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New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism
Open accessAbstract
This introduction sets out the context for the Special Issue and offers an in‐depth reflection on key themes addressed by our contributors. The Special Issue aims to place the social relations of production at the centre of debates about technology and the future of work, and create space for greater critical reflection on what it means to go ‘beyond technological determinism’. We identify ways in which aspects of technological determinism continue to influence debates on technology, the labour process and industrial relations, despite efforts to reject it. We argue that this influence is manifested in some persistent problems within the literature including overly rigid periodisations (such as ‘platform capitalism’), a narrow conceptual repertoire (which reifies notions like ‘algorithmic control’) and a constricted empirical focus. We elucidate the value of a social shaping of technology (SST) approach to overcome these challenges and provide a brief overview of the articles contained within the issue.
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Overview
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TL;DR
This editorial introduction to a *New Technology, Work and Employment* special issue argues that technological determinism persists residually in work and employment research despite widespread rejection, and proposes the social shaping of technology (SST) approach as a corrective. It identifies three problematic trends—rigid periodisation, a narrow conceptual repertoire, and a narrow empirical focus—and previews the issue's contributions.
Key findings
As an editorial, the paper's claims are conceptual rather than empirical:
- Technological determinism persists in three forms: "overly rigid periodisations (such as 'platform capitalism'), a narrow conceptual repertoire (which reifies notions like 'algorithmic control') and a constricted empirical focus."
- The "algorithmic" prefix has been applied to an increasingly diverse set of work aspects—"algorithmic governance," "algorithmic surveillance," "algorithmic boss," "algorithmic labour," "algorithmic information asymmetries," "algorithmic pricing," "algorithmic uncertainty," "algorithmic despotism"—reifying technology and concealing distinctions.
- Divergent findings on algorithmic control are rarely debated: Kellogg et al. (2020, p. 388) describe an "algorithmic cage" that is "more encompassing, instantaneous, interactive, opaque and disintermediating" than historical regimes, whereas Wood et al. (2018, p. 15) argue remote gig work "is a long way from being an 'assembly line in the head'" and emphasise autonomy, task variety and flexibility.
- Non-algorithmic technologies matter: Mathew's (2008) study of New York taxi drivers shows compulsory GPS tracking and credit card payment roll-out shifted power to firms and brokers without any algorithms, predating platform technology.
Methods
Conceptual/editorial article: a critical review of literature on technology, the labour process and industrial relations, drawing on SST and SCOT traditions (MacKenzie & Wajcman, 1999; Williams & Edge, 1996; Orlikowski, 1992) to diagnose determinist tendencies. It then summarises the special issue's contributions, which span the global South (India, China, Chile) and global North (Italy, Norway/UK, Belgium) and use labour process, political economy, STS/SST and ethnographic approaches. No primary data collection is reported; the paper notes the special issue was supported by the ESRC (grant ES/S012532/1) via the Digital Futures at Work Research Centre.
Limitations
The paper states that snapshot case studies and ethnographic methods "almost inevitably produce snapshot views of the deployment of new technology, but are nevertheless used as the bases for generalisation," and that longitudinal or "biography of artefacts" research is difficult because "the timescales of technology development, implementation and use are far longer than the duration of typical research projects" (Williams, 2019, p. 155). It also notes that technology design is temporally and spatially separated from work sites, contributing to "the illusion of exogeneity of technology." Evident from the text: as an introduction, it offers no original empirical evidence, and its critique of the field rests on illustrative examples rather than systematic review.
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In the paper
“They show how the prevalence of these competing visions of technology-including enduring scepticism and pessimism as well as optimism and determinism-are inseparable from the social relations of the workplaces.”
§ New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism > THE CONTRIBUTIONS
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- Not matchedcites Leonard et al.
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In the paper
“they show how embedded trade union power in Norway secured both more advanced technological deployment and better outcomes for workers.”
§ New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism > THE CONTRIBUTIONS
What the sources say
- Not matchedcites Lloyd and Payne
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In the paper
“The authors investigate the different ways that actors perceive the role of technology and the future of work, and show how these 'imaginaries' map onto different levels of agency within their case study organisation.”
§ New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism > THE CONTRIBUTIONS
What the sources say
- Not matchedcites Leonard et al.
Couldn’t be matched to a paper in Crossref, so it can’t be checked.
plainstates an associationSingle case- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
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In the paper
“The problem with such periodisations, based on a belief in the transformative power of certain technological innovations, is that they tend to ignore the complexity of change in sociotechnical systems; usually, by overstating technological novelty and understating social continuity, and ascribing decisive causality to the former.”
§ New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism > THEORETICAL CHALLENGES IN RECENT RESEARCH
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In the paper
“It may also prompt a narrow empirical focus on technologies that capture the popular imagination (currently, anything algorithmic) at the expense of the more mundane but equally important”
§ New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism > INTRODUCTION
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In the paper
§ New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism > TECHNOLOGICAL DETERMINISM AND ITS DISCONTENTS
“(Aksoy et al., 2020;Antón et al., 2022;Chung & Lee, 2023)”
§ New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism > References
“2. Aksoy, C.G., Özcan, B. & Philipp, J. (2021) Robots and the gender pay gap in Europe.”
Rated minor: it would not touch a result — a value no result rests on, a p-value that stays on the same side of the significance level, or a conflict that is clerical, resolved elsewhere in the paper, or outside its own findings.
In the paper
§ New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism > THE CONTRIBUTIONS
“Parth et al. also focus on India, analysing the intersections of simultaneous online and offline organising among delivery riders, via the notion of 'phygital space'.”
§ New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism > References
“56. Parth, S., Bathini, D.R. & Kandathil, G. (2021) Actions in phygital space: work solidarity and collective action among app-based cab drivers in India.”
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Metadata
- Authors
- Joyce, S., Umney, C., Whittaker, X., & Stuart, M.
- Affiliations
- University of Leeds (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Umney, Charles
- Venue
- New Technology, Work and Employment
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2023-06-27
- Volume
- 38
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 145-161
- ISSN
- 0268-1072 (ISSN-L)
- 1468-005X
- OpenAlex
- W4382244562
- Cited by
- 97
- References
- 62
- Citations by year
- 2026: 33 · 2025: 30 · 2024: 29 · 2023: 5
- FWCI
- 27.92
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- New Technology Work and Employment (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- White Rose Research Online (University of Leeds, The University of Sheffield, University of York) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Economic and Social Research Council
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Digital Economy and Work Transformation
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Industrial relations › Legal and Labor Studies
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Industrial relations › Employment, Labor, and Gender Studies
- Keywords
- technological determinism, relations of production, future of work, digital technologies, platform capitalism, algorithmic control, labor process, labor relations, social shaping of technology
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