Journal
NEW MEDIA & SOCIETY
Volume 20, Issue 8, Pages 2691-2711Publisher
SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD
DOI: 10.1177/1461444817729149
Keywords
Chinese taxi drivers; Didi Chuxing; digital labour; on-demand labour; ride-hailing apps; sharing; gig economy
Categories
Funding
- Faculty of Social Science at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR
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This article examines how taxi drivers adapt to, manipulate and fight against the rise of ride-hailing platforms like Didi Chuxing in China (which purchased Uber China). Chinese taxi drivers entered the on-demand labour platforms before private car drivers. Based on a nationwide data survey, the article argues that the technological power of Didi took shape by reinforcing inequalities facing informally employed taxi drivers prior to the emergence of ride-hailing apps. Drivers, far from being passive app users, have counteracted the changes in the work environment that resulted from platformisation in new and evolving ways, from strikes to algorithmic activism. This study suggests that online platforms are contested spaces where digital labour politics penetrate beyond the purported algorithmic power of the technology. The article enriches researches on on-demand labour by deconstructing the distinction between taxi drivers and private gig drivers and by pointing to the unfolding new grounds for digital labour activism.
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