The article examines the case of a Barcelona-based cooperative that is a member of the platform cooperative CoopCycle, specialised in bike delivery. Welcoming the invitation from labour scholars to adopt the concept of grey zone as a methodological and theoretical tool, we start from our empirical observations in the field, and intersect our critical perspectives in geography, organisation studies, and sociology to explore existing grey zones in the platform cooperative movement. Building on this concept, we highlight grey zones in economic and labour relations as well as in the circulation of knowledge happening within the cooperative. Based on a longitudinal ethnographic study, this article describes how this counterplatform is based on permanent compromises that generate grey zones between solidarity and competition, between paid and unpaid work, and among reinventing, integrating or hybridising managerial knowledge. It shows how the implementation of platform cooperatives is supported and constrained by the different relationships between the alternative and its economic and institutional context. This paper pleads for both a grounded and longitudinal approach to alternative organisations such as platform cooperative; this insider-focused approach suggests researchers to cross disciplines and exchange views with practitioners and policy makers in order to build shared and situated knowledge.
Eccher et al. (Sun,) studied this question.
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