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Climate change, Agrarian distress, and the role of digital labour markets: evidence from Bengaluru, Karnataka

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  • Aditi Surie

    (Indian Institute for Human Settlements)

  • Lakshmee V. Sharma

Abstract

In this article, we explore the use of the digital labour market set up by mobility platforms in Bengaluru, Karnataka, as a mechanism to cope with climate change-induced livelihood transition. Climatic hot spots within regions like the southern Indian state of Karnataka have caused a large volume of livelihood transition along the rural–urban continuum (Revi in Environ Urban 20(1):207–229, 2008. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956247808089157 ). Bengaluru is Karnataka’s primate city, thus absorbing agrarians pushed out of unprofitable agriculture into its ever-growing informal service sector (Singh et al. in Clim Risk Manag 21(June):52–68, 2018. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.crm.2018.06.001 ). Climate-induced migration into urban centres creates intersecting forms of differential vulnerability. This vulnerability is structured by social discrimination embedded in informal economies, performed through respect, dignity, and humiliation in work encounters in relational economies (Simone in Public Cult 16(3):407–429, 2004). Mobility platforms like Uber and Ola cabs have added to work opportunities within Bengaluru’s service sector by creating an alternative work opportunity—the digital labour market for taxi driving. The digital labour market set up by the mobility platforms offers migrants an alternative labour market to plug into without reliance on relational economies or incurring social debt. We find that the digital labour ecosystem attracts climate change-impacted migrants by offsetting ‘access to work opportunities’ in three key ways: (a) overcoming relational voids, (b) substituting network costs and circumventing social debts, (c) supplementing precarious agricultural work. This article uses evidence from qualitative data collected from in-depth semi-structured interviews with 113 Uber and Ola cab drivers in Bengaluru between 2015 and 2018 to explore the presence of the digital labour market as short-term adaptive strategy to create resilience against climate change-induced livelihood transitions into complex urban informal labour markets.

Suggested Citation

  • Aditi Surie & Lakshmee V. Sharma, 2019. "Climate change, Agrarian distress, and the role of digital labour markets: evidence from Bengaluru, Karnataka," DECISION: Official Journal of the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, Springer;Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, vol. 46(2), pages 127-138, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:decisn:v:46:y:2019:i:2:d:10.1007_s40622-019-00213-w
    DOI: 10.1007/s40622-019-00213-w
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Jean‐Charles Rochet & Jean Tirole, 2006. "Two‐sided markets: a progress report," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 37(3), pages 645-667, September.
    2. Uma RANI & Patrick BELSER & Martin OELZ & Setareh RANJBAR, 2013. "Minimum wage coverage and compliance in developing countries," International Labour Review, International Labour Organization, vol. 152(3-4), pages 381-410, December.
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    Cited by:

    1. Kaveri Medappa, 2023. "Rethinking Mutual Aid Through the Lens of Social Reproduction: How Platform Drivers Ride Out Work and Life in Bengaluru, India," Journal of South Asian Development, , vol. 18(3), pages 383-408, December.
    2. Sandeep Kandikuppa & Clark Gray, 2022. "Climate change and household debt in rural India," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 173(3), pages 1-27, August.
    3. Barbara Orth, 2024. "Stratified pathways into platform work: Migration trajectories and skills in Berlin’s gig economy," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 56(2), pages 476-490, March.
    4. Aditya Ray, 2024. "Coping with crisis and precarity in the gig economy: ‘Digitally organised informality’, migration and socio-spatial networks among platform drivers in India," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 56(4), pages 1227-1244, June.

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