Platform Labor as Economic Imperialism: Unequal Exchange and the Challenge of Chinese Digital Sovereignty

Since the mid-2000s, online labor platforms (OLPs) have emerged as vehicles for economic imperialism in the digitally deliverable services sector. By providing capital with instant access to inexpensive digital labor in the periphery, OLPs enable global North firms to bypass the costs associated with foreign direct investment and transnational labor migration while subjecting workers to conditions of super-exploitation. Drawing on Marxist unequal exchange theory, this paper develops the concept of digital labor arbitrage to explain how OLPs facilitate the transfer of value from periphery to core in this strategically significant sector of the global political economy. It argues that this process reinforces US dominance in key areas, including global technological infrastructure and artificial intelligence. The paper underscores the role of OLPs in perpetuating underdevelopment and considers China's technological and digital sovereignty as a potential challenge to 21st-century imperialism.

Published in the Journal of Labor and Society, volume 29, issue 3, pages 351–384. Received 2 April 2026; accepted 24 July 2026; published online 14 August 2026.

Platform Labor as Economic Imperialism: Unequal Exchange and the Challenge of Chinese Digital Sovereignty

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