Paper Type
Short
Paper Number
PACIS2025-1459
Description
Understanding the complexity of algorithmic power in digital platforms is crucial in the rapidly developing field of information systems. While algorithms help platforms steer people's and society's behaviour, tensions between firms and individuals can also be exacerbated due to characteristics such as opacity. This research adopts a sociomateriality theory perspective to answer this question and explore algorithmic governance by considering algorithms as members of the digital ecosystem. Although labour platforms that act as digital infrastructures have become fundamental to analysing the contested nature of people's appreciation and hegemonic aversion to algorithmic management. However, these studies largely overlook algorithms' resistance strategies and socialisation behaviours to the unfair treatment of groups of gig workers. Therefore, this research interviews government officials, platform algorithmic employees, and drivers in China's E-hailing industry and systematically dissects the dynamic flow patterns of algorithmic power from conceptual to thematic to dimensional through the Gioia methodology.
Recommended Citation
Yang, Yushan; Shaw, Nicky; and Morton, Josh, "Dynamic Flows of Algorithmic Power in Digital Platforms" (2025). PACIS 2025 Proceedings. 7.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/pacis2025/dig_plat/di/7
Dynamic Flows of Algorithmic Power in Digital Platforms
Understanding the complexity of algorithmic power in digital platforms is crucial in the rapidly developing field of information systems. While algorithms help platforms steer people's and society's behaviour, tensions between firms and individuals can also be exacerbated due to characteristics such as opacity. This research adopts a sociomateriality theory perspective to answer this question and explore algorithmic governance by considering algorithms as members of the digital ecosystem. Although labour platforms that act as digital infrastructures have become fundamental to analysing the contested nature of people's appreciation and hegemonic aversion to algorithmic management. However, these studies largely overlook algorithms' resistance strategies and socialisation behaviours to the unfair treatment of groups of gig workers. Therefore, this research interviews government officials, platform algorithmic employees, and drivers in China's E-hailing industry and systematically dissects the dynamic flow patterns of algorithmic power from conceptual to thematic to dimensional through the Gioia methodology.
Comments
Platform