Work without jobs: A study of gig economy workers´ existence

The purpose of the proposed project is to contribute to the development of strategies and policies to facilitate socially sustainable working lives for gig economy workers in Sweden.

The proposed project will provide empirically grounded knowledge about gig economy work and workers in Sweden, and the effects on workers’ short- and long-term labour-and-life opportunities. Cross-national comparisons will be possible through collaboration with a Dutch team of researchers.

The following research questions guide our inquiry:Who works via platforms in Sweden, why, and under what conditions?How do gig economy workers view their current existence as well as their short- and long-term opportunities for work, income and life more broadly?What strategies do gig economy workers develop individually and collectively to: a) take advantage of gig economy work, b) cope with life as a gig economy worker and c) improve conditions for gig economy workers?What are gig economy workers’ perceptions regarding the need of getting social support (in terms of social protection, worker protection, unionization and so forth)?We propose an exploratory and ethnographic study providing in-depth knowledge about these workers based on: i) interviews with workers; ii) participant observations and; iii) self-reflective, auto-ethnographic research.

The main entry point to reach interviewees will be a selection of platforms mediating: 1) skilled, online work (e.g. programming and design); 2) less skilled, online ‘click work’ (e.g. data entering and sorting pictures); and 3) off-line service work (e.g. deliveries and domestic services).Theoretically, the proposed research will engage with flexible and atypical forms of employment; more specifically with the emergence of ‘work without jobs’; labour control through audit culture and the gamification of work; labour agency; segmentation and social divisions of labour; labour-and-life geographies; and the changing meanings of the workplace.