Precarious work under platform capitalism

Cosmin Popan
Dec 19, 2020
Illustration by Irina Maria Iliescu.

It’s been almost four months since I started my three-year research project, Doing gig work: Social implications of platform-based food deliveries. I’m still scratching the surface of gig work, an increasingly prevalent phenomenon that appears to shape the future of work.

I find my fieldwork fascinating and at the same time emotionally exhausting. It has so far revealed a great complexity of reasons, life situations, and motivations which lead people to choose this kind of extremely flexible work.

My colleagues and friends from the media platform Inclusiv in Bucharest asked me to reflect on my project and write something for their audience. You can read more about my first fieldwork encounters here (in Romanian). Thank you, Ștefan and Alec, for the invitation!

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Cosmin Popan

GATES post-doctoral fellow, MaCI, Université Grenoble Alpes. Interested in mobilities, migration, labour, gig economy. Twitter: @cosminpopan