Digitizing Labor Unrest: Heterogenous Effects of Digital Communication on Strike Frequency in Brazil

• In Event: Labor and Labor Movements Section Refereed Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Roundtable 7: Labor Movements, Protest, and Political Contestation

Abstract

Scholars have shown that information and communication technologies (ICTs) have increased the frequency of social and labor protests, even as they pose challenges to the long-term collective organization required for sustained, high-risk action. Yet less attention has been paid to the heterogeneous nature of these effects: do ICTs shape labor unrest differently across industries, and if so, how? In this paper, I adopt a mixed-methods approach to this question using data from Brazil. Through time series regression, I show that the period of rapid diffusion of ICTs in Brazil between 2012 and 2014 saw a sharp and durable increase in strike frequency—one that cannot be attributed to other economic, political or organizational changes, constituting a structural break. Also reinforcing findings in the available literature, the effects were far more pronounced and lasting for (lower-risk) strikes over employment violations than for (higher-risk) strikes seeking better contracts. However, these impacts varied substantially across industries. To examine this heterogeneity, I develop a hypothesis grounded on in-depth interviews with workers who participated in strikes in some of the industries with highest rises in strikes since 2013, then test the generalizability of these hypotheses through statistical data. Overall, my findings indicate that digital technologies amplified strike activity most strongly in industries where major employers rely on employees spread across small and dispersed workplaces, as it substantially reduced communication barriers between these workers. These results highlight the contextual nature of ICTs’ impact on labor unrest: their effects depend both on type of grievance and structural features of each industry.

Author

• Alexandre Guelerman, University of Wisconsin-Madison