[Air-L] ECPR Digital Authoritarianism RN Online Lecture, 6 March: Dr. Gustavo Robles

[Ülker Sözen]

We cordially invite you to the second meeting of the seminar series "The
Many Faces of Digital Authoritarianism" organized by the ECPR Research
Network on Digital Authoritarianism. Dr. Gustavo Robles will discuss
"Senses of Freedom. Platform Labor and Ideology in Argentina." You can find
below the abstract and short bio of Dr. Robles.

The lecture will be held on *March 6, Thursday between 15:30 - 17:00 CET
via Zoom.*

Topic: ECPR Digital Authoritarianism RN lecture series: Dr. Gustavo Robles
Time: Mar 6, 2025 03:30 PM Amsterdam, Berlin, Rome, Stockholm, Vienna
Join Zoom Meeting
https://uni-leipzig.zoom-x.de/j/66267638871?pwd=0nsLTE1dO4qzgkszmN4MIpAxAkSAh3.1

Meeting ID: 662 6763 8871
Passcode: 576416

Kind regards,
Dr. Ülker Sözen
Post-doctoral Researcher
Chair of Development Politics, University of Passau
Institute for the Study of Religion, Leipzig University

-------------------

Title: Senses of Freedom. Platform Labor and Ideology in Argentina

Abstract: The media-disseminated image of the "Rappi vote" became very
popular during the last election campaign in Argentina in 2023 to such an
extent that it expanded the common idea of the young workers of the food
delivery platforms as the political subject of Javier Milei's electoral
success. A myth or not, the starting point of the presentation is that this
figure contains an ideological density that allows us to establish
relations between the working conditions on the platforms and the
libertarian interpellation propelled by Javier Milei and his political
party, La Libertad Avanza. Following an approach centred on ideologies, we
looked for concrete and practical senses of freedom that could explain the
“elective affinities,” to use Weber's acute expression, between the
experience of platform work and its resonance with the libertarian
understanding of freedom from three perspectives. First, the
political-institutional dimension shows how the ideal of freedom has been
deployed through global and local processes of institutionalizing labour
flexibility, the latest stage of which is represented by various forms of
platform labour. Second, the technopolitical dimension exposes the
algorithmic management of work as a mechanism of power production in the
workplace that constantly requires workers' freedoms for its reproduction
through multiple routine decisions. Thirdly, the subjective dimension,
given by the experience of platform workers in San Miguel de Tucumán,
reveals the practical understanding of freedom and autonomy as a pragmatic
way of dealing with the limitations of an authoritarian and depressed
labour market.

Bio: Gustavo Robles is a Gerda-Henkel Postdoctoral Fellow at the University
of Passau (Germany) and an Associated Fellow at the National University of
Tucumán (Argentina) and within the International Research Group on
Authoritarianism and Counterstrategies (IRGAC).  His research and teaching
focus on the ideological and subjective dimensions of the current crisis of
neoliberalism in the Global South.