‘You can book an interpreter the same way you order your Uber': (re)interpreting work and digital labour platforms

Abstract

ABSTRACT The gig economy, encompassing on-demand work via platforms, has grown exponentially with significant consequences for the interpreting industry. Arguing that this tendency of the interpreting industry towards gig work reflects wider shifts in both labour-capital relations and the role of technology in the economy, this study explores ‘gig’ interpreting work from a labour process theory perspective. Leveraging a qualitative case study of three platforms in Northwestern Europe, as well as interviews with platform companies’ managers and interpreters, the study indicates that platformisation is impacting business models, organisation, and intermediation of interpreting work, with implications for interpreters’ working conditions. The study finds that engaging in platform work exposes interpreters to risks related to monetary factors, algorithmic control, individualisation of employment relations, on-demand availability, and subjugation to a digital form of supply-demand intermediation. In contrast, platform companies push towards maximising interests of profit and flexibility, harnessing the potential of gig work as the natural, entrepreneurial extension of interpreters’ self-employment status. The study contributes to interpreting and sociological studies on workplace developments in digital capitalism, suggesting that the configuration of interpreting in platform-mediated production lubricates an exploitative labour-capital relationship.