Software factories in Spain. Organization and division of labor: Fluid labor in information society

Abstract

This text offers theoretical reflections based on a research project and discussion of international literature on the evolution and the future of labor and its transformations. Through it we contribute a concrete and empirical basis for recurrent debates on what has been called ‘information society’, based on study of the collective worker in software production. This worker has been frequently used to illustrate the golden future of central societies, one that is expected to extend, through processes of dislocation, to ‘emergent’ or ‘developing’ societies. It is here that non-material work should find its hopeful future. Contrasting with this idealized view and following a line of thought established in previous studies, the tendencies that we have uncovered through research on software factories in Spain are very similar to what has been witnessed at the international level. One of the major concerns of our investigations has been to get a better hold on what is actually occurring: how new productive organizations for making software develop. Thu, we are able to identify major tendencies for the present and future regarding what workers of this sector can expect. These workers can be considered exemplary for current discussions on the future of labor in information society.