Labor automation for fair cooperation: Why and how machines should provide meaningful work for all

By affecting work, resources, organizations, and people's lives, automation processes can be disruptive of the basic structure of society. Nonetheless, we may benefit from this disruption, as automation may offer opportunities to make social cooperation fairer. Just as philosophers have addressed the problem of which values and principles should regulate the distribution of goods, so we may consider the problem of the values and principles guiding technological change with regard to work. Indeed, automation is often addressed from a distributive perspective. A prevailing concern in the debate is about making sure that the technologically unemployed will not lose access to income through unconditional redistributive policies, while some have suggested policies like a "robot tax" to disincentivize companies' investment in labor-saving devices. While crucial given the massive increase in profits afforded by automation and the inequalities that go with it, concerns about income are not the only ones raised by automation. Without underestimating their relevance, in this article I leave aside problems about income to focus on automation from the perspective of work. That is, my concern here is on social cooperation from the perspective of contribution instead of distribution, within a framework that may be called technological contributive justice. If UBI advocates expect everyone to benefit from automation in their income, the contributive perspective postulates that everyone should benefit from automation in their work. There are three main reasons behind this shift. First, even in a world in which income were unconditionally accessible to all, there would be the problem of how to fairly organize the un-automated socially necessary labor (e.g., waste collection, care work, etc.). I call this the "somebody's got to do it" problem. It cannot be solved by merely reallocating income, because it concerns the division of labor itself and its norms. Second, by conceptualizing social cooperation only as a matter of markets and distribution but not production, we are not able to see what happens with regard to what people do besides what they own. But this matters too when it comes to pursuing our life plans (see Section 4) as well as the effects on our aims, aspirations, and character (see Section 3.1). Finally, even if work were completely automatable, we would most likely still consider it undesirable to fully automate certain tasks, such as child care or teaching. On the other hand, normative thinking about automation often takes the form of utopias of "full automation." Recent examples include ideas of "fully automated luxury communism" (Bastani, 2019) or a or "post-work" views world. A fully automated world, Danaher (2019b) argues, would allow us to pursue a life free from the pressures of economic demands and to enjoy activities for their own sake, much like playing games. From the premise that work is "structurally bad," he draws the conclusion that we should retreat from work, and the prospect of full automation is convenient to this purpose. This is what he calls a "withdrawal" strategy that disengages from work and its demands altogether. While captivating, post-work arguments rely on a debatable premise: that work will, in fact, end. This is by no means certain and, as such, is not falsifiable. There is much controversy around this issue and there are several nuances to consider. In this article, I develop the point that given this uncertainty, we should redirect our attention to the opportunities that hybrid cooperation may bring about for a fairer society. This requires us to reframe the problem of automation from one of whether future joblessness will take place and is desirable, to one of the preferable ways to realize hybrid cooperation. Thus, in this article I pursue an alternative "transformative" strategy, aimed at changing the structures of work instead of merely withdrawing from them. To this end, I explore an alternative ideal, which I call "fair hybrid cooperation," according to which we should arrange the automation processes that affect labor in such a way that provides meaningful work for all. This ideal assumes an always-evolving, hybrid cooperation scenario between humans and machines rather than one of "human obsolescence" (Danaher, 2019a). In this ideal, machines help us realize forms of cooperation that make meaningful work possible for all, rather than reserving it only for the few, as is currently the case, or anticipate a mere replacement scenario. The article proceeds as follows. First, I discuss the efficiency motives driving current automation processes (Section 2). Then, I explain why efficiency should not be the overriding value orienting automation choices and why the motives of automation deserve further normative scrutiny (3). Automation processes, I argue, are part of the basic structure of society, to which considerations of justice apply. Given the structural interdependence between humans and technology in social cooperation, we may refer to it as a system of "hybrid cooperation." Following on from this, I consider "fair hybrid cooperation" as an alternative value co-orienting automation priorities (3). Fair hybrid cooperation is achieved when the organizational arrangements between humans and machines—and between humans themselves as a result of technological disruption—do not hinder, and preferably enable, workers' experience of certain primary qualities in their activity (4). Finally (5), I provide some practical examples through a "fair hybrid cooperation test" to show how this ideal may play out in the real world. I then consider alternative cooperative imaginaries inspired by this ideal, focusing on the case of nurse bots. Section 6 concludes. The fact that what is called the technological development of modern times has been so largely oriented economically to profit-making is one of the fundamental facts of the history of technology. The costs of automation have dramatically dropped since the beginning of the computing era. As Nordhaus (2007, p. 1) points out, "depending on the standard used, computer performance has improved since manual computing by a factor between 1.7 trillion and 76 trillion." Companies have thus quite a strong incentive to substitute human labor: it costs less and produces more. Technological innovation has historically served ends of efficiency, which are often in conflict with the quality of workers' cooperation. Think of Adam Smith's (1776) classic reference to the pin factory. The detailed division of labor allowed by technological innovation in the 18th century determined a dramatic increase in productivity. There was a price to pay, though: what Smith called the "stultification" of workers, trapped into a series of mindless tasks ultimately degrading their intelligence and autonomy. Later on, Frederick Taylor's "scientific management" introduced the meticulous quantification of workers' input to maximize the productive output, thereby reducing workers to cogs in a machine. Notoriously, no consideration for the human benefits formed part of the Taylorist experiment. As captured by Taylor's (1919) own words, the goal was different: "in the past the man has been first; in the future the system must be first." Despite massive organizational transformations, automation's core rationale has not changed since that time. Efficiency might only derivatively benefit workers: that is, whether efficiency will benefit workers does not automatically follow from the general concern for efficiency in itself. To be sure, this is not to deny that many technological innovations already serve other values as well. Doctors rely on sophisticated AI devices to optimize diagnostics and surgery, for example. In such cases (and others could be cited), automation serves other purposes such as better healthcare services for patients. Therefore, strictly speaking, economic efficiency is not the only value being pursued. Thus, my argument is not entirely foreign to certain existing automation practices; rather, it explicitly articulates that economic efficiency should not be the exclusive, overarching value being pursued by automation choices. The idea is that distinctive concerns for the benefits of workers ought to be considered, which are often left out of the picture. When faced with opportunities for technological change, we ought to consider not merely productivity gains and performance optimization but also whether such changes will make cooperation fairer for workers. A tendency can sometimes be identified in public debates whereby automation is naturalized, that is, technological change is presented as a sort of natural process, much like an incontrollable calamity, despite it being the result of human choices (and of socio-structural processes cumulatively perpetuated by human choices). Naturalizing automation entails keeping it outside of the realm of moral inquiry and demands of justice. We consider as worthy of normative inquiry what we acknowledge as resulting from human choices and social processes, much like we do with taxes, social biases, and all sorts of policies. Theories have argued for the redistribution of goods based on values such as equality, fairness, and human capabilities, presupposing that the way in which goods are distributed depends on human decisions. There is no inherent reason why the same should not be done in the context of work and technological change, in terms of preferable ways to realize labor automation. This requires that we de-naturalize our discourses around automation, fully recognizing the human drive and social genesis of technological change and thereby making space to question its driving motives and to expand their scope. Before addressing the idea of fair cooperation, let me articulate why economic efficiency should not be the overarching value and, more broadly, why it is appropriate to include automation in normative considerations. To begin with, automation has a fully human and social genesis. Hence, it falls within the scope of normative inquiry, in which we question motives and ends and deliberate among the most desirable ones based on reasons. Furthermore, as I will argue shortly, automation belongs to the basic structure of society, to which—following John Rawls—considerations of justice apply. Automation affects how we organize cooperation and as such alters organizational forms which are themselves also part of the basic structure. Thus, automation affects workers' chances to pursue their life plans, as much as other institutions of the basic structure. A further reason concerns the consequences of automation: allowing automation to be driven merely by economic efficiency can exacerbate social inequalities and power imbalances. While I will not expand on this point here, arguments could be made that these undesirable outcomes matter as well (e.g., Marmot et al., 1997). Before expanding on these points, let me clarify that I have no exegetic intent with regard to the work of John Rawls. I do not wish to suggest a more accurate interpretation of his theory but rather use his work as a conceptual toolbox for independent reasoning. I depart from Rawls' view in at least three respects. First, I argue that not only what we own affects our chances to pursue our life plans but also what we do. Second, I emphasize that technology is part of social cooperation, which is thus to be deemed structurally hybrid. Third, I include organizations in the notion of the basic structure. In what follows, I expand on each passage of the argument. Rawls' definition of the basic structure is centered on the concept of social cooperation. Justice, it is maintained, applies to the basic structure, which is "[t]he way in which the main political and social institutions of a society fit together into one system of social cooperation, and the way they assign basic rights and duties and regulate the division of advantages that arise from social cooperation over time" (Rawls, 2001, p. 10). When Rawls includes the "structure of the economy" (Rawls, 2001, p. 10) in the basic structure, he mostly refers to markets and the ownership of the means of production, thereby addressing social cooperation in a distributive sense. Yet beyond distribution, social cooperation comprises non-distributive relations (Young, 1990, 2006) as well as a contributive side (Gomberg, 2007). The distributive side of social cooperation can be said to concern the outcomes of work. The contributive side can be said to concern work itself, at both the individual and the organizational level. In other words, social cooperation is not just about the outcomes of society's cooperative efforts; it is also about the cooperative efforts themselves. While much of the critical literature on the basic structure has focused on the family, there are reasons to consider work and the division of labor as part of the basic structure too. In this regard, it is helpful to look at the criteria of inclusion in the basic structure. This is a long-debated, difficult problem, which Rawls himself acknowledges. On his account, the criteria of inclusion in the basic structure are the "effects on citizens" aims, aspirations, and character, as well as on their opportunities and ability to take advantage of them, which are "pervasive and present from the beginning of life" (Rawls, 2001, p. 11). It would be hard to deny that work and the way we organize it have a significant impact on people's aims, aspirations, character, and the related opportunities in a rather pervasive way. Think of menial labor, reserved for the most socially vulnerable segments of the population. How can being reserved for repetitive, merely executory tasks not impact workers' aims, aspirations, character, and opportunities as pervasively as other institutions explicitly recognized as part of the basic structure? As for the requirement of being "present from the beginning of life," the relative lack of social mobility in developed countries like the US makes it hard for many people to escape their "occupational fate" (Hughes, 2017), as jobs often follow generational lines and "pedigrees" (Rivera, 2015). I will expand more on the impact of work in Section 4.1; for now, it suffices to note, following Young (2006, p. 92), that the social division of labor "is a fundamental aspect of a system of social cooperation." Besides capital and wages, relations of production "refer primarily to the processes of investment, production, marketing, technological invention, and so on." Given the case is compellingly made by Young (2006; 1990), I will not expand further on this point here. I am interested in the implications of this argument with regard to technology-driven changes to labor. In what follows, I develop Young's argument about the division of labor further, toward including processes of automation as fully-fledged parts of the basic structure. If the distributive conceptualization of social cooperation has tended to prevail over concerns for work, this can be said to be true also for technological change: as Suchman (2007) puts it, technology 'enchants' by 'masking' the 'labors of production'. Throughout human history, technology has defined the range of what we can and cannot do. Recent labor automation processes via the digitalization and algorithmization of tasks can be seen as the latest transformation of a long-dated, historically varied cooperative relation between humans and machines that began in the third century B.C., when the first waterlock was invented (Beniger, 1986). Over time, the invention of new technologies has expanded the realm of what we have conceived of as possible. It might be an algorithm that extracts news articles from raw data or sending a space shuttle to Mars; it might be a car or a dishwasher; it might be the Industrial Revolution. We tend to think of technology as an entity that externally adds to our human environment. But if we break the macro-system of social cooperation down to its smaller components, we find out that, in direct or indirect ways, at every step of the productive process we rely on technology. Technology is thus not a mere juxtaposition to a purely human cooperative scheme; it can be considered as a fully-fledged nonhuman cooperator (it is, in a sense, accumulated labor itself). On the other hand, if humans depend on technology to work, they are also the condition of possibility of technology—not only in terms of knowledge, invention (cultural capital), and investments (economic capital), but also of work and cooperation. Hence, regardless of the specific features of this ever-evolving relationship, it makes sense to qualify the division of labor between humans and technology as interdependent. We cannot really think of social cooperation without including technology as a substantial part of the structural processes of value-creation. These features make cooperation hybrid (Coeckelbergh 2009). Even if it may not directly affect all work at every moment, broadly speaking, we can say that, directly or indirectly, technology is structurally involved in society's overall cooperative practices. We depend on technology; technology depends on us (to a certain extent); and technology co-defines the scope of what we can, and cannot, do. My argument expands on Mark Coeckelbergh's (2009) point that nonhuman entities are to be deemed part of a hybrid cooperative scheme and, as such, they are subject to considerations of justice. Unlike Coeckelbergh, though, I do not confine my concerns to distributive justice but shift to contributive concerns, and I address the problem of fairness in work cooperation itself. And while Coeckelbergh seems mostly concerned with justice in terms of what is owed to nonhuman cooperators—both animals and robots—my reflection distinctively focuses on what machines can do with us. 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