Collectivizing Convenience? From Delivery to Logisticality
Research output: Contributions to collected editions/works › Chapter › peer-review
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In/Convenience: Inhabiting the Logistical Surround. ed. / Joshua Neves; Marc Steinberg. Amsterdam: Institute of Network Cultures, 2024. p. 66-81 (Theory on Demand; Vol. 54).
Research output: Contributions to collected editions/works › Chapter › peer-review
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RIS
TY - CHAP
T1 - Collectivizing Convenience?
T2 - From Delivery to Logisticality
AU - Beverungen, Armin
PY - 2024/12
Y1 - 2024/12
N2 - By characterizing Amazon’s convenience as logistical, as convenience delivered, the contribution points to the entanglement between logistics, planning and convenience at Amazon. Where critical commentary has established the costs of convenience in terms of labor exploitation and consumer surveillance, the contribution contends that Amazon’s convenience furthermore implies a logistification of life, which largely evacuates collectivity. The contribution subsequently challenges celebrations of Amazon’s logistical convenience, and suggests that a potential collectivization of convenience demands a more specific reckoning with convenience delivered. If Amazon’s convenience is logistics in disguise, and if the techniques and operations of Amazon’s logistics are fundamentally counter-collective, then Amazon’s convenience cannot simply be collectivized. Instead, it must be confronted with logisticality, that is, the collective capacity to organize life without logistical planning. Logisticality defies logistical convenience, and may bring forth a different kind of convenience.
AB - By characterizing Amazon’s convenience as logistical, as convenience delivered, the contribution points to the entanglement between logistics, planning and convenience at Amazon. Where critical commentary has established the costs of convenience in terms of labor exploitation and consumer surveillance, the contribution contends that Amazon’s convenience furthermore implies a logistification of life, which largely evacuates collectivity. The contribution subsequently challenges celebrations of Amazon’s logistical convenience, and suggests that a potential collectivization of convenience demands a more specific reckoning with convenience delivered. If Amazon’s convenience is logistics in disguise, and if the techniques and operations of Amazon’s logistics are fundamentally counter-collective, then Amazon’s convenience cannot simply be collectivized. Instead, it must be confronted with logisticality, that is, the collective capacity to organize life without logistical planning. Logisticality defies logistical convenience, and may bring forth a different kind of convenience.
KW - Digital media
KW - logistical media
KW - convenience
KW - Sociology
KW - Logistik
KW - Convenience
KW - Wirtschaftsplanung
M3 - Chapter
SN - 978-90-834125-5-9
T3 - Theory on Demand
SP - 66
EP - 81
BT - In/Convenience
A2 - Neves, Joshua
A2 - Steinberg, Marc
PB - Institute of Network Cultures
CY - Amsterdam
ER -