Uber in the Portuguese gig economy: a laboratory for platform capitalism

Call for Papers: Hierarchies of domesticity – spatial and social boundaries. Deadline for submissions is 30^th September, 2024. Full details can be read here.

Articles to be no longer than 6,000 words (excluding footnotes and bibliography) and submitted in two forms: an anonymised version in which all references to the authors’ institution and publications are omitted; and a full version including the authors’ titles and institutional affiliations. For complete instructions on style, formatting, etc., please consult: https://www.plutojournals.com/wp-content/uploads/WOLG-Instructions-for-Authors2023.pdf

scite_

Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation

Volume 14, Issue 2

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: found

Is Open Access

Uber in the Portuguese gig economy: a laboratory for platform capitalism

research-article

Author(s): Emanuele Leonardi , Giorgio Pirina

Publication date (Print): 1 January 2020

Journal: Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation

Publisher: Pluto Journals

Keywords: gig economy, Lisbon, platformisation, Portugal, TVDE, Uber Law, wage-earning society

Bookmark

Abstract

The paper frames the emergence of the Portuguese gig economy within the broader process of platformisation of work in Europe as set in motion by the neoliberal turn at a global scale. Against this background the case of Portugal in general and that of Lisbon in particular are analysed to show both their consistency with the general trends of the European Union's economic dynamics and their irreducible peculiarities. These latter particularities, and especially the so-called ‘Uber Law’, are discussed in connection with the hypothesis of a specifically Portuguese variety of the gig economy.

Content

Author and article information

Journal

Journal ID (doi): 10.2307/j50010512

Journal ID (jcode): workorgalaboglob

Title: Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation

Publisher: Pluto Journals

ISSN: 1745-641X

ISSN: 1745-6428

Publication date (Print): 1 January 2020

Volume: 14

Issue: 2 ( doiID: 10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.issue-2 )

Pages: 46-63

Article

Publisher ID: workorgalaboglob.14.2.0046

DOI: 10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.2.0046

SO-VID: 96b68099-3934-4f1b-aa98-074b98d118d8

License:

All content is freely available without charge to users or their institutions. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles in this journal without asking prior permission of the publisher or the author. Articles published in the journal are distributed under a http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

History

Custom metadata

lang eng

ScienceOpen disciplines: Sociology,Labor law,Political science,Labor & Demographic economics,Political economics

Keywords: Uber Law,TVDE,gig economy,Lisbon,platformisation,wage-earning society,Portugal

REFERENCES

Ahrendt, D., E. Sándor, A. Revello, J.-M. Jungblut & R. Anderson (2017). In-work poverty in the EU. Dublin: Eurofound. https://www.eurofound.europa.eu/sites/default/files/ef_publication/field_ef_document/ef1725en.pdf
Aloisi, A. (2016) 'Commoditized workers: The rising of on-demand work. A case study research on a set of online platforms and apps. Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal, 37 (3). https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2637485
Amado, J.L. & T.C. Moreira (2019) ‘A lei portuguesa sobre o transporte de passageiros a partir de plataforma eletrónica: sujeitos, relações e presunções’, Labour & Law Issues, 5(1): 47–81. https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2421-2695/9629
Andreotti, A., D. Benassi & Y. Kazepov (2018) Western Capitalism in Transition. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Casilli, A.A. (2019) En attendant les robots: Enquête sur le travail du clic. Paris: Seuil.
Castel, R. (2003) From Manual Workers to Wage Laborers: Transformation of the Social Question. New York: Routledge.
Chicchi, F. (2020) ‘Beyond the “salary institution”: On the “society of performance” and the platformisation of the employment relationship’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):15–31.
Chicchi, F., E. Leonardi & S. Lucarelli (2018) Más allá del salario: Lógicas de la explotación. Madrid: Enclave de Libros.
Coates, D. (2000) Models of Capitalism: Growth and Stagnation in the Modern Era. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Cocola-Gant, A., & A. Gago, (2019). ‘Airbnb, buy-to-let investment and tourism-driven displacement: A case study in Lisbon’, Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space. https://doi.org/10.1177/0308518X19869012
Coval, C., & G. Cutuli (2016). ‘Dinamiche e persistenza della povertà in Italia: un'analisi sui working poor tra il 2002 e il 2012‘, Sociologia del lavoro, 144: 136–155. https://doi.org/10.3280/SL2016-144009.
Crouch, C. (2011) The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Crouch, C. (2019) Will the Gig Economy Prevail? Cambridge: Polity Press.
De Stefano, V. (2016) The Rise of the ‘Just-in-Time Workforce’: On-Demand Work, Crowdwork and Labour Protection in the 'Gig-Economy. Conditions of Work and Employment Series, 71. Geneva: International Labour Organisation. https://www.ilo.org/travail/whatwedo/publications/WCMS_443267/lang–en/index.htm
De Stefano, V. & A. Aloisi (2018) ‘European legal framework for “digital labour platforms”‘, European Commission, Luxembourg. https://doi.org/10.2760/78590
EC (2016) Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions. A European Agenda for the Collaborative Economy. http://ec.europa.eu/DocsRoom/documents/16881. Brussels: European Commission.
Esping-Andersen, G. (1990). The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Fourastié, J. (1979) Les Trente Glorieuses ou la révolution invisible de 1946 à 1975. Paris: Fayard.
Gainsforth, S. (2019). Airbnb città merce. Roma: Derive Approdi.
Hamorim, H. & F. Moda (2020) ‘Work by app: Algorithmic management and working conditions of Uber drivers in Brazil’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):101–18. https://doi.org/10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.1.0101.
Harvey, D. (2005) A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Holts, K., M. Coates, H.N. Spencer, & U. Huws (2019) The Platformisation of Work in Europe: Highlights from Research in 13 European countries. https://www.feps-europe.eu/resources/publications/686-the-platformisation-of-work-in-europe.html.
Huws, U. (2014) Labor in the Global Digital Economy: The Cybertariat Comes of Age. New York: Monthly Review Press.
Huws, U. (2019) Labour in Contemporary Capitalism: What Next? London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Huws, U. (2020) ‘The algorithm and the city: Platform labour and the urban environment’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):14. https://doi.org/10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.1.0007.
Huws, U., H.N. Spencer, S.D. Syrdal, & K. Holts (2017). Work in the European Gig Economy. Brussels: FEPS – Foundation for European Progressive Studies. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.18745/DS.19911.
Huws, U. N., Spencer, & M., Coates (2019). The Platformisation Of Work In Europe: Highlights from Research in 13 European Countries. Brussels: FEPS – Foundation for European Progressive Studies.
Kozinets, R. (2010) Netnography: Doing Ethnographic Research Online. London: SAGE.
Kozinets, R. (2015). Netnography: Doing Ethnographic Research Online. London: SAGE.
Leonardi, E. & E. Chertkovskaya (2017) ‘Work as promise for the subject of employability: Unpaid work as a new form of exploitation’, Sociologia del lavoro, 141:112–30. https://doi.org/10.3280/SL2017-145007.
Leonardi, E. & M. Secchi (2016) ‘EXPO 2015 as a laboratory for neoliberalization: Great exhibitions, urban value dispossession and new labor relations’, Partecipazione e Conflitto: The Open Journal of Sociopolitical Studies, 9 (2):567–95. https://doi.org/10.1285/i20356609v9i2p567.
Marglin, S. & J. Schor (1989) The Golden Age of Capitalism: Reinterpreting the Postwar Experience. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Marrone, M. & G. Peterlongo (2020) ‘Where platforms meet infrastructures: Digital platforms, urban resistance and the ambivalence of the city in the Italian case of Bologna’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):135. https://doi.org/10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.1.0119.
Mendes, L. (2017). ‘Gentrificação turística em Lisboa: neoliberalismo, financeirização, e urbanismo austeritário em tempos de pós-crise capitalista 2008-2009‘, Cadernos Metrópole [en linea], 19 (39): 479–512.
Mezzadra, S. & B. Neilson (2018) The Politics of Operations: Excavating Contemporary Capitalism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Novella, M. (2019) ‘Il rider non è lavoratore subordinato, ma è tutelato come se lo fosse’, Labour & Law Issues, 5 (1):82–103. https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2421-2695/9630.
Peña-Casas, R., D. Ghailani, S. Spasova & B. Vanhercke (2019) In-Work Poverty in Europe: A Study of National Policies. Brussels: European Commission. https://doi.org/10.2767/31835.
Pesole, A., B.M.C. Urzi, M.E. Fernandez, F. Biagi & I. Gonzalez (2018) ‘Platform workers in Europe: Evidence from the COLLEEM survey’, in JRC Science for Policy Report. https://doi.org/10.2760/742789.
Prassl, J. (2018) Humans as a Service: The Promise and Perils of Work in the Gig Economy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Rosenblat, A. (2018) Uberland: How Algorith are Rewriting the Rules of Work. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Scholz, T. (2017) Uberworked and Underpaid. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Seixas, J., & A. Guterres Brito (2018). ‘Political evolution in the Lisbon of the digital era. Fast urban changes, slow institutional restructuring and growing civic pressures’, Urban Research & Practice, 12 (1), 99–110. https://doi.org/10.1080/17535069.2018.1505272.
Springer, S., K. Birch & J. MacLeavy (2016) ‘An introduction to neoliberalism’, in S. Springer, K. Birch & J. MacLeavy, The Handbook of Neoliberalism. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge:1–14.
Srnicek, N. (2016) Platform Capitalism. Cambridge: Polity.
Tubaro, P., C. Le Ludec & A.A. Casilli (2020) ‘Counting “micro-workers”: Societal and methodological challenges around new forms of labour’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):67–82. https://doi.org/doi:10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.1.0067.
Vecchi, B. (2017) Il capitalismo delle piattaforme. Rome: Manifestolibri.
Woodcock, J. & M. Graham (2020) The Gig Economy: A Critical Introduction. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Comments

Comment on this article

[1] Ahrendt, D., E. Sándor, A. Revello, J.-M. Jungblut & R. Anderson (2017). In-work poverty in the EU. Dublin: Eurofound. https://www.eurofound.europa.eu/sites/default/files/ef_publication/field_ef_document/ef1725en.pdf

[2] Aloisi, A. (2016) 'Commoditized workers: The rising of on-demand work. A case study research on a set of online platforms and apps. Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal, 37 (3). https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2637485

[3] Amado, J.L. & T.C. Moreira (2019) ‘A lei portuguesa sobre o transporte de passageiros a partir de plataforma eletrónica: sujeitos, relações e presunções’, Labour & Law Issues, 5(1): 47–81. https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2421-2695/9629

[4] Andreotti, A., D. Benassi & Y. Kazepov (2018) Western Capitalism in Transition. Manchester: Manchester University Press.

[5] Casilli, A.A. (2019) En attendant les robots: Enquête sur le travail du clic. Paris: Seuil.

[6] Castel, R. (2003) From Manual Workers to Wage Laborers: Transformation of the Social Question. New York: Routledge.

[7] Chicchi, F. (2020) ‘Beyond the “salary institution”: On the “society of performance” and the platformisation of the employment relationship’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):15–31.

[8] Chicchi, F., E. Leonardi & S. Lucarelli (2018) Más allá del salario: Lógicas de la explotación. Madrid: Enclave de Libros.

[9] Coates, D. (2000) Models of Capitalism: Growth and Stagnation in the Modern Era. Cambridge: Polity Press.

[10] Cocola-Gant, A., & A. Gago, (2019). ‘Airbnb, buy-to-let investment and tourism-driven displacement: A case study in Lisbon’, Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space. https://doi.org/10.1177/0308518X19869012

[11] Coval, C., & G. Cutuli (2016). ‘Dinamiche e persistenza della povertà in Italia: un'analisi sui working poor tra il 2002 e il 2012‘, Sociologia del lavoro, 144: 136–155. https://doi.org/10.3280/SL2016-144009.

[12] Crouch, C. (2011) The Strange Non-Death of Neoliberalism. Cambridge: Polity Press.

[13] Crouch, C. (2019) Will the Gig Economy Prevail? Cambridge: Polity Press.

[14] De Stefano, V. (2016) The Rise of the ‘Just-in-Time Workforce’: On-Demand Work, Crowdwork and Labour Protection in the 'Gig-Economy. Conditions of Work and Employment Series, 71. Geneva: International Labour Organisation. https://www.ilo.org/travail/whatwedo/publications/WCMS_443267/lang–en/index.htm

[15] De Stefano, V. & A. Aloisi (2018) ‘European legal framework for “digital labour platforms”‘, European Commission, Luxembourg. https://doi.org/10.2760/78590

[16] EC (2016) Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions. A European Agenda for the Collaborative Economy. http://ec.europa.eu/DocsRoom/documents/16881. Brussels: European Commission.

[17] Esping-Andersen, G. (1990). The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism. Cambridge: Polity Press.

[18] Fourastié, J. (1979) Les Trente Glorieuses ou la révolution invisible de 1946 à 1975. Paris: Fayard.

[19] Gainsforth, S. (2019). Airbnb città merce. Roma: Derive Approdi.

[20] Hamorim, H. & F. Moda (2020) ‘Work by app: Algorithmic management and working conditions of Uber drivers in Brazil’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):101–18. https://doi.org/10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.1.0101.

[21] Harvey, D. (2005) A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[22] Holts, K., M. Coates, H.N. Spencer, & U. Huws (2019) The Platformisation of Work in Europe: Highlights from Research in 13 European countries. https://www.feps-europe.eu/resources/publications/686-the-platformisation-of-work-in-europe.html.

[23] Huws, U. (2014) Labor in the Global Digital Economy: The Cybertariat Comes of Age. New York: Monthly Review Press.

[24] Huws, U. (2019) Labour in Contemporary Capitalism: What Next? London: Palgrave Macmillan.

[25] Huws, U. (2020) ‘The algorithm and the city: Platform labour and the urban environment’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):14. https://doi.org/10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.1.0007.

[26] Huws, U., H.N. Spencer, S.D. Syrdal, & K. Holts (2017). Work in the European Gig Economy. Brussels: FEPS – Foundation for European Progressive Studies. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.18745/DS.19911.

[27] Huws, U. N., Spencer, & M., Coates (2019). The Platformisation Of Work In Europe: Highlights from Research in 13 European Countries. Brussels: FEPS – Foundation for European Progressive Studies.

[28] Kozinets, R. (2010) Netnography: Doing Ethnographic Research Online. London: SAGE.

[29] Kozinets, R. (2015). Netnography: Doing Ethnographic Research Online. London: SAGE.

[30] Leonardi, E. & E. Chertkovskaya (2017) ‘Work as promise for the subject of employability: Unpaid work as a new form of exploitation’, Sociologia del lavoro, 141:112–30. https://doi.org/10.3280/SL2017-145007.

[31] Leonardi, E. & M. Secchi (2016) ‘EXPO 2015 as a laboratory for neoliberalization: Great exhibitions, urban value dispossession and new labor relations’, Partecipazione e Conflitto: The Open Journal of Sociopolitical Studies, 9 (2):567–95. https://doi.org/10.1285/i20356609v9i2p567.

[32] Marglin, S. & J. Schor (1989) The Golden Age of Capitalism: Reinterpreting the Postwar Experience. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

[33] Marrone, M. & G. Peterlongo (2020) ‘Where platforms meet infrastructures: Digital platforms, urban resistance and the ambivalence of the city in the Italian case of Bologna’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):135. https://doi.org/10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.1.0119.

[34] Mendes, L. (2017). ‘Gentrificação turística em Lisboa: neoliberalismo, financeirização, e urbanismo austeritário em tempos de pós-crise capitalista 2008-2009‘, Cadernos Metrópole [en linea], 19 (39): 479–512.

[35] Mezzadra, S. & B. Neilson (2018) The Politics of Operations: Excavating Contemporary Capitalism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

[36] Novella, M. (2019) ‘Il rider non è lavoratore subordinato, ma è tutelato come se lo fosse’, Labour & Law Issues, 5 (1):82–103. https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2421-2695/9630.

[37] Peña-Casas, R., D. Ghailani, S. Spasova & B. Vanhercke (2019) In-Work Poverty in Europe: A Study of National Policies. Brussels: European Commission. https://doi.org/10.2767/31835.

[38] Pesole, A., B.M.C. Urzi, M.E. Fernandez, F. Biagi & I. Gonzalez (2018) ‘Platform workers in Europe: Evidence from the COLLEEM survey’, in JRC Science for Policy Report. https://doi.org/10.2760/742789.

[39] Prassl, J. (2018) Humans as a Service: The Promise and Perils of Work in the Gig Economy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[40] Rosenblat, A. (2018) Uberland: How Algorith are Rewriting the Rules of Work. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

[41] Scholz, T. (2017) Uberworked and Underpaid. Cambridge: Polity Press.

[42] Seixas, J., & A. Guterres Brito (2018). ‘Political evolution in the Lisbon of the digital era. Fast urban changes, slow institutional restructuring and growing civic pressures’, Urban Research & Practice, 12 (1), 99–110. https://doi.org/10.1080/17535069.2018.1505272.

[43] Springer, S., K. Birch & J. MacLeavy (2016) ‘An introduction to neoliberalism’, in S. Springer, K. Birch & J. MacLeavy, The Handbook of Neoliberalism. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge:1–14.

[44] Srnicek, N. (2016) Platform Capitalism. Cambridge: Polity.

[45] Tubaro, P., C. Le Ludec & A.A. Casilli (2020) ‘Counting “micro-workers”: Societal and methodological challenges around new forms of labour’, Work Organisation, Labour & Globalisation, 14 (1):67–82. https://doi.org/doi:10.13169/workorgalaboglob.14.1.0067.

[46] Vecchi, B. (2017) Il capitalismo delle piattaforme. Rome: Manifestolibri.

[47] Woodcock, J. & M. Graham (2020) The Gig Economy: A Critical Introduction. Cambridge: Polity Press.