A paper by INCA researchers at COSMOS Conference

27 May 2025 By

On May 26th, INCA researchers Mattia Frapporti (University of Bologna) and Adam Mrozowicki (University of Wrocław) participated in the COSMOS Conference «Reclaiming Power: Bridging Social Movements and Industrial Relations in Labour Mobilisation».

At the event, they presented a paper entitled “Work hard, have fun, make history? Struggles inside Amazon in Italy and Poland” that examines the conditions, forms and consequences of workers’ struggles at Amazon and its ecosystem of subcontractors in Poland and Italy, combining the inspirations of the power resources approach with the literature on the infrastructural power of big tech companies.

Since the two study countries differ in terms of union power resources and state regulatory power vis-à-vis platform companies such as Amazon, the study formulated two research questions:

  • What kinds of power resources are mobilised by workers in Poland and Italy to counteract the infrastructural power of Amazon?
  • How can we explain the similarities and differences in the forms of mobilisation (and non-mobilisation) of Amazon workers in both countries?

Attendees at the event organized by the Centre on Social Movement Studies of the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences (Scuola Normale Superiore) had the opportunity to learn about the conclusions reached by INCA researchers after analyzing secondary data, in-depth interviews with stakeholders in labor relations and semi-structured interviews with workers, employers and managers of Amazon and subcontractors (about 50 interviews in total).

Conclusions can be summarized in two main ideas:

  • Forms of workers’ collective mobilisation are mediated but not determined by traditional trade union power resources, national institutions and employment and business practices of Amazon. Workers’ innovative resistance practices continue to shape the local varieties of global ‘Amazonification’ even in Poland, where their overall power resources are weaker.
  • The Amazon effect is also visible in the international diffusion of some repertoires of discontent through union networks and critical media discourse, parallel to the diffusion of coercive company management practices.