‘Becoming mainstream’: the professionalisation and corporatisation of digital nomadism

• Published date: 01 March 2020
• Author: François‐Xavier Vaujany,Edward Granter,Jeremy Aroles
• Date: 01 March 2020
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ntwe.12158

114 New Technology, Work and Employment © 2020 Brian Towers (BRITOW) and

John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

New Technology, Work and Employment 35:1

ISSN 1468-005X

‘Becoming mainstream’: the

professionalisation and corporatisation of

digital nomadism

Jeremy Aroles , Edward Granter and

François-XavierdeVaujany

Digital nomadism, a mobile lifestyle that encompasses a wide

array of professional endeavours, ranging from corporate re-

mote workers to digital entrepreneurs, has benetted from a

steadily growing appeal. Despite this, there is a dearth of re-

search exploring the premises and development of digital no-

madism. This paper is concerned with the image of digital no-

madism, its underlying structure and practices, and its relation

to the current world of work. In order to explore these aspects

and problematise digital nomadism, the paper traces the de-

velopment of digital nomadism and takes inspiration from the

Deleuzo-Guattarian image of the nomad. Adopting a qualita-

tive approach to content analysis, this paper argues that dig-

ital nomadism is becoming increasingly institutionalised and

professionalised, and, as such, is distant from the emancipato-

ry dimension underlying its discourse and many of its cultural

representations. Overall, digital nomadism appears as an ex-

tension of capitalist logics, rather than an alternative to them.

Keywords: digital nomadism, new ways of working, future of work, Deleuze and Guattari, profes-

sionalisation, corporatisation, gig economy, institutionalisation.

Electronic man is no less a nomad than his Paleolithic ancestors

(McLuhan, 1994: 28)

Introduction

Globalisation, economic volatility and technological development have changed sig-

nicantly the contours of the world of work (Brocklehurst, 2001; Messenger and

Jeremy Aroles (Jeremy.aroles@durham.ac.uk) Durham University, Durham University Business

School, Mill Hill Lane, DH1 3LB, Durham, UK. Jeremy Aroles is an assistant professor in organisation

studies at Durham University. His research interests gravitate around the emergence of new ways of

working, the management of culture, and the relation between ction and organisational worlds.

Edward Granter, University of Birmingham, Birmingham Business School, Department of Manage-

ment, UK. Edward Granter is a senior lecturer in organizational behaviour at Birmingham Business

School, University of Birmingham. His research and teaching interests range from the sociology of

work, to Frankfurt School Critical Theory, to organized crime.

François-Xavier de Vaujany, University Paris-Dauphine, Place du Maréchal de Lattre de Tassigny,

75016 Paris, France. François-Xavier de Vaujany is a professor of management & organisation studies

at the Université Paris-Dauphine. His research is focused on the emergence and legitimation of digital

innovations and new work practices.

Digital nomadism and new world of work 115

© 2020 Brian Towers (BRITOW) and

John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Gschwind, 2016; Aroles et al., 2019; Kingma, 2019). New work arrangements, which are

becoming increasingly prevalent (Cappelli and Keller, 2013; Petriglieri et al., 2019),

have affected the ways in which work is both performed and spatially or temporally

organised (Halford, 2005). Within the context of the so-called sharing economy, work

practices are depicted as increasingly exible, agile, autonomous, collaborative and

entrepreneurial (Felstead et al., 2005; Taylor, 2015). These changes both echo and are

further reinforced through various ‘professional’ trends, including coworking

(Spinuzzi, 2012), new forms of entrepreneurship (Matlay and Westhead, 2005), Do It

Yourself (DIY) and maker movements (De Vaujany and Aroles, 2019), crowdworking

(Bergvall-Kåreborn and Howcroft, 2014), and digital nomadism (Müller, 2016), and are

connected with the emergence of new work spaces (notably makerspaces, coworking

spaces, hackerspaces and Fab Labs).

In the context of workplace diversication and work exibilisation, the gure of the

nomad has been mobilised in different ways (Näsänen, 2017). Most papers addressing

nomadism, in a professional context, have equated nomadic workers to remote work-

ers through telework (see Chen and Nath, 2005; Bean and Eisenberg, 2006; Hirst, 2011;

Vayre and Pignault, 2014). More recently, attention has been drawn to one particular

type of nomad, namely the digital nomad (Müller, 2016; Bonneau and Enel, 2018; Nash

et al., 2018; Reichenberger, 2018; Thompson, 2018, 2019). Coined by Makimoto and

Manners (1997), the notion of ‘digital nomadism’ encapsulates individuals ‘whose

work does not tie them to any specic place (or to a specic itinerary), and who there-

fore travel while working’ (Sutherland and Jarrahi, 2017: 2). While digital nomads and

nomadic workers present some similarities, ‘what makes digital nomads distinct [from

nomadic workers] is their length of travel and decision not to have a home base’ (Nash

et al., 2018: 212). Importantly, digital nomadism lies at the intersection of three fram-

ings: as an economic activity, as a cultural phenomenon, and as a new technology-en-

abled form of working and organising (see Wang et al., 2018).

While still an emerging topic in academic spheres, digital nomadism is regularly

discussed in the media where it is typically depicted as an alternative, emancipatory,

fullling, glamorous and highly attractive ‘way of living’, at odds with the daily hum-

drum of ofce work. This paper sets out to probe this image through a focus on the

contours of digital nomadism (i.e. what constitutes digital nomadism) as well as its

relation to the current world of work and capitalism. In particular, this paper is pri-

marily concerned with the three following questions: How does the digital nomad

‘community’ portray digital nomadism? What are the underlying structures or prac-

tices that frame digital nomadism as a form of working life? Does digital nomadism

represent a discontinuity in the current world of work?

Our research adopted a qualitative approach to content analysis and drew from var-

ious types of online sources. Online sources can be insightful in the study of work and

organisations (Pongratz, 2018; Glozer et al., 2019) and are particularly suited to the

study of digital nomadism (as a discourse conveyed through digital channels). In the

context of our research, the focus was on forums, blogs, newspaper articles as well as

Facebook and Twitter posts, all of which were directly connected to the digital nomad

community. These sources have been mobilised at different stages of the research pro-

cess, with some sources becoming more central as the research progressed. All the data

collected and analysed have been generated naturally (see Boell et al., 2016). Altogether,

our empirical research amounts to analysing hundreds of forum threads and blog

posts, engaging with many newspaper articles and visiting a large number of websites

connected to the digital nomad community.

In order to problematise and explore digital nomadism, the paper traces its emer-

gence and draws on Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) gure of the nomad. More than a

mere coincidence of terms, we believe that the concept of the nomad sensu Deleuze and

Guattari (1987) can be mobilised in the exploration of the discourse(s) underlying dig-

ital nomadism. For Deleuze and Guattari (1987), the nomad is a revolutionary gure

that can bring about change; the nomad is perceived as ‘the embodiment of freedom

and irresponsibility and a challenge to the order of things’ (Engebrigtsen, 2017: 44).

While digital nomadism is typically portrayed as an alternative to mainstream forms