Worker Organisation in the UK: A Taxonomy of Struggle in the 'Gig Economy'

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A shift has occurred in labour markets towards types of digital platformmediated work. With increasingly more people working in the 'gigeconomy', trends that challenge traditional meanings of employment andworkplaces are becoming highly significant.Many studies have discussed working conditions within the gig economy(Gandini 2019, Cant 2019). It has also been observed how workers in thissector are engaged in new forms of political organising (Woodcock 2014,Wood & Lehdonvirta 2019). However, this previous research has focusedon limited, or non-UK case studies. There has been no taxonomy of thetypes of worker organisation happening now in the UK. There is a questionabout how these new forms of political organising relate to the social andworking conditions experienced in this sector.Operaismo, a current in Marxism, offers a potentially fruitful way oftheorising the relationship between social and workplace conditions andforms of political organisation in the gig economy. Operaismo'stheoretical innovation was 'class composition analysis'. This form ofanalysis posits a close relationship between workplace conditions andforms of political organisation. This study will examine the social andworkplace conditions present in the gig economy; it will further examinehow these conditions produce new forms of political organisation. Theresult will be a taxonomy of political organisation happening in the UK gigeconomy.