Thinking food delivery platforms infrastructurally: The practices and politics of Baemin's infrastructuralisation in Seoul

Abstract

The proliferation of food delivery platforms is profoundly changing the way urbanites eat, work, and move. These platforms increasingly mobilise urban resources and population to function as critical infrastructure in the field of logistics and transportation, giving rise to a new form of governance. This paper traces the infrastructuralisation of Baemin, the largest South Korean food delivery platform. By engaging with critical infrastructure studies, it seeks to make the infrastructuring work of platforms more visible and political, revealing an opening for progressive disruption. Drawing on the empirical data from a mobile ethnography in Seoul, the paper claims that Baemin operationalises distinct sociotechnical arrangements that infrastructurally integrate the labour of couriers in its automated operations and generate ceaseless urban flows. Furthermore, it brings to the fore the significance of couriers' embodied practices in enabling and sustaining the contingent, hence precarious, operation of the convenient platform‐mediated food delivery that many take for granted.