2020
What Polanyi Teaches Us: The Platform Economy and Structural Change
Martin Kenney, John Zysman, and Dafna Bearson
The rise of the platform economy marks the latest phase in the ongoing digital revolution. Indeed, the platform is to this digital era what the factory was to the industrial era, both a symbol and an organizing mechanism. Gernot Grabher and Jonas König (2020) used Karl Polanyi’s analysis of what he termed the “great transformation” to frame the rise of platform economy. The platform economy is remarkable as it confirms Polanyi’s (and Marx’s before him) insight that the reach of the market is based upon increased commodification as it has been able to reach into ever more parts of social life. We introduced the term “platform economy” in 2015 because we recognized that the digital platforms were changing the dynamics of capitalist accumulation – an analysis framed by regulationist school of political economy. The intuition was that the socio-technical innovation of digital online platforms was the critical fulcrum for an economic restructuring that would rewire the flows of data and ultimately money and power. The firms we have termed the mega-platforms, Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft, have become the most valuable and powerful firms in the world. Importantly, the reach of these platforms is global and yet local and personal. Moreover, platform power has been reinforced during the COVID-19 pandemic. Download the Full Paper.
Governing AI: Understanding the Limits, Possibility, and Risks of AI in an Era of Intelligent Tools and Systems
John Zysman and Mark Nitzberg
In debates about artificial intelligence (AI), imaginations often run wild. Policy-makers, opinion leaders, and the public tend to believe that AI is already an immensely powerful universal technology, limitless in its possibilities. However, while machine learning (ML), the principal computer science tool underlying today’s AI breakthroughs, is indeed powerful, ML is fundamentally a form of context-dependent statistical inference and as such has its limits. Specifically, because ML relies on correlations between inputs and outputs or emergent clustering in training data, today’s AI systems can only be applied in well-specified problem domains, still lacking the context-sensitivity of a typical toddler or house-pet. Consequently, instead of constructing policies to govern artificial general intelligence (AGI), decision-makers should focus on the distinctive and powerful problems posed by narrow AI, including misconceived benefits and the distribution of benefits, autonomous weapons, and bias in algorithms. AI governance, at least for now, is less about managing super-intelligent systems than about managing those who would create and deploy them and supporting the application of AI to narrow, well-defined problem domains. Download the Full Paper.
Digitalization and Platforms in Agriculture: Organizations, Power Asymmetry, and Collective Action Solutions
Martin Kenney, Hiam Serhan, and Gilles Trystram, April 2020
Technologies such as digitally-equipped agricultural equipment, drones, image recognition, sensors, robots and artificial intelligence are being rapidly adopted throughout the agri-food system, leading to the generation and use of ever more data. The benefits of data sharing for efficiency, productivity and sustainability are predicated upon the adoption of an online digital platform. The conundrum is that, as the intermediary, the owner of a successful platform acquires significant power in relationship to the platform sides. This paper identifies five types of platform business models/ownership arrangements and their benefits and drawbacks for the various actors in the agri-food system, assesses the business models for each of these organizational forms, and describes the drawbacks each of these organizational forms have experienced as they attempt to secure adoption of their particular platform solution. Download the full paper.
The Platform Economy Matures: Pervasive Power, Private Regulation, and Dependent Entrepreneurs
Martin Kenney, Dafna Bearson, and John Zysman, November 2019
Platforms are an emblem and embodiment of the digital era just as factories were of the industrial revolution. Digital platforms, through their power in their respective ecosystems, are intermediating and contributing to the reorganization of ever-greater segments of the economy and society. As this occurs, existing firms, jobs, and labor relationships are being displaced or transformed, even while new tasks and enterprises are emerging, and existing firms are adjusting. This paper explores the ways in which platform firms are insinuating themselves into ever more parts of the economy. Download the full paper.
The Platform Economy and Geography: Restructuring the Space of Capitalist Accumulation
Martin Kenney and John Zysman, November 2019
Digital online platform firms are reorganizing the geography of how value is created and who captures it and where. This essay argues that economic geographers have underestimated the power of platform and the firms that control them. To illustrate the impact on the geography of value creation, we undertake cases studies of two platforms, Amazon and Google Maps, to explicate their effects upon the location of economic activity. These platform leaders have the largest data sets and have created enormous teams of the best AI, machine learning resarchers, and, finally, have enormous reservoirs of capital with which to capture new technologies that may threaten them. Download the full paper.
Labor in the Platform Economy: New Work Created, Old Work Reorganized and Value Creation Reconfigured
Dafna Bearson, Martin Kenney, and John Zysman, May 2019
How do platform organizations create new jobs and reorganize old work? And how is value created in the platform economy? Platforms have profoundly altered market logic and dynamics, and challenge us to rethink the ways we define labor and value creation. In this paper, Dafna Bearson, Martin Kenney, and John Zysman present a new taxonomy of platform work that focuses on the reorganization of work in the platform era and apply this framework to the work generated by Etsy and Amazon publishing. Download the full paper.
2018
- BRIE Working Paper 2018-7, "CTRIP: China's Online Travel Platform - Local Giant or Global Competitor?", Tianyi Shao and Martin Kenney.
2017
- BRIE Working Paper 2017-3," What is the Core Tech of a Company Worth? It Depends Who Is Asking!". Helena Malikova
- “The Regulation of Labor Platforms: The Politics of the Uber Economy” Ruth Collier, Veena Dubal and Christopher Carter (2017). Supported in part by a grant from the Kauffman Foundation.
- “From Great Power Politics to a Strategic Vacuum: Origins and Consequences of the TPP and TTIP” Melissa K Griffith, Richard Steinberg, John Zysman, article submitted to Business and Politics for publication (January 2017).
- BRIE Working Paper 2017-1. “Explaining the Growth and Globalization of Silicon Valley: The Past and Today” Martin Kenney (2017)
2016
- BRIE Working Paper 2016-10. “Artificial Intelligence and Robots: Thoughts, Reflection on Policy Inaction in Israel and some nasty general predictions” Dan Breznitz. Presentation at the National Academics of Science, Engineering, and Medicine (USA) workshop on Robotics and Artificial Intelligence: Policy Implications for the Next Decade. Washington DC, December 12, 2016.
- BRIE Working Paper 2016-9. “What is the Future or Work? Understanding the Platform Economy and Computation-Intensive Automation“. Martin Kenney and John Zysman (2016).
- BRIE Working Paper 2016-8. “Measuring Entrepreneurial Activity at Kansas and Missouri Universities“. W. Richard Goe, Martin Kenney, Donald Patton (2016).
- BRIE Working Paper 2016-7. “Exploring the Marker-Industrial Revolution: Will the future of production be local?” Anna Waldman Brown (2016).
- BRIE Working Paper 2016-6. “Mobile Internet Business Models in China: Vertical Hierarchies, Horizontal Conglomerates, or Business Groups?“. Kai Jia and Martin Kenney (2016).
- BRIE Working Paper 2016-4. “SME Instrument – So Far So Good? Expectations, Reality and Lessons to Learn“. Alberto Di Minin, Chiara Eleonora De Marco, Maria Karaulova (October 2016).
- BRIE Working Paper 2016-3. “The Next Phase in the Digital Revolution: Platforms, Abundant Computing; Growth and Employment“. John Zysman and Martin Kenney (August 2016).
- BRIE Working Paper 2016-2. “Product-centric Information Management: A Case Study of a Shared Platform with Blockchain Technology“. Juri Mattila, Timo Seppälä and Jan Holmström (May 2016).
- “China’s 13th 5-Year Plan: Implications for the Automobile Industry” Testimony by Crystal Chang for The U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission (April 2016).
- BRIE Working Paper 2016-1. “The Blockchain Phenomenon: The Disruptive Potential of Distributed Consensus Architectures“. Juri Mattila (April 2016). This paper is also an ETLA working paper (no. 38).
- “Certification, Clusters, and Creativity: An Analysis of Etsy as a Platform Firm” Kara Hawkins. Article. (March 2016).
- “The Platform Firm Flexport: Benefitting from its cluster and the globalization of production” Kelsey Hutcherson. Term Paper. (March 2016)
- Concrete Economics: The Hamilton Approach to Economic Growth and Policy Stephen Cohen and Brad DeLong. Book. (March 2016).
- “Marketplace Rules and International Deal Making: Some thoughts about the implications of the TPP” John Zysman, Discussion Paper. Prepared for the Munk School Conference, “The Trans-Pacific Partnership: Options for Canada and the World” (January 2016).
2015
- “Great Power Politics in a Global Economy Origins and Consequences of the TPP and TTIP” Melissa K Griffith, Richard Steinberg, John Zysman, Conference Paper. Prepared for Unpacking the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) Negotiations (October 2015).
- BRIE Working Paper 2015-6. “Salient Green: Business Power and Trade Policy Responses to Chinese Solar Imports“. Llewelyn Hughes and Jonas Meckling (August 2015).
- BRIE Working Paper 2015-5, “Globalizing Solar: Industry Specialization and Firm Demands for Trade Protection” Jonas Meckling and Llewelyn Hughes (July 2015).
- “Choosing a Future in the Platform Economy: The Implications and Consequences of Digital Platforms” Martin Kenney and John Zysman. Discussion Paper. Prepared for the New Entrepreneurial Growth Conference, Kauffman Foundation (June 2015).
- “Beyond Cloud: Implications for the Industrialization of IT and the 3rd Era of Computing” Jonathan Murray, Presentation. (May 2015).
- “Value in the Era of the Platform Economy” Martin Kenney, Presentation. (March 2015 – Revised May 2015).
- BRIE Working Paper 2015-4, “Signaling Legitimacy to Foreign Investors: Evidence from Chinese IPOs on U.S. Markets.” Xu Jin, Donald Patton, and Martin Kenney (May 2015).
- BRIE Working Paper 2015-2. “Innovative Clusters & New Work: A case study of TaskRabbit” Emily Isaac (March 2015).
- BRIE Working Paper 2015-1. “MyFitnessPal: How This Winner-Took-All by Helping People Lose.” Emily Alonso (March 2015).
- “Work in the Digital Era: Choosing a Future” John Zysman, Presentation. Prepared for: Future of Work, Open Society Foundation (April 2015).
2014
- BRIE Working Paper 2014-7. “Disruptive Innovation: Risk-Shifting and Precarity in the Age of Uber” Emily Isaac (2014).
- BRIE Working Paper 2014-6, “Where Will Work Come from in the Era of the Cloud and Big Data?” John Zysman, Martin Kenney (2014).
- BRIE Working Paper 2014-5, “The Next Epoch in Cloud Computing: Implications for Integrated Research and Innovation Strategy.” Kenji E. Kushida, Jonathan Murray, Patrick Scaglia, John Zysman (2014)
- BRIE Working Paper 2014-4, “Escape from the Commodity Trap: Will the Production Transformation Sustain Productivity, Growth and Jobs?,” Written for the European Commission. John Zysman (2014).
- BRIE Working Paper 2014-3, “Awaiting the Second Big Data Revolution“, Mark Huberty (2014).
- BRIE Working Paper 2014-2, “Cloud Computing: From Scarcity to Abundance.” Kenji E. Kushida, Jonathan Murray, and John Zysman (2014)