In this edition of The Power Hour, Burnes Center for Social Change Senior Fellow Seth Harris is joined by Lilly Irani,  Associate Professor of Computer Science and Faculty Director of the Labor Center at U.C. San Diego; and Alexander Hertel-Fernandez, Associate Professor of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University and former Deputy Assistant Secretary for Research and Evaluation in the U.S. Department of Labor; to discuss the transformative potential of generative AI in building worker power, how technology can facilitating worker organizing, and how workers are resisting the exploitative nature of online platforms like Uber and Lyft.

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Alexander Hertel-Fernandez studies the political economy of the United States, with an emphasis on business, the workplace, labor, and public policy. Alexander is an Associate Professor of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, where he also serves as Vice Dean for Curriculum and Instruction. He previously served in the Biden-Harris Administration in the Department of Labor and the Office of Management and Budget. Alexander is also a co-director of the Columbia Labor Lab, an academic center for implementing data-driven evaluations in partnership with worker organizations, and a co-lead of the American Political Economy project, an effort to foster more research on the relationship between markets and government in the United States in comparative perspective. 

Lilly Irani's research investigates the cultural politics of high-tech work practices with a focus on how actors produce “innovation” cultures. Lilly is an ethnographer of work trained to analyze interactional, organizational, and cultural dynamics as mediated by technology. Lilly also draws on her training as a Computer Scientist and designer to develop novel technical, organizational systems for contexts she studies. She specializes in the cultural politics of high-tech work in the context of global digitally-mediated economies, with a focus on the United States and India. Lilly also build software with others to build worker power (Turkopticon, Dynamo) especially to resist and create alternatives to existing platforms. At UCSD, Lilly is Faculty Director of the UC San Diego Labor Center. She co-directs the Just Transitions Initiative and is faculty in Science Studies, the Design Lab, the Institute for Practical Ethics, Critical Gender Studies.