Urbanization of Life, Training and Work Paths: The Rider’s Case

Abstract

Post-modernity poses a number of issues for mankind: social alienation with difficulties of inclusion, job alienation as a result of employment crises and the demand for continued flexibility, following the ambivalent opportunity provided by technology, which in the meantime has also "digitized" relationships of any kind. And it is precisely in this flexibility that post-modern man becomes liquid (Bauman, 2003) and fragmented, whose existence consists of a set of episodes, in which he finds himself having to camouflage himself, as a "social chameleon" (Mantovani, 1995). The outcome of this process is the creation of today's culture consisting of the closeness and contiguity of many "splinters", the foundation of the constant provisionally and uncertain professional mobility (Sullivan & Arthur, 2006). This is the case of the emerging phenomenon of riders, in the current era of the gig economy, human resources engaged in home delivery on a bicycle and falling into the category of new digital workers, often belonging to excluded categories. This work aims to present the case study of food delivery riders in Italy and specifically in the city of Milan, through qualitative methodologies, comparing the situation with other Spanish cities. Data analysis has its roots in visual psychopedagogy and has been carried out through qualitative methodologies, such as the analysis of photos and images, useful for the creation of an identikit of this socio-economic and identity phenomenon and the subsequent creation of a research model.