Porque pagan entonces quieren tener un robot, y nosotras de robot no tenemos nada: arreglos intersubjetivos tecno-sociales del trabajo doméstico mediado digitalmente
Thesis
This paper analyzes the intersubjective relationships between customers and workers in two digital platforms for domestic work in Bogotá, Colombia. Inspired by feminist science and technology studies, it explores how control, auditing and subordination mechanisms are set up over female workers, where customers are central actors as they are the ones who end up establishing the conditions for their performance. The literature on digital work has focused on the analysis of technological intermediation systems, and algorithmic management, designed to geolocate, monitor and qualify domestic workers. However, little has been said about the relationships that are woven with clients and the way in which they configure the work process and the technologies involved. Through a set of more than 30 in-depth interviews with workers and customers, I explore this relationship in three areas: customers’ expectations of work, the use of rating systems, and finally, domestic work as affective work. The article concludes with some reflections on the double subordination to which the workers of digital domestic work intermediaries are exposed.
