Tracked and Targeted: A Word About Our Participatory Methodology
Consistent with our past research, the study presented in Tracked and Targeted: Navigating Worker Surveillance at Amazon is a participatory action research study. This means we focus deeply on individuals’ and groups’ lived experiences as the basis from which we can know and understand the world. This type of research design deeply emphasizes reciprocity and the collaboration between researchers and research participants in all aspects of the project, including implementation, study design, data analysis, and dissemination1 Kincheloe, J. L., & McLaren, P. L. (1994). Rethinking critical theory and qualitative research. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.), Handbook of qualitative research (pp. 138–157)
A common feature of participatory action research is its unique approach to scale. Instead of launching a quantitative study that focuses primarily on getting the largest number of replies possible, we focus on taking a small-scale or right-sized approach that allows us to engage participants through storytelling and conversations. By focusing on the qualitative data or stories, we are able to drill down on specific qualities, understand the full texture of life experiences, and gain more insight into what participants see, hear, and do on a daily basis2Brydon-Miller, M. (2001). Education, research, and action. In M. Brydon-Miller & D. L. Tolman (Eds.), From subjects to subjectivities: A handbook of interpretive and participatory methods (pp. 76–89). NYU Press. . We have chosen this approach because it leads to meaningful comparisons to other contexts and histories3Christians, C. G., & Carey, J. W. (1989). The logic and aims of qualitative research. In Research Methods in Mass Communication (pp. 354–357). Prentice Hall.. It provides frameworks for looking in the right direction, a stronger foundation for further investigations, and has great potential for both timely and lasting impacts. Lastly, this kind of approach allows for the centering of experiential knowledge of the participants, something that often gets obscured in the understanding of complex systems and institutions 4 Saba, M., Lewis, T., Petty, T., Gangadharan, S. P., & Eubanks, V. (2017). From paranoia to power: Our Data Bodies project 2016 report (pp. 1–12). New America. https://www.odbproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/ODB-Community-Report-7-24.pdf.
In our collaboration with United For Respect, we have thoroughly considered how we will use this work to address blind spots in surveillance studies, worker studies, and worker campaigns, which can be transactional and top-down processes. As a result, we have positioned our research as part of a larger process of collective learning in the hope that it can be used to support worker-led campaigns or, at the very least, amplify worker stories.
About Our Interviewees
Though we are still amidst our participatory process, we decided to report on key interim discoveries, given the timeliness of this issue. Increasingly, policymakers want to know whether and how workplace surveillance gives companies an unfair advantage at the expense of exploited workers. Based on the twenty-one in-depth, semi-structured interviews we have completed—twenty of which were usable in some form, we created four “composites” of low-wage workers5 We discovered audio files were damaged for two interviews and thus unusable. Having collected demographic data anonymously and separate from the interview process, we include them in our report of aggregate demographic data. Note that not all individuals responded to each demographic question.
. We are using composites for this work to help keep our workers safe from the powerbrokers who may want to retaliate against them6Cook, D. A., & Dixson, A. D. (2013). Writing critical race theory and method: A composite counterstory on the experiences of Black teachers in New Orleans post-Katrina. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 26(10), 1238–1258, https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2012.731531; Arjomand, N. A. (2022). Empirical Fiction: Composite Character Narratives in Analytical Sociology. The American Sociologist, https://doi.org/10.1007/s12108-022-09546-z
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We also randomly approached people at or near their site of work. We recruited interviewees in two ways. We worked with United for Respect and their affiliate Missouri Worker Center to recruit current and recently employed employees at Amazon. We also did “person on the street” interviews, by randomly approaching people at or near Amazon facilities. We attracted interviewees mostly through the former method, since workers leaving Amazon facilities had little time to learn about our study or were fearful of retaliation from Amazon if they did participate.
With that said, we conducted twenty-one in-depth, semi-structured interviews altogether. Our workers both reflect and slightly diverge from the aggregate demographic profile of laborers and helpers at Amazon. Similar to U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission employee data provided by Amazon7 Equal Employment Opportunity. (2021). 2021 employment information report EEO-1 consolidated report: Amazon. Department of Labor. https://assets.aboutamazon.com/ff/dc/30bf8e3d41c7b250651f337a29c7/2021-amazon-consolidated-eeo-1-report-2p.pdf
, our interviewee pool reflected an overwhelmingly non-white workforce. In our group of twenty, we spoke predominantly of workers who identified as Black or African American (70%), with the remaining identifying as white. However, unlike EEOC data which reflects near parity between male and female workers, most of our interviewees identified as women (60%).
EEOC data aside, our workers reflected a relatively diverse group. Interviewees hailed from practically all regions of the country. We also asked additional demographic questions to get a clearer sense of workers’ backgrounds. On balance, workers were income diverse, cisgender, and young. Altogether eleven workers who responded reported a diverse range of household income, nearly equally spread from the lower end of our income range—five to 10 thousand dollars yearly for the people that the respondent and the people they lived with took home—to over $75,000. The fifteen respondents who answered questions about sexuality identified as mostly heterosexual, with only 21 percent categorizing themselves as queer or gay. Of the seventeen respondents who answered questions about age, a majority (53%) reported being aged 18 to 34, with the age bracket 55-64 as the next most common age bracket (18%).)
A Final Reflection
Our team is based in and connected to communities affected by surveillance and technologies of control in–and outside of–the Amazon workplace. These connections have motivated us to develop a qualitative, participatory study in ways that build momentum for research-oriented perspectives to thrive in the places and communities where we live and work. The process can be slow-going, but speaking with workers at Amazon is yielding very powerful stories, insights, and patterns that can and should drive change.
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