1 : Vienna University of Technology
(TU Wien)
-
Website Karlsgasse 11, 1040 Vienna -
Austria
2 : Independent Researcher
Embedded within algorithmically managed supply chains and physically constrained by predictive models and routing systems, the labour of food delivery riders resembles the last-mile of AI-enabled urban logistics. Although hyper-visible and physically exposed in public space, their labour tends to be obscured, their subjectivities unacknowledged, and their presence marginalized. In this sense, food delivery riders embody a constitutive paradox of platform-mediated labour, which is not only reshaping the social fabric of urban life but reinforced by AI-based systems. Routing systems and surge pricing algorithms prioritize customer satisfaction and demand, disregarding the reality of food delivery riders, who are frequently forced to violate traffic regulations to meet unrealistic scheduling and avoid negative ratings. This presentation contributes to the theorizing of (in)visibility in platform-mediated work and the AI supply chain by exploring the paradox of 'visible invisibility' – workers being physically present yet unacknowledged. Scholarship on platform labour tends to associate invisibility with the disembodiment of web-based labour, economic devaluation, and sociocultural disguise. Yet it has not been addressed how extended presence in public space, increasingly managed by AI-based processes, reproduces and requires delivery riders to negotiate cultural, legal, and economic invisibilities. Inspired by interviews with food delivery riders in Toronto and drawing on international studies, we unpack three interrelated facets of visible invisibility: the gendered segmentation in the platform delivery sector; the cultural and institutional under-representation of minority riders within cycling communities; and spatial practices that marginalize uses of public space perceived to transgress established norms. For each of these facets we elicit how algorithmic management and AI supply chain logics reproduce cultural othering and economic devaluation that render work invisible even if performed in the public sphere. Our presentation makes two key contributions: First, we provide an expanded analytical framework for studying (in)visibility in platform-mediated work that enables more comprehensive analysis of how socio-spatial arrangements (re)produce invisibility. Second, we elicit the lack of traceability in AI-enabled urban logistics as a key challenge to improving both labour standards for food delivery riders and their public acceptance in publics space. Future governance pathways need to couple traceability requirements with social dialogue on the everyday realities of AI-enabled urban logistics.
Subject :
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Abstract
Topics
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Transparency and traceability in the AI models and their supply chains
Topics
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Working conditions, occupational safety and health of workers in the human-in-the-loop
Topics
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Algorithmic management, labour control, and workers’ resistance
