Né passivi né resistenti: algoattivismo, tecnologie digitali e organizzazione

The introduction of digital technologies into the workplace has been at the centre of a wide interdisciplinary debate involving different branches of study. This article focuses on the active role of workers in influencing the ways in which algorithmic technologies are embedded and used in contemporary organisations. With this aim, the article presents and discusses some of the results emerging from empirical research carried out in two work organisations in northern Italy. The findings show that the workers’ algoactivism consists in appropriating technology, and adapting algorithmic technology to their own background of beliefs. They also adapt algoactivism to the representations elaborated regarding the technology in the course of its use, as well as to the possibilities and constraints dictated by their own everyday life. Workers’ algo-activism also consists in shaping broader socio-organisational processes to monitor and manage their health conditions thanks also to technological support. The emerging organisational texture was, therefore, characterised by a continuous connection and overlap between health management, work activity, family obligations and everyday life.