As digital labour platforms continue to expand across Asia, debates on the future of work often circle back to a familiar reference point: ride-hailing apps such as Uber. But focusing on one dominant model can obscure more than it reveals—particularly in countries like India, where platform work has taken on diverse forms across sectors such as home-based services, education, logistics, agriculture, and healthcare.

This was the central argument of a recent FutureWORKS Asia knowledge-sharing session by Dr. Aditi Surie of the Indian Institute for Human Settlements, which examined how different types of labour platforms govern workers’ time, income, and behaviour. Rather than asking whether platform workers are “employees” or “independent contractors,” the session invited participants to look more closely at how platforms exercise control—and how that control shapes workers’ everyday experiences.

India is home to one of the world’s largest platform economies. Millions of workers rely on platforms for income, often entering platform work from an already informal labour market with limited access to contracts, social security, or legal protection. At the same time, governments increasingly view platforms as engines of job creation and economic growth.

Although platforms promise flexibility and opportunity, workers often experience uncertainty, income volatility, and shifting rules they have little power to influence. Understanding this tension requires moving beyond surface claims made by firms and examining how platforms actually organise work.

Moving past the “Uber model”

A key intervention of the session was its critique of treating Uber-style ride-hailing as the default model for platform work. While transport platforms have shaped global discussions, partly because drivers have organised and mobilised effectively, they represent only one slice of a much larger ecosystem.

In India, platforms operate across a wide range of sectors, each with distinct business strategies and degrees of control over workers. Some platforms manage the entire service process end-to-end, while others act mainly as digital intermediaries. Lumping them together under a single regulatory lens risks overlooking how power, risk, and responsibility are distributed in practice.

To address this, the session introduced a typology of platform models commonly used in industry:

• Full-stack or closed ecosystems, which tightly control service delivery and often employ workers on formal contracts.
• Managed marketplaces, which curate and train workers to deliver consistent service quality.
• Software-as-a-service (SaaS) or B2B platforms, which provide tools for managing labour without directly supervising workers.
• Open gig or micro-task platforms, which prioritise scale and volume over close oversight.

These distinctions are not merely technical. They shape how much autonomy workers have, how they earn, and how risks are allocated.

The “operational axes of control”

To make these differences visible, the session analysed platform work through several “axes of control” – areas where platforms exert influence over workers’ lives, often without formal employment relationships.

Time control is one such axis. While flexibility is a core selling point of platform work, in practice it is often conditional. Some platforms impose fixed shifts, others use financial incentives to nudge workers to log in during peak hours, and still others limit how much work can be done in a day under the guise of safety or quality. The result is a spectrum of constrained autonomy rather than true freedom over time.

Income control is another critical axis. Platforms use a variety of pricing and payment models – commissions, subscriptions, fixed fees, or minimum guarantees – to shape how and when workers earn. In many cases, income security is tied to meeting specific time or performance thresholds, shifting economic risk onto workers while maintaining the platform’s flexibility.

Penalties and rule enforcement further illustrate how governance operates. Some platforms rely on direct supervision and monitoring, while others use algorithmic penalties such as reduced task allocation or loss of incentives. Importantly, rules can change quickly, with limited transparency or recourse for workers affected by them.

Beyond these, the session also highlighted recruitment and onboarding as powerful control mechanisms. Platforms act as gatekeepers, deciding who can access work through vetting, documentation requirements, and training. While these processes can offer workers entry into formal financial systems, they also transfer costs and liabilities, such as background checks or asset purchases, onto individuals.

Platform governance versus regulation

The session highlighted the contrast between traditional labour regulation and platform governance. Labour laws tend to be written as static texts, while platforms operate through dynamic, constantly evolving digital systems. Rules governing work are embedded in code, contracts, and algorithms that can be updated overnight.

This mismatch creates challenges for policymakers. Regulations designed around one business model can be sidestepped as platforms shift pricing structures or reorganise their operations. In India, emerging social security arrangments for platform workers have so far tended to assume commission-based platform models, even as some companies increasingly experiment with subscription or fixed-fee structures, raising questions about how well these policy mechanisms can keep pace with evolving business practices.

The implication is not that regulation is futile, but that it must adapt. Rather than focusing narrowly on employment status, the session argued for regulating mechanisms of control: how time is structured, how income is calculated, how penalties are imposed, and how risks are transferred.

Why this matters for the Global South

In many Global South contexts, platform work enters labour markets already characterised by informality and weak social protection. Platforms often fill institutional gaps by facilitating payments, verification, or access to credit, but in doing so, they also centralise power and redefine norms of work.

Recognising diversity within platform economies is essential for crafting effective responses. A one-size-fits-all approach risks protecting some workers while leaving others exposed. It can also reinforce gender and sectoral inequalities, particularly where women are concentrated in highly managed service platforms with intense scrutiny and limited bargaining power.

Throughout the session, Dr. Surie underscored the need for more nuanced research and policy thinking on platform labour. By shifting the focus from labels to lived realities, it offered a framework for understanding how platforms govern work, and how that governance shapes the future of labour in Asia. As platform economies continue to grow, such perspectives will be critical for designing regulations and protections that reflect how work is actually organised, rather than how it is marketed.