysis within the broader and global perspective of neoliberalism and financialisation, it demonstrates how the use of digital technology in many workplaces and labour processes has benefited ‘unproductive’ global capital, particularly capital in the unproductive financial sector.