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PRECANOMIES: Precarious Autonomies? Workers’ Identity and Technocontrol in Platform Economies from the European Semi-Periphery

Objective

The rapid growth of platform work, employing over 28 million people in the EU, poses urgent challenges for labour rights, identity, and governance. In Slovenia, a semi-peripheral country with around 30,000 platform workers, weak institutional frameworks, fragmented markets, and limited enforcement exacerbate precarity. Workers face the paradox of flexi-vulnerability: valuing autonomy and flexibility while remaining dependent on opaque algorithmic systems that control pay, visibility, and recognition. PRECANOMIES addresses this gap through an interdisciplinary, ethnographic study of platform work in Slovenia, in dialogue with Spain as a comparative case. The main objective is to analyse how algorithmic management and regulatory reforms shape worker identities, autonomy, and collective agency under regimes of technocontrol. Specific objectives include: (1) documenting workers’ narratives and everyday negotiations of precarity; (2) analysing the interaction between agency and algorithmic control through ethnography and exploratory audits; (3) mapping contractual and institutional arrangements; (4) tracing strategies of resistance and solidarity; and (5) advancing theoretical concepts such as flexi-vulnerability and algorithmic subjectivation. Methodologically, the project combines multi-sited ethnography, digital ethnography, algorithmic audits, and policy analysis. Its innovation lies in bridging micro-level lived experience, meso-level organisational practices, and macro-level EU regulation, positioning semi-peripheral Europe at the centre of global debates on digital labour governance.

Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)

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Keywords

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Programme(s)

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Topic(s)

Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.

Funding Scheme

Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.

HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships

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Call for proposal

Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.

(opens in new window) HORIZON-MSCA-2025-PF

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Coordinator

UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 209 914,56
Address
AVENIDA DE SENECA 2
28040 MADRID
Spain

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Region
Comunidad de Madrid Comunidad de Madrid Madrid
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
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Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

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