Matthew Cole is a postdoctoral research fellow at Oxford University in the Oxford Internet Institute working on the Fairwork project. Fairwork is committed to highlighting best and worst practices in the emerging platform economy by evaluating platforms against global measures of fairness. Beyond the project, his academic interests are interdisciplinary, revolving around the political economy and sociology of work and technology. Recent research has involved themes such as the social shaping of the platform economy, trade union responses to digitalisation, the politics of inequality and policy development aimed at creating a more just society. Drawing on various disciplines, his approach to research is grounded in political economy, yet multi-level, using qualitative methods to link the micro to the macro. He is also an affiliate member of the Autonomy Institute, an independent, progressive think tank focused on work and its futures.
He has written for the Independent, Novara Media, Open Democracy, Social Europe,Tribune, the Verso Blog and Vice.
