3 Algorithmic Management and Migrant Workers
Migrants have become an important part of the socio-economic and political fabric of the country, but without much reliable data regarding its economic and spatial distribution. Migration of marginalised populace in India mainly occurs because of conditions of agrarian crisis, a growing debt crisis and a change in the economic relations in rural (or broadly non-urban) India (Gopalakrishnan & Sreenivasa, 2009; Gopalakrishnan et al., 2018). Most of them work for lower wages and remain unprotected by most labour and social welfare schemes and programmes run by the government. Under global capitalism, migration has become central to the process of capitalist accumulation and exploitation changing the social relations and relationships of production therein (Arnold, 2012). It has become one of the tools by which capitalism ensures a certain biopolitical control over the people (Tazzioli, 2020). In India, migration is often juxtaposed with failed developmental projects, or with failed policies of the state during times of crisis. Writing about the exceptionality of the Indian scenario, historian Chinmay Tumbe writes:
What makes the Indian case unique is the sheer persistence and magnitude of [the phenomenon of migration], one that has lasted for well over a century now. It is also a phenomenon that affects regions cover- ing at least 20 per cent of the Indian population, currently comprising over 200 million people. I call it the ‘Great Indian Migration Wave’, and it ranks among the largest and longest migration streams for work in documented history. It led to the rise of cities like Kolkata and Mumbai in India and Yangon and Dubai abroad. (Tumbe, 2018, pp. 39–40).
Platformisation on a global level allows for an assetisation of migrant labour and also helps platforms garner more venture capital, a critical part of their pricing policy (Surie, 2020; Van Doorn & Vijay, 2024). The algorithmic management of workers by the platforms is a part and parcel of the platformisation of everyday life that accompanies the growth of digital platforms. Algorithmic management-based processes are the most important aspect of the domination that platforms have come to inflict on the urban spaces. These strategies have enabled many platforms to compensate the lack of fixed labour with footloose labour<sup>21</sup> whereby the hypermobility of some workers has been used to replace those who are immobilised due to alterations within the technical division of labour under capitalism (Huws, 2006, 2020). For migrant workers, the question of livelihoods amidst these circumstances gets entwined with a constant devaluation of their self-esteem—which has a deteriorating effect on their performance (Baumeister et al., 2003)—which also affect the workers’ job satisfaction and organisational commitments (Watson et al., 2021).
5 MIGRANT GIG WORKERS OF INDIA’S CONSUMERIST CITIES
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