"FREEDOM" ON WHEELS: THE CONTRADICTIONS BETWEEN AUTONOMY AND PRECARIZATION IN THE UBERIZATION OF WORK.

as contradições entre autonomia e precarização na uberização do trabalho

Abstract

Contemporary transformations in the world of work, driven by algorithmic mediation, reveal a constant productive restructuring that radicalizes the subsumption of labor to capital. This article analyzes the conflict between the promise of autonomy offered by platforms and the reality of digital control exercised over app-based drivers, with the central objective of examining the tension between the pursuit of individual freedom and digital surveillance. Grounded in historical-dialectical materialism, the research employed Discourse Analysis (DA) and the participant observation method, integrating the researcher’s previous experience with the application of a structured questionnaire ($n=10$). The results reveal a latent contradiction: while 100% of the drivers seek the app as a strategy for material survival, 60% work shifts exceeding 12 hours a day, and 100% express a desire to return to the formal employment regime (CLT). It is concluded that uberization operates a "modernization of the archaic," characterized by the individualization of risk and the full transfer of operational costs to the worker. The supposed autonomy is configured as an ideological fetish that masks the emergence of a "digital proletariat" subjected to subordinated self-management and structural intermittency, demanding an urgent debate on regulation and social protection in the scenario of platformization.