PLATFORMISATION FROM THE SOUTH: MAPPING THE EPISTEMOLOGIES AND IMAGINATIONS OF UBER'S INFILTRATION IN BRAZIL

本研究旨在探讨“平台化”的社会、政治、文化和认识论含义，即数字平台的基础设施、治理和商业模式渗透和重组各个部门和生活领域的动力。这不是一个统一的过程：随着数字平台在全球范围内的扩张，它们遇到了各种各样的条件和意想不到的地方奇点。该研究强调了平台化的基础设施维度及其对全球南方的影响，通过探索一个特定的平台，Uber，以及它在巴西的渗透，巴西是该平台在美国以外最大的市场。我的目标是研究Uber的基础设施维度，以及它们如何使以数据为主导的方式在异质领域的了解和干预成为可能。为了实现这一目标，本提案在平台研究（van Dijck等人，2018年；Poell等人，2019年）、基础设施研究（Plantin等人，2018年）和南方视角（de Sousa Santos， 2007年；Milán & tretreve， 2019年）之间进行了近似。尽管大多数关于Uber在巴西行动的研究都是调查其在劳动力不稳定化和数字化中的作用（Abilio, 2020; Grohmann, 2020），但本提案侧重于Uber作为“现有空间知识基础设施中的参与者”的出现（Plantin, 2018，第494页）。“知识基础设施”的概念描述了“一个持久的、广泛共享的社会技术系统”，它“包括由人、人工制品和机构组成的强大网络，这些网络产生、共享和维护关于人类和自然世界的特定知识”（Edwards, 2010 p.17）。我的观点是，优步对地域、移动模式和日常实践进行数据化的努力，产生了总体认识论，使该平台能够根据自己的私人利益，在全球范围内管理劳动力和城市动态。在对地域进行数据化的过程中，优步产生了抽象的、同质化的方式，从而消除了地域的独特性。这对以严重不平等和不稳定为特征的全球南方领土尤其重要。评估来自南方的平台可以揭示，当地域、实践和地方奇点被抽象和算法处理时，会失去什么，以及优步整体抱负的局限性。我打算结合两种方法方法。首先，平台化的技术和认识论维度可以通过技术来映射（Bucher, 2018）。我打算收集、选择和分析Uber产生的一系列文件和铭文，包括Uber官方网站和专业博客上的出版物；专利申请;由优步科学家撰写或合作撰写的研究论文。其次，我打算进行一次民族志入侵，探索当地的谈判、抵抗和拨款，并将它们与Uber所设想的抽象、客观和综合的能力进行对比。我计划在巴西圣保罗进行一系列半结构化的采访，采访对象包括Uber乘客和司机、城市代表、Uber员工和活动家等不同的社会行动者。该提案旨在为媒体和传播研究中的基础设施转向做出贡献（Plantin & Punathambekar, 2018），并将平台研究与基础设施研究相结合。我希望对作为认知行动者的平台的分析有所贡献，并强调它们如何将城市、劳动力和日常实践作为生产和测试知识的实验室的一部分；最后，通过调查来自南方的平台化，我希望阐明另一种认识论，为未来的数字平台和超越数字平台提供其他想象和可能性。

This study intends to investigate the social, political, cultural and epistemological implications of "platformisation", i.e. the dynamics through which digital platforms' infrastructures, governance and business models infiltrate and re-organize various sectors and spheres of life. This is not a uniform process: as digital platforms expand their reach across the globe, they encounter variable conditions and unexpected local singularities. The proposed research emphasizes the infrastructural dimension of platformisation and its implications in the Global South by exploring one specific platform, Uber, and its infiltration in Brazil, the platform's largest market outside the U.S. I aim to examine Uber's infrastructural dimension and the ways in which they enable the production of predominantly data-oriented ways of knowing and intervening in heterogeneous territories. In order to achieve that, this proposal operates an approximation between platform studies (van Dijck et al., 2018; Poell et al., 2019), infrastructure studies (Plantin et al., 2018) and Southern perspectives (de Sousa Santos, 2007; Milán & Treré, 2019). Whereas most studies about Uber's actions in Brazil investigate its role in the precarization and digitalization of labor (Abilio, 2020; Grohmann, 2020), this proposal focuses on Uber's emergence as an "actor in the existing spatial knowledge infrastructure" (Plantin, 2018, p. 494). The concept of "knowledge Infrastructure" describes "an enduring, widely shared sociotechnical system", which "comprise robust networks of people, artifacts, and institutions that generate, share, and maintain specific knowledge about the human and natural worlds" (Edwards, 2010 p.17). My approach will argue that Uber's efforts to datafy territories, mobility patterns and everyday practices produces totalizing epistemologies that empower the platform to globally manage labor and urban dynamics, according to its own private interests. In datafying territories, Uber produces abstract and homogenizing ways of knowing that extirpate territories of their singularities. This is especially significant for Global South territories, marked by acute inequalities and instabilities. Assessing platformisation from the South can reveal what gets lost when territories, practices and local singularities are abstracted and algorithmically processed, together with limitations of Uber's totalizing aspirations. I intend to combine two methodological approaches First, the technological and epistemological dimension of platformisation can be mapped through technography (Bucher, 2018). I intend to collect, select and analyse a series of documents and inscriptions produced by Uber, including publications on Uber's official websites and specialized blogs; patent applications; research papers authored or co-authored by Uber's scientists. Secondly, I intend to conduct an ethnographic incursion to explore local negotiations, resistances and appropriations and contrast them with the abstract, objective and totalizing capacities envisioned by Uber. I plan to conduct a series of semi-structured interviews in São Paulo, Brazil, with different social actors including Uber riders and drivers, city representatives, Uber employees, and activists. This proposal seeks to contribute to the infrastructural turn in media and communication studies (Plantin & Punathambekar, 2018) and to the combination of platform studies and infrastructure studies. I expect to contribute to the analysis of platforms as epistemic actors, and to highlight how they appropriate cities, labor, and everyday practices as part of a laboratory where knowledge is produced and tested; Finally, by investigating platformisation from the South, I expect to articulate alternative epistemologies that allow for other imaginations and possibilities for a future with and beyond digital platforms.