Even the most notable examples of effective resistance from digital platform workers, such as the e-food campaign, have experienced shortlived and limited impacts, much like other mobilizations such as the migrants’ demonstrations in the strawberry fields of Manolada. Additionally, the individual strategies employed by migrants to cope with precarity have had similarly limited effects in terms of providing access to full citizenship. Migrant workers consistently serve as a reserve army of labour without union representation, which subjects them to direct employer control and workplace exploitation.
This takes us to two main conclusions. First, the employment disadvantages of migrants in Greece both before and after the emergence of the gig economy should be understood both as part of the historical interplay between social, cultural, and economic forces, and as a power issue involving the complex interplay of managerial practices, state incapacity, and the agency of individual migrants and their associations. Second, jobs in the gig economy, which are frequently evangelized in the media as providing greater flexibility and choice (Chen et al., 2019; Fleming, 2017; Zwick, 2018), can also conceal the decline of workers’ rights and the harsh exploitation of already politically and economically vulnerable groups, such as migrant workers. Such conclusions indicate the urgent need for more inclusive policies for migrant workers by the state and the Greek trade union movement.
References
2 MIGRANT LABOUR IN THE GREEK GIG ECONOMY
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