IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/envirc/v37y2019i8p1418-1433.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The common-seekers: Capturing and reclaiming value in the platform metropolis

Author

Listed:
  • Ugo Rossi

Abstract

This article offers a critical account of technology-based urban economies within cognitive-affective capitalism, particularly of their socially extractive nature and the contradictions arising from related processes of value extraction. Drawing on the work of Hardt and Negri and other theorists of ‘extractivist’ capitalism, the article explores the way in which ‘the common’ has become the oil of today’s ‘platform metropolis’. In particular, it is pointed out that the platform metropolis is illustrative of conflicting common-seeking claims involving high-tech corporations, on the one hand, and precarised workers, on the other. With evidence obtained from qualitative field research conducted with the on-call workers employed in the food delivery service, the article shows how the contradiction between capital and labour in the platform metropolis paves the way to an interstitial politics of the common that illuminates the socially produced nature of technology-based urban economies as well as the wider relationship between capital and life in our biopolitical era.

Suggested Citation

  • Ugo Rossi, 2019. "The common-seekers: Capturing and reclaiming value in the platform metropolis," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 37(8), pages 1418-1433, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envirc:v:37:y:2019:i:8:p:1418-1433
    DOI: 10.1177/2399654419830975
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2399654419830975
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/2399654419830975?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Krueger, Anne O, 1974. "The Political Economy of the Rent-Seeking Society," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 64(3), pages 291-303, June.
    2. Harvey, David, 2005. "The New Imperialism," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199278084.
    3. Fujita,Masahisa & Thisse,Jacques-François, 2013. "Economics of Agglomeration," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107001411.
    4. Smith, Adam, 1977. "An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226763743 edited by Cannan, Edwin, September.
    5. Shaikh, Anwar, 2016. "Capitalism: Competition, Conflict, Crises," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199390632.
    6. Jamie Peck, 2016. "Economic Rationality Meets Celebrity Urbanology: Exploring Edward Glaeser's City," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(1), pages 1-30, January.
    7. Richard Florida & Patrick Adler & Charlotta Mellander, 2017. "The city as innovation machine," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(1), pages 86-96, January.
    8. Carlo Vercellone, 2010. "The Crisis of the Law of Value and the Becoming-Rent of Profit," Post-Print halshs-00516801, HAL.
    9. David B. Audretsch & Maksim Belitski, 2017. "Entrepreneurial ecosystems in cities: establishing the framework conditions," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 42(5), pages 1030-1051, October.
    10. Carlo Vercellone, 2010. "The Crisis of the Law of Value and the Becoming-Rent of Profit," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-00516801, HAL.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Marco Marrone & Gianmarco Peterlongo & Giorgio Pirina, 2021. "La classe operaia va nel cyberspazio. Il capitalismo di piattaforma oltre i miti della digitalizzazione," ECONOMIA E SOCIET? REGIONALE, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 0(1), pages 127-151.
    2. Letizia Chiappini, 2020. "The Urban Digital Platform: Instances from Milan and Amsterdam," Urban Planning, Cogitatio Press, vol. 5(4), pages 277-288.
    3. Ugo Rossi, 2020. "Fake friends: The illusionist revision of Western urbanology at the time of platform capitalism," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 57(5), pages 1105-1117, April.
    4. Sami Moisio & Ugo Rossi, 2020. "The start-up state: Governing urbanised capitalism," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 52(3), pages 532-552, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Emrah Karakilic, 2022. "Rentierism and the commons: A critical contribution to Brett Christophers’ Rentier Capitalism," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 54(2), pages 422-429, March.
    2. Leonardi, Emanuele, 2019. "Bringing Class Analysis Back in: Assessing the Transformation of the Value-Nature Nexus to Strengthen the Connection Between Degrowth and Environmental Justice," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 83-90.
    3. Jeon, Heesang, 2015. "Knowledge and Contemporary Capitalism in Light of Marx's Value Theory," Thesis Commons g5njk, Center for Open Science.
    4. Fabian Frenzel & Armin Beverungen, 2015. "Value struggles in the creative city: A People’s Republic of Stokes Croft?," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 52(6), pages 1020-1036, May.
    5. Sami Moisio & Ugo Rossi, 2020. "The start-up state: Governing urbanised capitalism," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 52(3), pages 532-552, May.
    6. Cajas-Guijarro, John & Pérez-Almeida, Bryan, 2021. "Comercio, sobreexplotación laboral y ciclos en la periferia: una propuesta teórica y el caso ecuatoriano desde un modelo PVAR. || Trade, super-exploitation of labor power and cycles in the periphery: ," Revista de Métodos Cuantitativos para la Economía y la Empresa = Journal of Quantitative Methods for Economics and Business Administration, Universidad Pablo de Olavide, Department of Quantitative Methods for Economics and Business Administration, vol. 31(1), pages 161-197, June.
    7. Jason Oakes, 2016. "Rent-seeking and the tragedy of the commons: two approaches to problems of collective action in biology and economics," Journal of Bioeconomics, Springer, vol. 18(2), pages 137-151, July.
    8. Christof Parnreiter, 2022. "The Janus-faced genius of cities," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 59(7), pages 1315-1333, May.
    9. Tobias Franz, 2018. "Power balances, transnational elites, and local economic governance: The political economy of development in Medellín," Local Economy, London South Bank University, vol. 33(1), pages 85-109, February.
    10. Vahabi,Mehrdad, 2019. "The Political Economy of Predation," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107591370, January.
    11. David S. Lucas & Christopher J. Boudreaux, 2019. "The Interdependence of Hierarchical Institutions: Federal Regulation, Job Creation, and the Moderating Effect of State Economic Freedom," Papers 1903.02924, arXiv.org.
    12. Леиашвили, Паата, 2015. "Функциональная Замкнутость Рыночной Экономики. Рановесие. Циклы. Воспроизводство [Functional Closure of Market Economy. Equilibrium. Cycles. Reproduction]," MPRA Paper 83515, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Anthony M Levenda & Eliot Tretter, 2020. "The environmentalization of urban entrepreneurialism: From technopolis to start-up city," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 52(3), pages 490-509, May.
    14. Monnier Jean-Marie & Vercellone Carlo, 2014. "The Foundations and Funding of Basic Income as Primary Income," Basic Income Studies, De Gruyter, vol. 9(1-2), pages 59-77, December.
    15. Angelo Cavallo & Antonio Ghezzi & Raffaello Balocco, 2019. "Entrepreneurial ecosystem research: present debates and future directions," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 15(4), pages 1291-1321, December.
    16. Luiza Nassif Pires, 2020. "Notes on Intersectional Political Economy: The Long Period Method, Technical Change, and Gender," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_957, Levy Economics Institute.
    17. Christian Bjørnskov, 2012. "Can bribes buy protection against international competition?," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 148(4), pages 751-775, December.
    18. Andrea Fumagalli & Stefano Lucarelli & Elena Musolino & Giulia Rocchi, 2018. "Digital Labour in the Platform Economy: The Case of Facebook," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(6), pages 1-16, May.
    19. Tan Ngoc Vu & Duc Hong Vo & Michael McAleer, 2019. "Rent seeking for export licenses: Application to the Vietnam rice market," Documentos de Trabajo del ICAE 2019-13, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Empresariales, Instituto Complutense de Análisis Económico.
    20. Pierre Pestieau & Gregory Ponthiere, 2017. "Optimal fertility under age-dependent labour productivity," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 30(2), pages 621-646, April.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:envirc:v:37:y:2019:i:8:p:1418-1433. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.