Dr Kelle Howson
Former Postdoctoral Researcher
Dr Kelle Howson is a Research Associate on the Fairwork project. Kelle is a development geographer interested in how ethical certification is reshaping governance and power relations in global networks.
Remote working has become rapidly normalised as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. This trend has been aided and accompanied by explosive growth in the online gig economy. The International Labour Organisation calculates that digital labour platforms have proliferated five-fold in the last decade. With this growth has come new opportunities for workers from all over the world to participate in a planetary scale labour market.
This report presents the first set of Fairwork ratings for companies mediating remote work in the global gig economy, or cloudwork platforms. Drawing on desk research, dialogue with platform managers, and a survey of 792 workers in 75 countries, report assigns 17 platforms a score out of 10 based on their fairness towards workers. The scores are based on five principles: pay, conditions, contracts, management, and representation. The report finds that, despite a few platforms achieving high scores, the majority of the platforms the project evaluated failed to evidence that basic standards of fairness are met.
Details
Publication date:
June 2021
June 2021
Authors
Hannah Johnston
Fairwork Foundation
Nancy Salem
DPhil Student
Nancy is a DPhil student at the OII. Her research concerns the public perception and user experience of emerging technologies.
Robbie Warin
Fairwork Foundation
Fabian Ferrari
Former DPhil Student
Fabian's doctoral research examined the political economy of artificial intelligence.
Yihan Zhu
Former MSc Student
Yihan is curious about on Smart Cities, IoT, and Echo Chamber. Before joining OII, Yihan graduated from LSE and had worked in the consulting sector. Yihan is supported by the China Oxford Scholarship Fund.
Pablo Aguera Reneses
Former Research Assistant
Pablo Aguera is a Research Assistant for the Fairwork project at the Oxford Internet Institute.
Dr Funda Ustek Spilda
Former Research Associate
Dr Funda Ustek-Spilda was a postdoctoral researcher and project manager on the Fairwork project at the Oxford Internet Institute.
Dr Daniel Arubayi
Former Postdoctoral Researcher
Daniel Arubayi was a Postdoctoral Researcher at Fairwork, a global project based at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford.
Srujana Katta
DPhil Student
Srujana is a doctoral student at the OII and a member of the Fairwork Project. Her research focusses on digital labour, migration, and resistance.
Shelly Steward
Former Postdoctoral Researcher
Shelly is an economic sociologist and applied scholar who studies the changing nature of work. Her work in research and policy strives to identify the challenges faced by workers and develop solutions that build a more equitable economy.
Dr Matthew Cole
Former Research Associate
Matthew Cole was a Postdoctoral Researcher with Fairwork, investigating global platforms. His research interests include the political economy of technology and platforms, particularly the transformation of work.
Dr Adam Badger
Former Research Associate
Adam Badger was a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Oxford Internet Institute, researching working practice in the global gig economy as part of the Fairwork project.
Professor Mark Graham
Professor of Internet Geography
Mark Graham is an economic geographer. His research focuses on digital labour, the gig economy, and digital inequalities. He is the author, most recently, of Feeding the Machine: The Hidden Human Labour Powering AI
Press Coverage
Can new EU rules make gig work fairer?
Reuters, 07 February 2023
Gig workers using digital platforms hail European Union move to boost their rights.
The App – My Boss
SRF, 17 November 2022
In this documentary, Swiss broadcaster SRF speaks to Fairwork researcher Dr Alessio Bertolini about workers' rights and the gig economy.
Fairwork
Fairwork highlights best and worst labour practices in the platform economy. Our goal is to show that better, and fairer, jobs are possible in the platform economy and low pay, precarity, and poor working conditions.