TY - JOUR
T1 - Hunger for Profit
T2 - How Food Delivery Platforms Manage Couriers in China
AU - Chan, Jenny
N1 - Funding Information:
The author thanks Simon Malyon for his contribution to fieldwork and invitation to collaborate. She is also grateful to Ping Sun, Julie Yujie Chen and Amber Zhang for their co-participation in the panel entitled ?Labor and technology in China?s digital transformation? in the 2018 Association for Asian Studies (AAS)-in-Asia conference in Delhi, India. In the writing process, she benefitted from helpful comments of Sociologias editors, anonymous reviewers, Rafael Grohmann, Chris K. C. Chan, Eric Florence and Jack Linchuan Qiu. Last but not least, she would like to express her gratefulness to every food delivery worker who has taken the time to share their experience.
Funding Information:
* The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, China. ◊ This project is funded by the Early Career Scheme of the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong (RGC Project No. 25602517) and the Start-Up Research Fund of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU Project No. P0000548).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021. Sociologias. All rights reserved.
PY - 2021/8/30
Y1 - 2021/8/30
N2 - [English] How do food delivery platform firms, such as Meituan (operated by Tencent) and Ele.me (owned by Alibaba), manage couriers through service contracting rather than formal employment? How do couriers experience control and autonomy at work? Using observation and interviews, the author finds that a combination of data-driven surveillance systems and customer feedback mechanisms are incentivizing workers’ efforts. Corporate utilization of both manual and emotional labor is critical to realizing profits. Individual freedom is framed in a way that crowdsourced couriers are not required to work a minimum amount of time. Flexibility enabled by the algorithmic management, however, cuts both ways. When there is less demand, the platform corporations automatically reduce their dependence on labor. With variable food orders and piece rates, workers’ minimum earnings are not guaranteed. In the absence of Chinese legal protections over the fast-growing food delivery sector, informal workers are desperately struggling for livelihood.[Portuguese] How do food delivery platform firms, such as Meituan (operated by Tencent) and Ele.me (owned by Alibaba), manage couriers through service contracting rather than formal employment? How do couriers experience control and autonomy at work? Using observation and interviews, the author finds that a combination of data-driven surveillance systems and customer feedback mechanisms are incentivizing workers’ efforts. Corporate utilization of both manual and emotional labor is critical to realizing profits. Individual freedom is framed in a way that crowdsourced couriers are not required to work a minimum amount of time. Flexibility enabled by the algorithmic management, however, cuts both ways. When there is less demand, the platform corporations automatically reduce their dependence on labor. With variable food orders and piece rates, workers’ minimum earnings are not guaranteed. In the absence of Chinese legal protections over the fast-growing food delivery sector, informal workers are desperately struggling for livelihood.
AB - [English] How do food delivery platform firms, such as Meituan (operated by Tencent) and Ele.me (owned by Alibaba), manage couriers through service contracting rather than formal employment? How do couriers experience control and autonomy at work? Using observation and interviews, the author finds that a combination of data-driven surveillance systems and customer feedback mechanisms are incentivizing workers’ efforts. Corporate utilization of both manual and emotional labor is critical to realizing profits. Individual freedom is framed in a way that crowdsourced couriers are not required to work a minimum amount of time. Flexibility enabled by the algorithmic management, however, cuts both ways. When there is less demand, the platform corporations automatically reduce their dependence on labor. With variable food orders and piece rates, workers’ minimum earnings are not guaranteed. In the absence of Chinese legal protections over the fast-growing food delivery sector, informal workers are desperately struggling for livelihood.[Portuguese] How do food delivery platform firms, such as Meituan (operated by Tencent) and Ele.me (owned by Alibaba), manage couriers through service contracting rather than formal employment? How do couriers experience control and autonomy at work? Using observation and interviews, the author finds that a combination of data-driven surveillance systems and customer feedback mechanisms are incentivizing workers’ efforts. Corporate utilization of both manual and emotional labor is critical to realizing profits. Individual freedom is framed in a way that crowdsourced couriers are not required to work a minimum amount of time. Flexibility enabled by the algorithmic management, however, cuts both ways. When there is less demand, the platform corporations automatically reduce their dependence on labor. With variable food orders and piece rates, workers’ minimum earnings are not guaranteed. In the absence of Chinese legal protections over the fast-growing food delivery sector, informal workers are desperately struggling for livelihood.
KW - algorithmic management
KW - China
KW - emotional labor
KW - food delivery workers
KW - informal work
KW - rural migrants
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85116563133&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1590/15174522-112308
DO - 10.1590/15174522-112308
M3 - Journal article
AN - SCOPUS:85116563133
SN - 1517-4522
VL - 23
SP - 58
EP - 82
JO - Sociologias
JF - Sociologias
IS - 57
ER -