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Dissertation
State labor, digital inequalities, and governed creativity
Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Drexel University
May 2025
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17918/00010937
Abstract
This dissertation, State Labor, Digital Inequalities, and Governed Creativity, examines how state power, platform governance, and capitalist forces intersect to shape the experiences of digital creative labor in China. This research contributes to digital labor studies and broader conversations on digital inequalities, labor protection, and the de-Westernization of media and communication scholarship. This dissertation asks: How do Chinese digital creators understand their labor, and how do they navigate their roles within tightly controlled and platformed industries? What challenges, opportunities, and risks emerge in their creative work under intersecting state power and market forces? My research draws on qualitative methodologies, including content analysis, online and offline observation, and ethnographic interviews with digital laborers, ranging from content creators and platform managers to employees of multi-channel networks (MCNs). Through immersive fieldwork, I aim to uncover the nuanced lived experiences of digital creators and the structural conditions shaping their work. Central to my dissertation is the concept of "state labor with governed creativity," which captures how Chinese digital creators--once imagined as independent cultural producers--are increasingly co-opted into state-led narratives of nation-building. The findings of my dissertation reveal that these creators operate within deeply asymmetrical power structures shaped by platform governance, algorithmic control, and expanding state oversight. Despite their visibility, they lack legal recognition, institutional support, and basic labor protections, leaving them highly susceptible to exploitation and censorship. In addition, the findings reveal four interrelated labor issues in Chinese DCCIs: creators' subjection to platform hegemony, their vulnerability to content takedowns and censorship, the lack of legal recognition, and the absence of collective support. These insights not only contribute to scholarship on digital inequality and creative labor but also offer practical implications for labor policy in the platform economy--an urgent and underdeveloped area.
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Details
- Title
- State labor, digital inequalities, and governed creativity
- Creators
- Qingyue Sun
- Contributors
- Brent Adam Luvaas (Advisor)
- Awarding Institution
- Drexel University
- Degree Awarded
- Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)
- Publisher
- Drexel University; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
- Number of pages
- 201 pages
- Resource Type
- Dissertation
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- College of Arts and Sciences; Communication, Culture, and Media; Communication; Drexel University
- Other Identifier
- 991022053038904721