Le digital labour, extension infinie ou fin du travail ?

Tracés

关键词: labour;    value;    automation;    algorithm;    digital capitalism;    work;   

DOI  :  10.4000/traces.6882

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

This article considers that the emergence of digital labour studies is revealing of two current trends: the framing of a growing number of social activities as labour, the growing economic importance of algorithmic automation. My hypothesis is that the tendency to consider as labour many everyday life activities – such as using a search engine or wearing a tracking device – has to do with the fact that, in some parts of the digital economy, conscious human activity is not the only source of value any more. In other words, digital labour theorists expand the notion of labour to activities that common sense knowledge does not consider as such, because these activities serve as inputs in a process of value generation that heavily relies on algorithmic automation. They thus seek to highlight new forms of labour in parts of the economy where human labour seems to have lost its prominence. Although this theoretical move is an important contribution to the current debate about the mutations of work and labour, it can be criticised. First, digital labour theorists seem to easily give up on the modern philosophical definition of labour as a conscious and intentional activity. Secondly, they seem prone to considering that the only signification of our online activities is to fuel the process of capitalist accumulation. The end of the article elaborates on these two aspects.

【 授权许可】

Unknown