A Research On Labor Control Of Take-out Delivery Clerks In The Internet Platform Economy

In 2015,Premier Li Keqiang put forward the "Internet plus" action plan for the first time in the government work report."Internet plus" action plan are promoting the transformation and upgrading of traditional Chinese industries and becoming a new engine to stimulate China's economic development.Various emerging Internet platform enterprises are rapidly rising and greatly expanding the economic space of the Internet.In this context,the take-out industry has developed rapidly,and the new professional group of take-out delivery clerks has emerged.The take-out delivery clerks are bringing tremendous convenience to urban life,but the working conditions of themselves are worrying.It is of great theoretical and practical significance to carry out the research on the labor process of take-out delivery clerks for the continuation of Marxism's concern for the working class,the enrichment and development of labor sociology,and the promotion of the normal development of the Internet platform economy.Based on the theory of labor process and the ethnography of M Take-out in Shanghai,this paper outlined the group portrait of take-out delivery clerks,including direct clerks,special clerks and crowdsourcing clerks.Then this paper probed into the operation mechanism,manufacturing consent and response strategy of take-out delivery clerks' labor control in detail from the remote management,compromise and independence,and survival in the crack.This paper presented a complete picture of the labor process of take-out delivery clerks.It is found that in the era of mobile Internet,the identity characteristics of migrant workers of take-out delivery clerks have a significant impact on the labor process.First of all,the take-out delivery clerks are mainly new generation of migrant workers and time control is the core of the platform to control the clerk's labor.In terms of specific means of control,the platform focuses on salary system and Internet technology.The platform skillfully changes the disadvantage of the non-presence of the management and realizes the remote management of take-out delivery clerks through nested payment and incentive mechanism,and closed-loop monitoring and punishment mechanism.Secondly,The reason why take-out delivery clerks reach a consensus with the management and are consent to the strict control of the platform is that they know how to consider themselves and calculate rationally.Their choice is a mixture of compromise and autonomy.On one hand,they have become accustomed to normal compromises and formed a sense of self-help.On the other hand,the flexibility of platform work itself,the low threshold of access or exit mechanism and the instant visibility of labor remuneration meet their individual needs,human capital characteristics and instant income requirements,which make them feel moderately autonomous and relatively satisfied.At last,due to the objective restriction of atomized labor and inhumane management,take-out delivery clerks usually adopt various compromising response strategies,such as join take-out delivery clerks,settle consumers and draw site managers,etc.A handful of clerks also choose to "vote with their feet",but they rarely jump out of the take-out industry.These response strategies are actually the performance of the clerk's survival in the crack.In a word,the labor control problem of take-out delivery clerks can be seen to a large extent as the continuation of the labor problem of migrant workers in the Internet era.It is undeniable that part of migrant workers get new employment opportunities and increase their income by joining the platform work.However,in fact these are based on invisible exploitation and self-exploitation.Their labor situation is not optimistic.The survival situation of migrant workers represented by take-out delivery clerks in the Internet platform economy is an important issue worthy of further discussion in the political and academic circles.