Digital Intersections: Synergies Between the Gig Economy and Evolution of the Smart City

Abstract

Technology and a gig economy have affected how people are employed, with shorter-term, more flexible, and technologically mediated work arrangements increasingly becoming the norm. The digital platform, which acts both as a marketplace and a “shadow employer,” makes this possible, with workers provided with unprecedented autonomy and flexibility. The authors examine the interplay between the gig economy and the concept of the smart city – an urban environment reliant upon information and communication technologies – and focus on how technological integrations such as blockchain, the collective network of connected devices, and the technology that facilitates communication between devices and the cloud, as well as between the devices themselves (Internet of Things [IoT]), and 5G, bolster opportunities for gig workers to carve out an existence in a perpetually changing landscape. Examples are provided for the global giant Amazon and the regional businesses Talabat and Raha in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Application of real-time tracking, precision-driven management, and decentralized transactions, provides gig workers new opportunities for employment in their evolving digital smart-city environment.