The emotional labor of surveillance: Digital control in Fast fashion retail
Abstract
Rooted in critical labor studies and feminist surveillance studies, this article explores how big data and biometric surveillance impact fast fashion’s predominantly feminized and racialized workforce. Through ethnography and interviews, I find that automated flexible scheduling, a now widely documented phenomenon, not only disciplines just-in-time staff but also encourages additional forms of digital control—including biometric scanners and point-of-sale metrics. While the technologies described exhibit regular limitations, such as failure and vulnerability to sabotage, they nevertheless have the cumulative effect of exacerbating worker insecurity and reinforcing inequality. I argue that alongside the decline of interactive emotional service work in low-wage retail, emerges another kind of affective labor—that of working amid often invisible yet pervasive digital monitoring. I call this work “the emotional labor of surveillance.”
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Greater use of customer monitoring and data in worker management requires workers to display exaggeratedly and sustained positive emotions in online interactions with customers, increasing the risk of emotional demands.
“Literature also suggest that, like the call centers' emotional state monitoring described above and involving continuous requests of rapid emotional shifts, the greater use of customer monitoring and data in workers management require them to display exaggeratedly and sustained positive emotions in their online interactions with customers, increasing the risk of emotional demands (Van Oort, 2019).”
From Algorithms as work designers: How algorithmic management influences the design of jobs (2022) · cites this paper as Van Oort, 2019
The influence of algorithmic termination on job insecurity is particularly salient in highly metrified contexts like the service industry or for workers less able to attain ever-increasing quantitative standards.
“According to some authors, this is a particularly salient in highly metrified contexts, like the service-industry (Van Doorn, 2017;Van Oort, 2019) or for workers who are less subject to attain the ever-increasing quantitative standards (Rani & Furrer, 2020;Williams & Beck, 2018).”
From Algorithms as work designers: How algorithmic management influences the design of jobs (2022) · cites this paper as Van Oort, 2019
Algorithmic monitoring is positively associated with emotional demands.
“Emotional demands (+)”
From Algorithms as work designers: How algorithmic management influences the design of jobs (2022) · cites this paper as Van Oort (2019)
A system used to make automated job termination or scheduling would probably lead to more job insecurity when these decisions are biased or discriminatory.
“In terms of bias minimization, for instance, a system used to make automated job termination or scheduling would probably lead to more job insecurity when these decisions are biased or discriminatory, as it has been found by some researchers (Rani & Furrer, 2020;Van Doorn, 2017;Van Oort, 2019) or reported by media (e.g., Geiger, 2021).”
From Algorithms as work designers: How algorithmic management influences the design of jobs (2022) · cites this paper as Van Oort, 2019
Algorithmic scheduling is positively associated with job insecurity.
“Job insecurity (+)”
From Algorithms as work designers: How algorithmic management influences the design of jobs (2022) · cites this paper as Van Oort (2019)
Cites
Exposed: Desire and Disobedience in the Digital Age
Harcourt, B. E. (2015) · doi:10.4159/9780674915077 · Cited by 193 · see citing works
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Algorithms as work designers: How algorithmic management influences the design of jobs
Parent-Rocheleau, X., & Parker, S. K. (2022) · Human Resource Management Review · doi:10.1016/j.hrmr.2021.100838 · Cited by 512 · see citing works
The downsides of digital labor: Exploring the toll incivility takes on online comment moderators
Riedl, M. J., Masullo, G. M., & Whipple, K. N. (2020) · Computers in Human Behavior · doi:10.1016/j.chb.2020.106262 · Cited by 48 · see citing works
Consumer Redlining and the Reproduction of Inequality at Dollar General
Vargas, T. L. (2021) · Qualitative Sociology · doi:10.1007/s11133-020-09473-w · Cited by 21 · see citing works
- Authors
- Van Oort, M.
- Affiliations
- University of Minnesota, USA
- Venue
- Critical Sociology
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2018-07-13
- Volume
- 45
- Issue
- 7-8
- Pages
- 1167-1179
- ISSN
- 0896-9205 (ISSN-L)
- 1569-1632
- OpenAlex
- W2884826728
- Cited by
- 60
- References
- 1
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 7 · 2022: 16 · 2021: 6 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 4
- FWCI
- 26.87
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Critical Sociology (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Industrial relations › Legal and Labor Studies
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Digital Economy and Work Transformation
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Emotional Labor in Professions
- Keywords
- biometric surveillance, fast fashion retail, digital control, affective labor, flexible scheduling, big data, racialized workers, job insecurity
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