Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Digitalisation and the regulation of work: theoretical issues and normative challenges

  • Open Forum
  • Published:
AI & SOCIETY Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This paper presents an introductory overview of the main issues that the digitalisation of industrial enterprises known as Industry 4.0 raises for social sciences. First, it will show that this technological transition—which, however, is unfinished and is seen to be in continuity with the so-called “third industrial revolution”—cannot be interpreted with reference to a deterministic approach. It can be analysed more usefully as a range of decisions affecting the industrial policies of national states, the conception and design of machines, their adoption in production processes and finally their use by operators. Second, certain aspects of Industry 4.0 of special concern in terms of organisation of work processes will be analysed on various scales (from inter-company transactions to the specific tasks of individual workers). Finally, we will explain various hypotheses that social and economic research is developing with regard to the new technologies’ controversial effects on employment.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. Consider, for example, the case of Nokia, a former mobile phone leader, which–shaken by the “smartphone revolution”, i.e. a disruptive transformation of the mobile phone market by hyper-capitalised companies such as Google and Apple – had to downsize its field of action and competitive positioning, announcing in 2016 a three-year staff reduction plan affecting 10-15,000 workers. It is interesting to note that in order to avoid analogous failures, a consortium of the main German car manufacturers in 2015 acquired the Nokia division of navigation devices, thus trying to gain control of activities that have become essential in the mobility market.

  2. For example, the interventions carried out by a machine operator based on his experience can be tracked and cross-analyzed together with machine self-diagnostic data. Similarly, three radio transmitters and one accelerometer can track the path variations, accelerations and decelerations operated by a trolley driver supplying workstations. Most of the times, such manoeuvres and adjustments – inspired and guided by the logic of practice in accordance with contingent conditions – are irreflexive and can be hardly explained by the workers themselves, but their function can be inferred and made explicit by the analysis of (big) data. Knowledge made explicit can be later codified and used for programming “intelligent” self-driving robots.

References

  • Acemoglu D, Autor D (2010) Skills, tasks, and technologies: implications for employment and earnings. In: Ashenfelter O, Card D (eds) Handbook of labor economico, vol 4B. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp 1043–1171

    Google Scholar 

  • Acemoglu D, Restrepo P (2016) The race between machine and man: implications of technology for growth, factor shares and employment, NBER working paper no. 22252. http://www.nber.org/papers/w22252

  • Acemoglu D, Restrepo P (2017) Robots and jobs: evidence from US labor market, NBER working paper no. 23285. http://www.nber.org/papers/w23285

  • Arntz MT, Gregory and Zierahn U (2016) The risk of automation for jobs in OECD countries: a comparative analysis, OECD social, employment and migration working papers, no. 189, OECD Publishing, Paris. http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/5jlz9h56dvq7-en

  • Beck U (2013) German Europe. Polity, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Benasayag M (2016) Cerveau augmenté, homme diminué. La Découverte, Paris

    Google Scholar 

  • Berta G (2014) Produzione intelligente. Un viaggio nelle nuove fabbriche, Einaudi, Torino

    Google Scholar 

  • Boltanski L, Esquerre A (2016) L’économie de l’enrichissement et ses effets sociaux, Teoria Politica, nuova serie, annali VI, pp 289–306

  • Boston Consulting Group (2015a) Industry 4.0. The future of productivity and growth in manufacturing industries. http://www.zvw.de/media.media.72e472fb-1698-4a15-8858-344351c8902f.original.pdf

  • Boston Consulting Group (2015b) Man and machine in industry 4.0. https://www.bcgperspectives.com/content/articles/technology-business-transformation-engineered-products-infrastructure-man-machine-industry-4/?chapter=3#chapter3

  • Bower JL, Christensen CM (1995) Disruptive technologies: catching the wave. Harvard Bus Rev 73(1):43–53

    Google Scholar 

  • Brynjolfsson E, McAfee A (2014) The second machine age: progress and prosperity in a time of brilliant technologies. Norton, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Cirillo V, Pianta M, Nascia L (2015) The dynamics of skills: technology and business cycles, scuola superiore sant’Anna Lem working paper, no. 2015/30

  • Dardot P, Laval Ch (2009) La nouvelle raison du monde. Essai sur la société néolibérale, La Découvert, Paris

    Google Scholar 

  • de Terssac G (1992) Autonomie dans le travail. PUF, Paris

    Google Scholar 

  • Engelen E, Johal S, Salento A, Williams K (2014) How to build a fairer city, The Guardian/Cities. http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/sep/24/manifesto-fairer-grounded-city-sustainable-transport-broadband-housing. Accessed 24 Sept 2014

  • European Commission (2012) A stronger European industry for growth and economic recovery, communication to the European parliament, the European economic and social committee and the committee of the regions. http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2009_2014/documents/com/com_com(2012)0582_/com_com(2012)0582_en.pdf

  • Fligstein N (2001) The architecture of markets: an economic sociologo of twenty-first-century capitalist societies. Princeton University Press, Princeton

    Google Scholar 

  • Florida R (2002) The rise of the creative class. And how it’s transforming work, leisure, community and everyday life. Perseus Book Group, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Frank RH, Cook P (1995) The winner-take-all society. Why the few at the top get so much more than the rest of us. Free Press, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Frey CB, Osborne MA (2013) The future of employment. How susceptible are jobs to computerisation? Oxford University programme on the impacts of future technology, Oxford

  • Gallino L (1998) Se tre milioni vi sembran pochi. Sui modi per combattere la disoccupazione, Einaudi, Torino

    Google Scholar 

  • Glaeser EL (2011) Triumph of the city: how our greatest invention makes us richer, smarter, greener, healthier, and happier. Penguin, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Granovetter M (1985) Economic action and social structure: the problem of embeddedness. Am J Sociol 78(6):481–510

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Harrison B (1994) Lean and mean: the changing landscape of corporate power in the age of flexibility. Basic Books, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Head S (2014) Mindless: why smarter machines are making dumber humans. Basic Books, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Krippner G (2011) Capitalizing on crisis: the political origins of the rise of finance. Harvard University Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Maggi B (2003) De l’agir organisationnel: un point de vue sur le travail, le bien-être, l’apprentissage. Toulouse, Octarès

    Google Scholar 

  • Magone A, Mazali T (2016) Industria 4.0. Uomini e macchine nella fabbrica digitale, Guerini e Associati, Milano

  • Masino G, Zamarian M (2000) La mediazione degli artefatti nella regolazione organizzativa. In: Maggi B (ed) Le sfide organizzative di fine e inizio secolo. Tra post-fordismo e deregolazione, Etas, Torino, pp 151–164

    Google Scholar 

  • Mayo E (1933) The human problems of an industrialized civilization. Macmillan, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Moretti E (2012) The new geography of jobs. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Boston

    Google Scholar 

  • Noble D (1979) Social choice in machine design. In: Zimbalist A (ed) Case studies on the labor process. Monthly Review Press, New York, pp 100–134

    Google Scholar 

  • Norman DA (1993) Things that make us smart. Addison-Wesley, Reading

    Google Scholar 

  • Page SE (2006) Path dependence. Q J Political Sci 1:87–115

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Piketty Th (2013) Le capital au XXI siècle. Seuil, Paris

    Google Scholar 

  • Polanyi M (1967) The tacit dimension. Doubleday Anchor, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Ramella F (2015) Sociology of economic innovation. Routledge, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Sachs JD and Kotlikoff LJ (2012) Smart machines and long-term misery”, NBER working paper no. w18629. https://ssrn.com/abstract=2192802)

  • Salento A, Masino G (2013) La fabbrica della crisi. Finanziarizzazione delle imprese e declino del lavoro, Carocci, Roma

    Google Scholar 

  • Staglianò R (2016) Al posto tuo. Così web e robot ci stanno rubando il lavoro, Einaudi, Torino

    Google Scholar 

  • Standing G (2011) The precariat: the new dangerous class. Bloomsbury, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Thompson JD (1967) Organizations in action. McGraw-Hill, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • World Economic Forum (2016) The future of jobs. Employment, skills and workforce strategy for the fourth industrial revolution. http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Future_of_Jobs.pdf

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of History, Society and Human Studies University of Salento, Via San Nicola, 73100, Lecce, Italy

    Angelo Salento

Authors
  1. Angelo Salento
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Angelo Salento.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Salento, A. Digitalisation and the regulation of work: theoretical issues and normative challenges. AI & Soc 33, 369–378 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-017-0738-z

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-017-0738-z

Keywords

Search

Navigation