The platform or “gig” economy has an ambitious goal: the restructuring of work for tens of millions of workers throughout the world. These platforms entice workers with claims about being your own boss (Uber: “You decide when and how often you drive.”[i]), giving you the flexibility to focus on the things that are important to you (Lyft: “The quality of life that I get from working with Lyft is essential to doing the projects that I love”[ii]), and personal satisfaction (TaskRabbit: “I love doing different tasks and meeting great people, and the way my clients react to a job well done is priceless”[iii]).
The growing numbers of workers engaged in platform work is particularly visible in Argentina where a Columbian-based delivery service, Rappi, has proliferated. Rappi allows users to order food, deliver items or order groceries with the touch of a button. With more than 25,000 ‘distributors’, it is the fastest growing platform app in Latin America.[iv] To work for Rappi as a distributor, one needs only a form of transportation (bicycle, motorbike, or car), an Android phone, and working papers.[v] Rappi distributors are one of the most visible signs of this new platform-based economy: distributors zip around cities, mostly on motorbikes, and are easily identified by their bright orange backpacks and raincoats.
Throughout the world, organizations are forming with the goal of empowering platform workers. Common demands include greater control over the algorithms that determine their work, state recognition as “employees”, and higher wages. These efforts are, in some countries, being led by unions; in others, they take the form of grassroots, social movement organizations built and controlled by the platform workers themselves.
Yet, building solidarity among platform workers poses unique challenges. Given the work’s individual nature, the workforce is fragmented and dispersed. Without a common workspace, platform worker organizing often involves the use of digital communications platforms such as Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp to provide workers a space to meet, share grievances, and plan job actions.
Case Description
Union Representation in Argentina
Trade unions in Argentina enjoy a large amount of political and legal power. A series of labor law reforms passed following Juan Peron’s ascension to power in 1946 granted unions, “financial resources, monopoly of workers’ representation in collective bargaining, protection for union officials and against anti-union practices.”[vi] These reforms greatly strengthened the power of unions within Argentina, but also led to a situation in which worker representation is highly concentrated and subject to political intervention.[vii]
Political intervention mainly takes the form of union recognition in a particular sector. While workers have the power, in principle, to associate and determine the nature of their representation, a legal union cannot be formed without the Ministry of Labour’s grant of personeria gremial.[viii] Without this status, a union does not have the power to negotiate collective agreements, or to represent workers before employers or in the courts.[ix] The Department of Labor’s decision to grant a particular union personeria gremial in a given sector is often a political one, and established unions are generally favored in these situations given their power and connections.
While this legal framework does provide unions with a greater degree of formal and functional power than what is found in many countries, it also hampers union democracy and representation within unions. This has led to a number of member-driven movements for reform within various unions.[x] Commentators have also suggested that this rigid legal framework has prevented unions from flexibly adapting to the needs of a growing number of precarious, informal workers within the economy.[xi]
Background of Motorbike and Delivery Workers in Argentina Struggle to Organize
Work in Argentina has been, historically, significantly more formalized when compared to other Latin American countries owing to the relatively early industrialization and resulting strength of trade unions.[xii] Motoqueros, or bikers, have played a role in delivering goods in Argentina for decades. These jobs were once formalized and a part of the internal organizations of private companies and public administrations.[xiii] With the growth of subcontracting and privatization, however, most of these jobs shifted to small firms specializing in delivery or courier services.[xiv] This shift resulted in lower wages and longer working hours––often due to the piece-rate nature of the work.
The Argentine depression of 1998-2002 brought with it a period of social rebellion. Street protests were massive, with protestors destroying private property––the destruction was focused primarily on banks, and large American and European companies. The social unrest quickly translated into a tool for marginalized and informal workers to express their dissatisfaction. In the case of the motoqueros, they had cut their teeth in the protests of 2001 by providing logistical support to the demonstrations, transporting injured protestors, and using their motorbikes to block the path of the police. This experience was channeled into the creation of SIMeCa, an unrecognized union that advocated grassroots democracy, and utilized direct action techniques to raise the profile of their demands.[xv]
While initially SIMeCa activists, informed by their success and importance in the 2001 strikes, did not believe that official union recognition was necessary, they quickly realized that they could not sign a collective agreement without personeria gremial status from the Ministry of Labour. After years of attempting to organize for recognition, the Ministry of Labor eventually recognized a competing union––a newly formed division of the established CGT confederation.[xvi]
The APP Union and Platform Workers
The APP union was formed by Rappi delivery workers in 2018. The workers are seeking official recognition as employees––this would entitle them to certain legal protections against unfair and unilateral treatment by Rappi and other platform companies, and will also allow them to negotiate collective agreements. Legal recognition as employees will also ensure that Rappi workers will have access to paid time off, benefits, and social insurance. Juan Ottaviano, an Argentine labor lawyer working with APP, says that the workers are also interested in gaining control over how the Rappi’s algorithm works.
The first strike, which took place in July 2018, was largely in response to unilateral changes the company had made to how the application worked. Many workers were enticed to work for Rappi by claims that they could “be their own boss”. Central to this, for many of the Rappi distributors, was the ability to accept or reject certain orders. Because work is paid on a piece rate basis, workers were not inclined to accept orders where they had to travel long distances as the time that it took them to get back to the areas in which most of the deliveries were concentrated ate into their earning potential. Recognizing this, Rappi altered the application so that if a worker rejects an offer, they were locked out of the system for an hour. If they rejected too many offers, they would be banned from the platform entirely.[xvii]
The strike lasted for one hour and resulted in a significant increase in the price of ordering on the app and garnered significant media attention. The strike also caught the attention of the CGT––the trade union that eventually had been granted representation for the motoqueros. CGT members reacted negatively to the strike––many viewed the Rappi distributors and other platform-based workers as taking away jobs that used to belong to the motoqueros through their employment at small courier firms. Moreover, most of the motoqueros are native Argentinians whereas a high percentage of Rappi distributors are Venezuelan immigrants. The APP strike was met with a violent response by many CGT members.
A second strike took place more recently. However, the growing number of Rappi distributors was making organizing more difficult. A significantly smaller number of distributors participated in the second strike. The action was, however, more impactful than the first strike. This was due in large part to a group of hackers, unaffiliated with the APP union, who were able to take the application offline for a period of time.
Current Situation
Moving forward, the APP union’s first goal is to ensure that the Rappi distributors are legally recognized as employees of the company. If the distributors continue to be considered independent contractors, they will not be able to unionize. The union is trying to avoid allowing the courts to make this determination on a piece-meal basis. Instead, they have turned to the Ministry of Labor to ask for recognition. If recognition is granted, all Rappi’s distributors will be recognized legally as employees.
Analysis of Power Resources
Associational Power
As APP is not currently recognized by the government as a union, building associational power is particularly important. In the initial stages of organization, much of the power was built through grass-roots organizing on the part of the distributors. Facebook and WhatsApp were the primary tools the workers used to communicate about the union, grievances, and potential job actions. However, as the workforce has continued to grow these channels have become inadequate. Efforts to build associational power are further frustrated by the lack of common shared space among the workers. The APP union is currently in touch with other platform-worker unions internationally and is attempting to create an application through which workers can connect with one another. This platform would centralize communication through one platform, and is intended to allow for a greater feeling of unity among the workforce.
Structural Power
In the case of platform-based workers, structural power is highly linked to the degree of associational power possessed by the union. While the union has attempted to disrupt the functioning of the app through two strikes, strike actions are becoming more difficult as the pool of distributors grows. Furthermore, platform-based companies are able to implement “surge pricing” to entice workers to take orders during times of particularly high demand. Companies have used this feature during labor actions to discourage workers from participating in work-stoppages or job actions, as the cost of participation increases.
The APP union has considered a number of types of work stoppages. These include encouraging workers to not sign into the app, or to accept orders and then not fill them. This second type of action has the potential to be more impactful as it is difficult for the company to counteract. A significant number of orders may go unfilled before the company is able to attempt to counter-act the effects through mechanisms like surge pricing. The union admits, however, that right now it does not have the associational power necessary to successfully operationalize any significant structural power.
Institutional Power
Platform workers in Argentina are currently afforded virtually no institutional power. There is currently no union authorized to officially represent them. That means that there is currently no possibility for collective bargaining or negotiations with the company. Furthermore, companies have been very careful to not register their workers as employees. The APP union has petitioned the Ministry of Labor for recognition, but it is likely that the Argentinian Parliament will have to amend the law to determine whether or not platform-workers may unionize.
APP has attempted some litigation to ensure that platform-workers who are involved in union activity cannot be fired. Recently, the union took Rappi to court for firing a union activist and won. Yet, the union was very careful during that case to not enter a theoretical debate regarding the technical definition of the employees––instead, they are relying on the Ministry of Labor and the Parliament to make that determination. Until such a time as APP is officially recognized by the Ministry of Labor, it has no institutional power.
Societal Power
One of the most promising avenues for building societal power may be the introduction of an entirely new platform controlled by workers. Recently, a group of Rappi workers, with the help of APP, has introduced a new service with similar functionality to Rappi. The workers on the new platform, Tuenco, are classified employees and have a greater degree of control over the functioning of the application. This ‘democratic’ application is intended to compete directly with Rappi. Through building societal power, the APP union could help convince consumers to switch to from Rappi to Tuenco.[xviii]
Lessons Learned
- Platform work is a growing part of the new digital economy. The ways in which governments choose to define the relationships these companies have to their workers will be critical to the abilities of unions to organize this growing segment of the workforce.
- While unions have a strong stake in the outcome of these classifications, groups focusing on workers’ rights should also take particular interest in these policy debates. Apart from the legality to unionize, the classification of platform-based workers has ramifications for workers’ ability to access social benefits, paid time off, and to have any say in their terms and conditions of employment.
- The development of associational power among platform workers is challenging due to the fragmented nature of the workforce. New tools must be created to engender a sense of solidarity among workers, and to facilitate communication. These tools, however, have the potential to assist in organizing drives in more traditional sectors, as well.
- The experience of platform workers underscores the need for existing unions to be responsive to new forms of precarity within the economy. Traditional organizing tactics are less likely to resonate among workers in more precarious forms of work, and unions need to emphasize forms of societal power to reach these workers. This can include workers’ centers, as well as greater collaboration with community, religious and civic groups.
Further Reading
De Stefano, V. (2016) The Rise of the Just-in-Time Workforce: On-Demand Work, Crowdwork, and Labor Protection in the Gig-Economy. Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal, vol. 37, no. 3, Spring 2016, pp. 471-504.
This article provides an analysis of employment classification in the gig economy, and argues against an ‘intermediate’ classification (somewhere between independent contractors and employees) of platform-workers. This comprehensive overview of the labor market trends and legal structures that have given rise to gig work ultimately concludes with policy recommendations encompassing full recognition of gig-economy workers as employees, and a theoretical integration of gig-economy work into the broader economy.
Gullo, E. (2018) Capitalism with Blood Traction. Revista Anfibia, Universidad Nacional De San Martin, 2018.
This piece gives a first-hand account of what it is like to be a Rappi distributor. The author worker for Rappi for 10 days, and describes the difficulties of working for the service. Though the article was written in Spanish, Google translate makes the article intelligible for those who cannot read the original.
Johnston, H. and C. Land-Kazlauskas (2018) Organizing On-Demand: Representation, Voice and Collective Bargaining in the Gig Economy. Conditions of Work and Employment Series No. 94, International Labor Organization, 2018.
This report offers an overview of the gig economy. It explores trade union approaches to organizing in this space, as well as highlighting the role online forums and workers centers can play in helping to bring collective identity to groups of gig economy workers. It concludes with a useful discussion of the legal impediments towards collective agreements for gig economy workers in the United States and in Europe.
Wyss, Jim. How a Colombian Billion-Dollar Delivery App Became a Lifeline for Venezuelan Migrants. The Miami Herald.
This piece provides further context for the rise of Rappi, and the ways in which the service has become a primary source of employment for many Venezuelan migrants in Latin America. Many migrants have had difficulty finding formal employment abroad, and services such as Rappi require little more than a phone, transportation, and legal working papers.
[i] https://www.uber.com/us/en/drive/
[ii] https://www.lyft.com/driver
[iii] https://www.taskrabbit.com/become-a-tasker
[iv] Miranda, Boris. “Rappi, the ‘Amazon of Colombia’ That Became the Most Successful Endeavor in the Country (and That Generates Protests in Some Cities of Latin America).” BBC News, BBC, 26 Oct. 2018, http://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-america-latina-45975280.
[vi] Atzeni, Maurizio. “Beyond Trade Unions’ Strategy? The Social Construction of Precarious Workers Organizing in the City of Buenos Aires.” Labor History, vol. 57, no. 2, 2016, pp. 193–214., doi:10.1080/0023656x.2016.1086537.
[vii] Ibid.
[viii] Ibid.
[ix] Ibid.
[x] Ibid.
[xi] Ibid.
[xii] Ibid.
[xiii] Ibid.
[xiv] Ibid.
[xv] Atzeni, Maurizio, and Pablo Ghigliani. “The Re-Emergence of Workplace Based Organisation as the New Expression of Conflict in Argentina.” New Forms and Expressions of Conflict at Work, edited by G. Gall, Palgrave, 2013.
[xvi] Ibid.
[xvii] http://anccom.sociales.uba.ar/2018/09/12/la-app-de-la-explotacion/
[xviii] Atkins, Jacob. “Delivery Drivers Face off Rappi and Glovo, Launch Their Own App.” Contxto, 13 Mar. 2019, http://www.contxto.com/en/argentina/delivery-drivers-face-off-rappi-and-glovo-launch-their-own-app/.
Solidarity and Campaigns 