Skip navigation
Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://arks.princeton.edu/ark:/88435/dsp01sb397b96p
Title: Crowd and Community: Organizations and Occupations in Crowdsourced Work
Authors: Schwartz, David
Advisors: Vertesi, Janet
Contributors: Sociology Department
Keywords: Crowdsourcing
Future of work
Occupations
Online community
Subjects: Sociology
Organization theory
Organizational behavior
Issue Date: 2018
Publisher: Princeton, NJ : Princeton University
Abstract: Over the past two decades, firms have relied increasingly upon external workers rather than employees for their core production tasks. More recently, firms in the high-technology and software industries have come to rely on crowdsourced workers, who are formally external to firms and organized via the Internet. This project investigates the management of crowdsourced work by firms, the experiences of crowdsourced workers themselves, and the implications for organizational boundaries and occupational identity within and outside of firms. Three motivating questions are central to the research presented here. First, how does crowdsourced work remain socially embedded despite pressures toward atomization? Second, in the absence of employment relationships, how do organizations approach the socialization of crowdsourced workers as variously organizational and occupational members. Third, how is control established among non-employees when work is completed online? To answer these questions, this project relies on organizational ethnography, practiced online and offline for two years, and interviews with crowdsourced workers and employees of three software firms. These firms were similar in their reliance on crowdsourced work, yet distinct in size, product, skill requirements, and models of incorporating external workers.
URI: http://arks.princeton.edu/ark:/88435/dsp01sb397b96p
Alternate format: The Mudd Manuscript Library retains one bound copy of each dissertation. Search for these copies in the library's main catalog: catalog.princeton.edu
Type of Material: Academic dissertations (Ph.D.)
Language: en
Appears in Collections:Sociology

Files in This Item:
File Description SizeFormat 
Schwartz_princeton_0181D_12566.pdf777.61 kBAdobe PDFView/Download


Items in Dataspace are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.