Venezuelan migrants in delivery platform work during the COVID-19 pandemic in Buenos Aires, Argentina: Between exploitability, precariousness, and daily resistance

Abstract

In this article, we analyse the working conditions of Venezuelan migrants, who participate in delivery work in Argentina, based on a conceptual discussion on the ‘precarisation’ processes of migrant workers in the countries of the global south. The labour conditions of workers in South America have historically deteriorated for several decades, but its effects have intensified after the COVID-19 pandemic. This analysis is focused on the dynamics of Venezuelan migrant labour within digital platforms in Buenos Aires, contrasting data obtained between 2019 and 2020 from two surveys and interviews conducted with this population. Drawing upon contributions from the sociology of migration and the sociology of work, this article seeks to understand how irregularised migrants employed in the platform work, at the intersection of super-exploitation and super-exposure to contagion, have been brutally affected by the expansion of delivery work.