Digital Mind 🧠

🪵 The Threshold

Amazon drivers' unionization won recognition as logistics workers but stayed workplace-bound without broader politicization.

Properties2
tagsja-picks, xref, connection_points, primary_study, singleton, category/connection-points
aliases@della_porta_mobilizing_2022, loc. 85

3 min read

Amazon drivers’ unionization won recognition as logistics workers but stayed workplace-bound without broader politicization.

Evidence

Amazon logistics is a key site for anyone investigating the rise of economic digitization, its implications for working conditions and the collective action of workers. The second case in our analysis is the first cycle of contention at Amazon in the Milan area, one of the most important e-commerce centers in Italy. From 2015, the launch of new stations attracted a new workforce with no previous experience with the “Amazon model” of work organization based on digital monitoring through algorithms (Delfanti 2021). The years that followed saw these workers rapidly unionizing and organizing, a process that remains ongoing. The first cycle of strikes, which emerged in May 2017 in Milan, triggered the unionization of around one third of the Milanese drivers. These protests helped to establish several mechanisms of collective negotiation on various levels, bringing about a number of important improvements in working conditions, such as improved contracts, slower paces of work and more sustainable working schedules. … Above all, though, this first cycle of contention produced a shift in the way these workers are recognized as a collective actor. Rather than being seen as a fragmented workforce employed by several subcontractors that work for Amazon—the “head” of the supply chain of lastmile urban deliveries—they gained recognition as logistics workers, with a specific national contractual framework (CCNL) and the right to participate in collective negotiations with employers. … In our investigation of the 2017 opening cycle of strikes in the Milan area, we looked at the workers’ resources, repertoire of action and claims in order to identify the characteristics of their identity framing in a key sector of the platform economy. In contrast to our case of food couriers, the identity framing of these workers remained confined to the workplace level and lacked any sign of broader politicization. — Donatella della Porta et al., Mobilizing Against the Odds, 85

Categorization

  • XREF: This is exactly the case contrast the reader’s stated purpose targets: Amazon driver’s employer-specific workplace frame vs. food-delivery couriers’ broader precarious-worker identity. — connects to: Amazon drivers built workplace-only solidarity while couriers developed broader political identity frames. — Donatella della Porta et al., Mobilizing Against the Odds: Solidarity…, 116; Amazon drivers mobilized a narrow identity frame demanding recognition as skilled logistics workers. — Donatella della Porta et al., Mobilizing Against the Odds: Solidarity…, 99; Amazon drivers organize around narrow pragmatic goals, not political identity — Donatella della Porta et al., Mobilizing Against the Odds: Solidarity…, 105

Broader Connections

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