Connecting at the edge: Cycles of commodification and labour control within food delivery platform work in Belgium

• Published date: 01 July 2023
• Author: Milena Franke,Valeria Pulignano
• Date: 01 July 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ntwe.12218

Received: 11 September 2020

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Accepted: 19 September 2021

DOI: 10.1111/ntwe.12218

SPECIAL ISSUE PAPER

Connecting at the edge: Cycles of

commodification and labour control within

food delivery platform work in Belgium

Milena Franke |Valeria Pulignano

Centre for Sociological Research (CeSO),

Faculty of Social Sciences, KU Leuven,

Leuven, Belgium

Correspondence

Milena Franke and Valeria Pulignano,

Centre for Sociological Research (CeSO),

Faculty of Social Sciences, KU Leuven,

Leuven, Belgium.

Email: leamilena.franke@kuleuven.be

and valeria.pulignano@kuleuven.be

Funding information

Flemish Research Council,

Grant/Award Number: G073919N;

European Research Council (ERC) under

the European Union's Horizon 2020

research and innovation programme,

Grant/Award Number: 833577

Abstract

In this paper we examine how commodification and la-

bour control unfold within a digital labour platform, fo-

cusing on the connections between the platform, its users

and workers. Based on a qualitative study covering

couriers, clients, restaurants and the management of a

food delivery platform in Belgium, we shed light on the

complexity of commodification, explaining how the

platform simultaneously empowers and disempowers all

participants. We illustrate how the platform fosters

commodification by granting access to transactions and

fuelling competition, while at the same time increasing

dependency through withholding information from users

and workers. In so doing, we contribute to understanding

how platforms exert control and create, extract and cap-

ture value by connecting users and workers with each

other through the use of digital technology.

KEYWORDS

commodification, control, digital technology, food delivery,

labour platform, value, work

INTRODUCTION

Recent studies on platform work—that is, paid work mediated via on‐and offline labour

platforms—have turned their attention to the control processes involved (Griesbach et al., 2019;

Wood et al., 2018), the role of new technology (Moore, 2017), platforms' abusive use of the

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self‐employment status (Cherry & Aloisi, 2017) and the emergence of platform worker activism

and representation (Tassinari & Maccarone, 2020; Vandaele, 2018). Several studies have

highlighted the coordination and intermediation processes between different parties as key to

understanding how labour platforms work (Heiland, 2021; Langley & Leyshon, 2017). Inter-

mediation is based on platforms collecting and processing vast amounts of data to track and

predict transactions and activities, bringing workers and users together in ever‐changing

constellations for the execution of a task (Van Dijck et al., 2018). Arguments in the literature

claim that the way in which platforms steer workers and users through the use of technology is

at the core of ‘platform capitalism’(Srnicek, 2017). In addition, it is claimed that these me-

chanisms underpin value creation, extraction and capture by digital platforms (Zysman &

Newman, 2006).

Sociological and labour studies have examined the implications of digital platforms for

labour subordination and control, pointing to the importance of algorithmic ratings, mon-

itoring and financial nudges prevalent in these platforms (Gandini, 2019; Shalini & Bathini,

2021). Wood et al. (2019) refer to a process of commodification when explaining how platform

capitalism achieves control by subordinating labour through exposing workers to market for-

ces. While these studies are clearly important, they fail to account for the complexity of the

labour arrangements generated by platforms (Richardson, 2020). We argue that by focusing

solely on a platform and its workers without considering the entirety of relationships involved

in platform work—including the users which we define here as both individual clients and

businesses such as restaurants—, labour study scholars are limiting the contribution that they

can make to understanding the complex forces underpinning commodification.

Drawing on scholars who use Marxian theory to locate platforms at the centre of ‘digital

economic circulation’(Langley & Leyshon, 2017, p. 13), we attempt to uncover the complex

nature of these forces by examining the relationships between platform workers and users. In

so doing, we reveal what we call the empowerment and the disempowerment cycles connecting

a digital labour platform, platform users (i.e., restaurants and clients) and workers (i.e.,

couriers), showing how they serve the logics of valorisation—which we here define as value

creation, extraction and capture—within platform capitalism. Our study explores how plat-

forms foster commodification by fuelling competition through the use of digital data and

metrics to boost efficiency in managing transactions between workers and users and si-

multaneously create dependency through withholding information. This suggests that com-

modification occurs through both competition and information asymmetry and that the joint

occurrence of these forces enhances platforms' power to control and valorise. The two ques-

tions are thus: (1) how do labour platforms commodify relationships between workers and

users; and (2) what practices do they use in the service of valorisation?

Examining digital data and metrics is key to understanding how ‘new’modes of capital

valorisation and labour control occur (Srnicek, 2017). Shapiro (2020), for instance, refers to

dynamic price‐setting as a calculative technique allowing platforms to optimise efficiency at

the expense of other market participants. Attoh et al. (2019) show how Uber workers' sub-

ordination occurs through their participation in the production of digital data. Digital data

and metrics are deployed within the platform‐worker‐user relationships to reduce transaction

costs (Lehdonvirta et al., 2019), concealing the social arrangement behind the platform in-

terface (Richardson, 2020). This is because ‘valuable data is generated when customers

browse their apps an d rate the services pr ovided, or when rest aurants fulfil ord ers’(Van

Doorn & Badger, 2020, p. 1476). We complement this literature by pointing to the empow-

erment and disempowerment cycles and explaining how platforms use digital data, metrics

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