Search Results (2)

Artificial intelligence-based management systems are becoming increasingly embedded in labor processes, particularly in platform-mediated work. While existing research has shown that algorithmic management intensifies data-driven control, opacity, and performance monitoring, less attention has been paid to how algorithmic decision-making reshapes the institutional conditions of representation, negotiation, and accountability in employment relations. This article examines how AI-based management may reconfigure workplace conflict by translating managerial decisions into “system outputs” and narrowing the extent to which disputes remain institutionally addressable and negotiable. Drawing on a qualitative case study of platform-based motorcycle couriers in Türkiye, the analysis is based on semi-structured, decision-moment-focused interviews with 19 couriers and 5 representation actors. Rather than testing a full causal model or advancing a universal claim about algorithmic management, the article traces recurring processual linkages among the technicalization of decision-making, epistemic opacity, weakened addressability, and the thinning of representational intervention. The findings suggest that, in the Turkish platform courier context examined here, representationless governance appears as an empirically observable pattern where consequential algorithmic decisions intersect with limited transparency, fragmented appeal channels, income-sensitive sanctions, and constrained collective representation. In this configuration, decision-making remains procedurally dense yet substantively difficult to contest through identifiable, accountable, and negotiable channels. The article argues that the social sustainability of labor governance depends not only on efficiency, flexibility, or access to work, but also on whether decisions affecting workers’ livelihoods remain intelligible, contestable, attributable, and open to institutional negotiation. Full article

In Southeast Asian cities, it is common for logistic companies to operate a heterogeneous fleet of delivery vehicles with motorcycles being the preferred vehicle to handle the final phase of delivery. In such scenarios, heterogeneous fleet vehicle routing problem (HFVRP) is generally applied to plan an optimal delivery. However, in many downtown cores of large and rapidly developing Southeast Asian cities, HFVRP is neither viable nor reliable because of road usage restrictions. The purpose of this article is to develop and test a different approach that accurately takes these restrictions into account and provides viable and more sustainable results. Restrictions in this paper refer to situations of urban areas in Vietnam where (i) certain vehicle types are prohibited in specified areas or where narrow alleyways limit the utilization of vehicles that exceed the road capacity and (ii) certain roads are exclusive to certain vehicle types. In networks, limited access and exclusive lanes are represented as links, or arcs, exclusive to one or another. Taking these limitations into consideration, we have developed a unique model, which we have termed Vehicle Routing Problem with Exclusive Links (VRP-EL). The model was validated and tested for its performance on scenarios with varying ratios of exclusive links. Scenarios up to 500 customers were tested on a meta-heuristic algorithm, simulated annealing. VRP-EL produces realistic outcomes. Limiting certain links to be selected according to vehicle types increases overall travel distance. However, this increase outweighs the cost of re-planning and rerouting had they not been constrained initially. The reduction in traveling distance leads to fossil fuel reduction for the overall system. The estimation of reduced carbon emissions through applying the proposed model is presented. Considering the severe traffic congestion and carbon emissions caused by motorcycles in Vietnam, the proposed model leads to a sustainable road environment. Full article