Abandoned Spaces and Technology Displacement by Labour: The Case of Hand Car Washes

Abstract

The diffusion of hand car washes is in contradistinction to vogue arguments about automation and new technology. However, what is absent from the literature is a focus on abandoned spaces as a capitalist commodity and the displacement of technology by labour which is particularly associated with the emergence of low‐cost informalized areas of work that occupy and self‐regulate these spaces. The contribution of this research to new knowledge is a theoretically informed empirical derivation of abandoned spaces which low‐cost businesses such as hand car washes occupy to inform two research propositions; one, the spatial dimension to abandoned spaces derives from economic restructuring from above; this restructuring informs restructuring from below rather than as an independent development of migrant‐dominated sectors of work and employment such as hand car washes. Two, that the application of new technology can be displaced by, operates in conjunction with or relies on low‐cost labour‐intensive providers where labour practices tend towards informalization.