“When the algorithm becomes the boss”

digital colonialism and the new era of platformized slavery

Abstract

The expansion of digital platforms and artificial intelligence has reconfigured labor relations within contemporary capitalism. In Brazil, this process is historically intertwined with informality, labor precarization, and the enduring structural legacies of colonialism and racism. This article aims to demonstrate how digital colonialism updates and reorganizes historical relations of labor exploitation and expropriation in the country, highlighting continuities between the colonial-slaveholding logic and contemporary forms of labor mediated by digital platforms. It is argued that algorithmic management operates as a mechanism of control and intensified value extraction, capturing not only labor power but also the subjectivity, data, and lifetime of workers and users. Furthermore, these dynamics are shown to operate in a racialized manner, reproducing historical inequalities linked to Brazil’s social formation and slaveholding legacy. The article concludes that the platformization of labor does not represent a rupture with historical forms of domination, but rather their technological reconfiguration. Digital colonialism deepens the capture of human life by capital and reinforces racialized structures of exploitation. In this context, the defense of dignified working conditions becomes fundamental to safeguarding the dignity of human life.