Artificial intelligence, algorithmic management and the chronopolitics of working time

Abstract

Digitalisation, artificial intelligence (AI) and algorithmic management are often analysed in relation to productivity, efficiency or job quality. In contrast, this article draws on the lens of chronopolitics, which refers to the power relations through which working time is valued, organised and contested. Building on research on unpaid labour, digital control and the invisibility of labour, the article distinguishes three connected temporal dimensions: fragmentation , which concerns the arrangement and remuneration of working intervals; acceleration , which is the compression of task and response times; and control , which relates to authority over temporal conditions. Qualitative data from platform-based care work, an Australian university staff survey and online discussions on AI-mediated recruitment illustrate these dimensions across contrasting work relationships. The accounts reveal unpaid gaps in paid care work, contested expectations of AI-enabled productivity and tensions between rapid recruitment and relational judgement. They also identify time savings and efforts to retain discretion. By specifying the temporal elements of established employment relations concerns, the framework connects work-related time, the allocation of productivity gains and the contestability of temporal rules to a working-time reform agenda.