Platform parasitism

Platform parasitism: co-constitution of regulatory and platform capitalism

Yosuke Uchiyama & Jamie Woodcock

Yosuke Uchiyama & Jamie Woodcock (16 Dec 2025): Platform parasitism: co-constitution of regulatory and platform capitalism, New Political Economy, DOI: 10.1080/13563467.2025.2601116

ABSTRACT

This study critically reconsiders the dominant portrayal of platform firms as external disruptors operating beyond the scope of institutional regulation. It introduces the concept of platform parasitism to capture the embedded and extractive relationship between platform capitalism and regulatory capitalism. Rather than bypassing regulation, platform firms strategically infiltrate and reconfigure state institutions to construct profit-oriented architectures. The framework theorises three interrelated mechanisms: the exploitation of institutional ambiguity, the co-construction of regulations, and the parasitic appropriation of institutional infrastructure. These dynamics are situated within a multi-layered regulatory context where platforms interact with and depend upon institutional structures for legitimacy, resources, and governance leverage. To explore the empirical applicability of this framework, the study investigates Malaysia’s ride-hailing and food delivery sectors through semi-structured interviews with 25 platform workers and five legal experts. The findings reveal how firms embed themselves within fragmented regulatory environments, not as passive rule-takers but as active co-constructors of governance, while avoiding employer responsibilities and public accountability. The study contributes a novel theorisation of digital labour regulation by showing that platform power stems not from regulatory absence but from strategic institutional embeddedness. The concept also advances understanding of capitalist governance by showing how platform and regulatory capitalism are co-constitutive.

Introduction

Platform capitalism has been the subject of extensive interest and research as one of the most prominent and radical forms of organisation in contemporary capitalism (Srnicek 2017, Haidar and Keune 2021). The rise of platforms has shifted the locus of coordination from asset ownership and hierarchical supervision to data-driven intermediation and algorithmic governance. Platform firms, often with limited asset ownership, therefore, represent a qualitative departure from ownership-based corporate governance. By centralising at the platform layer the rules of multi-sided matching, evaluative metrics and remuneration allocation, they reorganise the core functions of labour supervision, price formation and access provision (Pasquale 2016, Uchiyama et al. 2024). On the other hand, the emergence of these platforms has often been positioned outside neoliberalism as drivers of innovation, institutional disruptors or regulatory evaders, and spoken of as entities that transcend the state and regulation (Kost et al. 2020, Roy-Mukherjee and Harrison 2020).

However, this dominant understanding has faced a decisive challenge in recent years. Indeed, many platform firms do not exist outside the national regulatory and institutional environment but instead are increasingly strategically incorporated into and dependent on it. In areas such as labour, resources, and trade rulemaking, platform firms have been increasing their profits and control by cleverly parasitising the legal systems and infrastructure built and maintained by state and local authorities, and exploiting the resources and order they create. Accordingly, it is imperative to develop a new perspective that moves beyond the conventional view of platforms merely as entities evading regulatory oversight.

To characterise these dynamics, this study proposes the concept of platform parasitism. Here, ‘parasitism’ is employed analytically rather than normatively, denoting a pattern whereby platform firms become institutionally embedded and asymmetrically extract value from state-created resources, legal orders, and labour-management mechanisms. This concept reframes platform firms not merely as innovators or disruptors, but as entities whose business models are constructed upon existing regulatory structures. In addition, regulatory capitalism provides a comprehensive perspective for situating this lens. Regulation is treated not as an external constraint on capitalism, but as a constitutive infrastructure that shapes markets through legal categories, standards, and public institutions (Braithwaite 2005, Levi-Faur 2005, Levi-Faur and Jordana 2005). From this perspective, the central issue is not whether platform firms evade regulation, but rather how they actually utilise, co-create, and selectively internalise the regulatory infrastructure.

This study aims to bridge the persistent theoretical divide between academic fields that have often treated regulatory capitalism and platform capitalism as separate domains, despite platform labour occurring both online and offline (Srnicek 2017). In sectors such as ride-hailing, food delivery, microtasks, crowd work, and freelancing, platform firms do not merely evade regulation. They utilise state regulation, infrastructure, and labour management systems as the very foundations of their business models, extracting resources and shaping labour control. In essence, platforms do not evade regulation but embrace it, turning it into a resource for their survival.

This study empirically examines how platform parasitism generates patterns of inclusion and exclusion within regulatory systems, using Malaysia’s ride-hailing and food delivery sectors as case studies. The Malaysian capital region (Kuala Lumpur – Selangor) features coexisting federal and state multi-level governance, explicit ride-hailing/delivery regulations alongside fragile labour protections, strong linkages with public infrastructure, and high platform employment density. Therefore, this case provides a suitable analytical environment for observing institutional internalisation and asymmetric burden-sharing within a single jurisdiction.

By taking platforms in these countries as empirical targets and reconceptualising them not as disruptive factors external to the regulatory system but as parasitic elements within it, a new theoretical horizon opens for understanding how platforms and regulatory capitalism mutually constitute each other, and how platform power emerges from strategic institutional embedding.

Paradigm of platform economy

The rapid rise of platform firms such as Uber, Airbnb and TaskRabbit is not merely the emergence of a new type of business, but a new economic paradigm of the ‘platform economy’ that is reorganising the existing economic structure itself. Kenney and Zysman (2016) view the platform economy as a core organising principle of economic activity that replaces the manufacturing-oriented factory model and positions it as a socio-economic infrastructure that reconfigures the distribution structure of data, labour, assets and services. Acs et al. (2021) conceptualise the evolution of the platform economy since 1971 through three interrelated components – digital technological infrastructure, multisided platforms, and platform ecosystems – arguing that this transformation marks a shift from the ‘invisible hand’ of the market to the ‘visible hand’ of managerial coordination, and ultimately to the ‘digital hand’ of platform control.

Platforms are characterised by their algorithmic intermediary function and ability to monetise human and material resources, enabled by information and communication technologies, which allow companies to redefine their relationships with workers and consumers, transforming the very structure of economic activity (Kenney and Zysman 2016, Farrell and Greig 2016). Farrell and Greig (2016) point out that the platform economy increases income insecurity and simultaneously acts as a device to complement existing social security systems and labour market deficiencies through extra-institutional means. Schor et al. (2020) also view the platform economy as a ‘second economic sphere’ that relies on the formal employment system but develops on its periphery. Furthermore, Kenney and Zysman (2020) argue that the essence of the platform economy is not the creation of new business models, but rather the accumulation of profit by exploiting gaps in the existing system and leveraging institutional external structures.

In light of these discussions, previous studies have classified and discussed the structural characteristics of the platform economy into three main theoretical paradigms.

First, platforms are characterised by algorithmic and data-based labour market domination and function as devices that deepen information asymmetries and power imbalances (Srnicek 2017, Graham and Woodcock 2018). With the development of Information and Communications Technology (ICT), platforms transcend geographical constraints They mediate labour and form new structures of control that separate workers from traditional labour regulations and collective rights. Cohen (2017) states that these structures manifest themselves in the form of unilateral acquisition of data, opacity of terms of use and invisible labour assessment by algorithms, perpetuating asymmetrical relations with institutional coercion. Lehdonvirta et al. (2019) also show that reputation systems on platforms function institutionally as an alternative basis of trust to state and qualification systems, thereby creating new vulnerabilities and exclusions.

Second, arguments represented by Cohen (2017) and Stark and Pais (2021) see platforms not as extensions of existing market institutions, but as institutional devices that redesign the market itself through displacement and reconfiguration. Platform governance differs from traditional bureaucratic management and Taylorist labour management, moving towards a new inclusive rule based on algorithmically structured feedback loops (Kost et al. 2020, Uchiyama et al. 2022). Cutolo and Kenney (2021) introduce the concept of platform-dependent entrepreneurship to highlight the structural constraints faced by workers. They argue that rather than fostering autonomy, platform arrangements produce asymmetrical power relations that compel workers to accept platform-defined contracts and remuneration schemes.

Third, Kenney and Zysman (2016, 2020) view platforms from the perspective of extra-institutional intermediaries as arbitrageurs who strategically exploit regulatory ambiguity. This pattern involves platforms exploiting legal voids and institutional incompatibilities to expand, and then later legalise or adapt to the system ex post, portraying them as gainers beside the system rather than reconstituting system actors. Van Doorn and Badger (2020) point out that in this structure, platforms engage in ‘double value creation’. This implies that, beyond the monetised services provided by workers, there exists a structural mechanism through which unpaid data – such as behavioural patterns, user ratings, and geolocation – is extracted and subsequently capitalised as a source of value.

The commonality among all three paradigms is the tendency to position platforms ‘outside’ or ‘above’ institutions. Srnicek (2017) conceptualises platforms as neutral market intermediaries, Scholz (2017) views them as data-driven instruments of control, and Cutolo and Kenney (2021) depict them as infrastructures that reinforce the dependency of economic actors. However, these perspectives do not sufficiently address how platforms embed themselves within institutional structures and engage in co-constitutive relationships with existing institutional orders. In particular, there is a lack of theoretical perspectives on how, under regulatory capitalism, the institutional structure of the state and platform firms build interdependent relationships and redesign the conditions for profit accumulation inside the system. In response to this theoretical vacuum, this study aims to build on the recognition that platforms do not stand outside of institutions, but rather parasitically enter the intermediary sphere of institutions, partially absorbing and reconfiguring institutional resources and legitimacy, while avoiding responsibility for their structural characteristics. To advance this theoretical complement, it is essential to adopt a conjunctive perspective that bridges two key theoretical currents: platform capitalism, which offers a lens for analysing the control structures and value creation logics of platform firms; and regulatory capitalism, which provides a framework for rethinking the relationship between capital and the regulatory practices of institutional actors, including the state. The next section critically examines how these two theoretical approaches have each depicted the structure of the platform economy and presents the theoretical foundations that constitute platform parasitism as the junction between the two theoretical perspectives.

Platform capitalism

Platform capitalism represents a new regime of capital accumulation in post-industrial societies, harnessing digital technologies and networks to generate and extract value through the online mediation of labour and services (Srnicek 2017, Howson et al. 2022, Uchiyama et al. 2024).

The primitive accumulation discussed by Marx denoted the prehistorical process that laid the foundations of the capitalist mode of production, violently separating workers from the means of production through enclosure and land expropriation (Marx 2024). By contrast, platform capitalism extracts value by monopolising data and access and by privately governing connections through algorithms, rather than by concentrating physical assets (Langley and Leyshon 2017). Furthermore, whereas traditional industrial capitalism depended on ownership of the means of production and direct management of labour, in post-industrial societies surplus is extracted not through the expansion of industrial production, but through the expansion of mediation and computability (Block and Hirschhorn 1979). This allows platforms to be understood as an institutionally embedded mode of accumulation, parasitically integrated within the system rather than acting as external disruptors (Van Dijck et al. 2019, Kenney and Zysman 2020). This impact is particularly pronounced in the peer-to-peer transport sector, where the rapid proliferation of ride-hailing platforms such as Uber and Grab1 has substantially eroded the earnings of traditional taxi drivers (Vallas 2019). While these platforms create employment opportunities, they have also led to political and regulatory conflicts (Seidl 2022).

Developments in information technology and algorithms support these platform-based accumulation models, and their economic and social impact goes beyond mere efficiency gains to institutional structures. Platform firms act as intermediaries in the digital space, reducing physical costs from the service supply process, while building new markets through data-driven value creation (Langley and Leyshon 2017, Uchiyama et al. 2023). Platform capitalism reorganises the relationship between firms and workers, markets and norms, with algorithmic labour management and black-boxed value determination processes at its core (Srnicek 2017, Kenney and Zysman 2020, Woodcock 2021). Formally, workers have access to the means of production, but in reality, they are covered by an opaque structure of control called crowd-fleecing, an operational reality controlled by algorithms and networks (Scholz 2017). Supported by this phase, large platform firms such as Airbnb and Uber are moving towards monopolisation while increasing the supply of labour, leading to low levels of work and widening inequality in the name of efficiency (Pasquale 2016, Schor and Attwood-Charles 2017).

In the restructuring of labour, platform labour provides nominal flexibility and autonomy, while in practice, the reward and evaluation systems impose instability and high risk on workers (Haidar and Keune 2021, Uchiyama et al. 2022). Although such performance-linked flexibility means variable labour costs and labour procurement mobility for companies, unpredictable working conditions and disenfranchisement structures for workers (Ravenelle 2019, Vallas 2019). These structures are systematically reinforced by the fact that platform firms often classify workers as independent contractors and exclude them from labour and employment law protections (Cherry and Aloisi 2016). Platform firms avoid employer liability by placing themselves in the institutional middle ground, where there is inconsistency in the regulatory system (Roy-Mukherjee and Harrison 2020).

In parallel to this institutional exclusion of workers, platform firms control and queue labour through data collection and algorithmic evaluation. They build a structure that fuels internal competition while controlling the quality of the platform through quantitative visibility of service providers’ performance (Van Doorn and Badger 2020). This structure represents a novel form of labour governance that presents itself as a technically neutral market mechanism, while in practice consolidating control in the hands of the platform, which monopolises the authority to define performance metrics (Van Dijck et al. 2019).

Against this background, Uchiyama et al. (2024) present a two-layered framework in the domination structure of platform capitalism. The first layer is the strategic construction of platform firms’ relationships with investors and consumers to concentrate capital and dominate the market, while the second layer systematically and technically excludes and divides workers through algorithmic control and contractual ambiguity (Uchiyama et al. 2024). Within this structure, the absence of regulation does not equate to lawlessness; rather, it reflects corporate strategies that actively reshape labour management power relations by strategically leveraging existing institutional frameworks dominated by investors or consumers (Rahman and Thelen 2019, Leonardi and Pirina 2020, Cutolo and Kenney 2021).

Furthermore, the expansion of institutional flexibility has created a surplus population, leading to increased competition and a disconnect in skills accumulation (Zanoni and Pitts 2022). Under this structure, platform firms facilitate access to a fluid and disposable labour pool and recycle big data from displaced workers to improve the quality of their services (Uchiyama et al. 2024). However, the individualising and competitive mechanisms inherent in platform capitalism make it difficult to form solidarity among workers (Woodcock and Graham 2020, Chan 2023, Uchiyama and Furuoka 2025). They demonstrate how the institutional design of such companies structurally undermines the foundations of collective action by internalising competitive logic through the classification of workers as entrepreneurs or self-employed (Todolí-Signes 2017, Edward 2020). Under the balance-of-power asymmetry between platforms and workers, the platforms’ side reconfigures the relationship between domination and subordination, while parasitising and connecting inside the capitalist institutional order by cleverly exploiting institutional and normative ambiguities.

Regulatory capitalism

Since the 1980s, regulatory capitalism has emerged as a conceptual lens to capture the structural transformation of state – market relations under advanced capitalism. Unlike neoliberal narratives centred on deregulation and privatisation, regulatory capitalism highlights the paradoxical expansion and increasing sophistication of regulatory mechanisms that actively constitute the capitalist order (Braithwaite 2005, Levi-Faur 2005, 2017). In this framework, regulation does not simply correct market failures but plays a foundational role in shaping capitalism’s institutional architecture (Levi-Faur 2011).

Levi-Faur (2017) contends that regulatory capitalism represents more than an extension of the regulatory state. It marks a systemic shift in which liberalisation and regulation advance simultaneously (Levi-Faur 2006a). This regime is defined by a decentralised and pluralistic regulatory landscape, involving the state, private actors, NGOs, international organisations, and professional networks (Levi-Faur and Jordana 2005, Levi-Faur 2009). Regulation now operates through a diverse set of tools, including soft law, algorithmic governance, contracts, self-regulation, third-party audits, and industry certification (Scott 2015, Schmidt and Scott 2021). The result is a move away from hierarchical state command to more dispersed, technocratic modes of governance (Braithwaite 2005).

A key contribution of Levi-Faur (2017) is his distinction between the regulation of capitalism and the regulation for capitalism. The former refers to interventions designed to mitigate capitalism’s externalities – such as labour protections, environmental standards, and competition law (Levi-Faur 2006b). The latter, more fundamental in nature, constructs the very institutional conditions that render markets possible, such as frameworks for contracts, corporate personhood, intellectual property rights, and financial instruments (Levi-Faur 2017). This perspective dismantles the fiction of autonomous markets by revealing their reliance on state-crafted legal and institutional foundations (Levi-Faur 2011). In this context, the state is not merely a market intervenor but acts as a designer of institutional frameworks. Regulatory capitalism is premised on a new division of labour: the state is tasked with institutional design and oversight, while private actors undertake innovation and service delivery (Levi-Faur and Jordana 2005). Civil society also plays a role within this governance arrangement, forming a multi-level and coordinated regulatory system in which state, market, and non-state actors interact and co-produce regulatory outcomes (Levi-Faur 2009).

Levi-Faur (2005) identifies five institutional shifts underpinning regulatory capitalism: (1) a reallocation of regulatory authority between the state and society; (2) the proliferation of independent regulatory agencies; (3) the adoption of advanced regulatory techniques, such as smart auditing and meta-regulation; (4) the formalisation of national and transnational regulatory frameworks; and (5) the growing influence of epistemic communities and professional networks (Windsor and Warming-Rasmussen 2009). These shifts are not imposed solely from above. Rather, they emerge through dynamic, recursive interactions among states, industries, and civil society (Parker and Nielsen 2009) and spread through processes of institutional diffusion and imitation mediated by expert knowledge (Jordana and Levi-Faur 2005).

Unlike the laissez-faire capitalism of the nineteenth century or the welfare capitalism of the 20th, regulatory capitalism represents a distinct regime in which state-led institutional design and market-based governance are interdependent (Levi-Faur 2009). The contemporary state remains central to this hybrid governance, not by direct control, but through infrastructure, coordination, and legitimacy-building (Levi-Faur 2006b). This transformation is evident in areas such as labour regulation, environmental governance, and digital oversight, where institutional complexity has become a feature of capitalist legitimacy (Braithwaite 2005, Levi-Faur 2005). Importantly, regulatory capitalism cannot be reduced to a variant of neoliberalism. Although it shares neoliberalism’s preference for markets and non-state actors, it integrates these within formalised and institutionalised regulatory systems (Levi-Faur 2006b). Based on EU cybersecurity policy, Farrand and Carrapico (2018) introduce the concept of Networked Regulatory Capitalism, where public authorities, private entities, and independent regulators jointly engage in institutional steering and design. This model departs from the conventional metaphor of state steering and private rowing, suggesting instead a decentralised process of co-governance and hybrid institutional formation (Farrand and Carrapico 2018).

Empirical research reinforces this theoretical framework. Studies on UK healthcare reform (Wright and Head 2009), psychotropic drug regulation (Seddon 2014), international food safety governance (Yasuda and Ansell 2015), and cybersecurity (Farrand and Carrapico 2018) show how regulatory capitalism functions through a variety of sector-specific arrangements and institutional logics, while retaining common structural features of pluralistic governance and institutionalised coordination.

As a theoretical framework, regulatory capitalism advances beyond the concepts of the regulatory state or regulatory governance by focusing not merely on institutions but on the capitalist system itself (Levi-Faur 2017). It compels attention to multi-scalar power dynamics, epistemic networks, and horizontal linkages that shape institutional construction and diffusion (Jordana and Levi-Faur 2005). At the same time, it demands critical inquiry into the complex interplay between state authority, market mechanisms, and expert knowledge in producing governance outcomes (Parker and Nielsen 2009, Scott 2015). Yet, this very institutional complexity has opened up spaces for exploitation. Platform capitalism has particularly capitalised on the fragmented and pluralised nature of regulatory capitalism. By creating quasi-autonomous institutional arrangements, platform firms operate within legal grey zones – evading responsibility while gaining normative legitimacy (Srnicek 2017, Cutolo and Kenney 2021). This highlights the urgency of rethinking regulatory capacity in the digital era, where the terrain of capitalism itself is being reconstituted through emerging regimes of infrastructural and algorithmic control (Levi-Faur 2017, Srnicek 2017).

Platform parasitism

As demonstrated in prior research, contemporary scholarship on the platform economy has largely converged around three core theoretical paradigms. Namely, platforms as algorithmic labour intermediaries (Srnicek 2017, Graham and Woodcock 2018), platforms as institutional disruptors that redefine market governance (Cohen 2017, Cutolo and Kenney 2021), and platforms as arbitrageurs exploiting regulatory ambiguity (Kenney and Zysman 2020, Van Doorn and Badger 2020). These paradigms have revealed mechanisms of value extraction and control in platform capitalism, but generally describe platforms as operating outside or above the institutional framework. Specifically, they are often seen as neutral market facilitators (Srnicek 2017), instruments of algorithmic domination (Scholz 2017) or extra-institutional actors that exploit legal voids (Kenney and Zysman 2016). However, this popular discourse ignores an empirical reality that is becoming increasingly evident. Platform firms do not merely bypass institutional systems but embed themselves within them.

Rather than existing in a regulatory vacuum, they are actively involved in the co-construction, reinterpretation and selective absorption of regulatory mechanisms (Uchiyama et al. 2024). This is a dynamic that has become increasingly evident in public contestations and shifting narratives around digital infrastructure governance (Mills 2021). Thus, platform firms function as internal reconstructors of the institutional order rather than external disruptors. Despite the burgeoning research on platform and regulatory capitalism, the interrelationships between these regimes and the structural logics that link them have not been adequately theorised.

To fill this gap, this study introduces the concept of ‘platform parasitism’ to capture the emerging institutional conditions under which platform firms consolidate their power by operating within the state’s regulatory structures. Srnicek’s (2017) conception of platforms as data-driven infrastructures and Levi-Faur’s (2005) formulation of regulatory capitalism as a pluralistic, multi-actor system provide the theoretical foundation for this study.

Drawing on these perspectives, the concept of platform parasitism theorises how platform firms do not reject institutional order but instead rely on it, appropriate it, and reconfigure it to maximise profit. In this concept, platform firms are not regulatory evaders, but re-interpreters and resource exploiters of institutions that position themselves at the heart of regulatory capitalism. They absorb institutional legitimacy, participate in the rule-setting process and entrench themselves in the public infrastructure while avoiding direct accountability.

Within this concept, the term ‘parasitism’ is analytical rather than normative, serving as a construct to describe institutional mechanisms. As Serres (1982) demonstrates, parasitism denotes a relationship concerning order formation through asymmetric appropriation and noise (externalities) (Serres 1982). Here, it refers to the process whereby platforms depend on public infrastructure and regulatory resources while selectively internalising them, simultaneously externalising burdens such as employment and compensation (Bailey et al. 2023, Gurrieri et al. 2023). The scope of this term lies in its ability to capture the dynamics of reconfiguration from within the system, distinct from rent-seeking focused on capture of distribution or regulatory arbitrage at the institutional periphery (Levi-Faur 2005, Rahman and Thelen 2019). As existing terminology alone cannot fully capture the dual movement of institutional co-constitution and simultaneous internalisation/externalisation, this study defines ‘parasitism’ as an operational analytical concept for grasping value acquisition within institutions. Operationally, this parasitic logic can be explained in three main aspects.

First, platform parasitism assumes a strategic rationality that actively exploits institutional ambiguity. For instance, by blurring the definition of the employment relationship and classifying workers as independent operators (or treating them as such), it avoids the obligations of an employer, while in effect maintaining a high level of command and control through algorithms. This imprecision in classification is not merely the result of a legal vacuum but reflects the discretionary space afforded to companies within regulatory capitalism. At the same time, it is an institutional product of that very system (Schmidt and Scott 2021).

Second, platform firms act as actors involved in the construction and operation of the regulatory system. For example, they reposition themselves from ‘the regulated’ to ‘co-designers of regulation’ through the development of self-regulatory guidelines, the establishment of industry associations and the interpretation of transparency accountability measures for algorithm operations. In this process, platform firms act as institutional players to build institutional frameworks consistent with their own commercial interests and develop co-constitutive relationships with states and other regulatory bodies (Parker and Nielsen 2009). This trend resembles what Langley and Leyshon (2021) call ‘re-intermediation’ in the fintech sector – where platforms strategically reinsert themselves into institutional and regulatory channels to consolidate control (Langley and Leyshon 2021).

Furthermore, platform firms legitimise a certain raison d’etre in the process by shielding the main players who support them, such as investors, venture capitalists and consumers, as a precondition for commercialisation (Uchiyama et al. 2024). This represents a new regulatory dynamic that goes beyond the traditional normative dichotomy of state versus firm.

Third, platform parasitism encompasses structures that are parasitic on existing institutional infrastructure (i.e. public services, transport networks, financial systems, social security systems, etc.). As an example, food delivery apps become entrenched in the legal framework of transport policy as a means of complementing and replacing the public licensing system while utilising it, thereby internalising it in a doubled form in the public system. Furthermore, they create their own limited support schemes and promote them as a kind of support as an alternative to the workers’ compensation and social insurance systems, while adding pressure that makes access to the public system structurally more difficult. In this process, platforms do not operate as deviators from the system but function as mechanisms that partially internalise and absorb its logic, while simultaneously distorting and ultimately redefining its meaning (Figure 1).

As outlined above, platform parasitism is rooted in the dynamics of institutional internalisation and diversion, which conventional platform studies have often overlooked. It illustrates how platform firms reinforce their own operational logic within existing systems, while maintaining and expanding asymmetrical power relations built upon institutional capital. This concept theorises a paradoxical situation in which the fragmentation and ambiguity of institutions themselves are a resource for platforms, regardless of the measure of state weakness. Platform parasitism, therefore, is not merely a description of a new structure of domination that operates not in opposition to institutions, but through their combination, dependence, and reconfiguration. It also serves as a bridging theory that connects the logics of platform capitalism and regulatory capitalism.

Methodology

Through the conceptual framework of platform parasitism, this study elucidates how platform firms depend on the state and institutions and reconfigure their structures to gain a dominant position. This theory sees platform firms not merely as agents of technological innovation and institutional disturbance, but as entities that are strategically incorporated into and reconfigure existing institutional resources and regulatory orders.

To investigate the validity and explanatory power of this theoretical proposition, this study adopts a qualitative multi-method research design (Teddlie et al. 2010). Firstly, this study conducted a qualitative case study and used the ride-hailing and food delivery industry in central Malaysia (i.e. Kuala Lumpur and Selangor) as a case study location. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with 25 platform workers in Malaysia (16 ride-hailing, 9 food delivery), conducted between 2023 and 2024. Participants primarily used Grab/GrabFood and Foodpanda. Grab is a regional super-app integrating ride-hailing, food delivery and financial services, and is widely regarded as the leading ride-hailing provider in Malaysia. Foodpanda is the Asian arm of Delivery Hero and, together with GrabFood, constitutes one of the two principal food-delivery services in the country (Furuoka et al. 2022). Both platforms connect to the institutional interfaces central to the analysis of platform parasitism, including registration and identity verification, driver qualifications and vehicle permits, and, where applicable, taxation, information-reporting routines and local regulatory schemes.

In April 2025, the study also interviewed five Malaysian legal experts specialising in the platform economy, employment and labour law, transport law and the regulation of gig work, bringing the total sample to 30 participants.

When conducting interviews, the study took full account of the fact that platform workers’ time is directly linked to their income. Interviews were limited to 15–30 min per person and were scheduled during breaks or after work to avoid disrupting participants’ employment. Alternatively, some interviews with ride-hailing drivers were conducted during their journeys for their convenience. Additionally, participants received an honorarium of 10 Malaysian Ringgit (approximately USD2) or an equivalent tip within the app. This ensured participants incurred no financial or time-related disadvantage. All participants were informed in advance of the interview duration and purpose, and consent was obtained prior to conducting the interviews. These measures ensured an ethically fair and sustainable research environment that respected workers’ daily rhythms and income structures.

The interviews with gig workers were designed in terms of the mode of construction of labour relations, contact with legislation and regulation, their relationship with the platform and the reality of institutional exclusion and protection. Targeted gig workers were selected based on the following eligibility criteria: a minimum age of 18 years; active engagement with the platform at the time of interview; successful completion of mandatory training modules as either a driver or rider; and the ability to participate in interviews conducted in English or Malay. On the other hand, the questions to the legal experts were structured around the legal status of gig workers in the current legal system, the limits of application of labour regulations, the legal responsiveness to algorithmic management and the institutional position of the right to collective bargaining. Secondly, the study also collected data, including legal documents and legal cases, to identify loopholes in the institutional regulation that the platforms parasitise on a more detailed scale.

The data collected were analysed using the framework analysis. This analysis method is particularly suitable for combining structured comparison and theoretical extraction (Ritchie and Spencer 2002, Ritchie et al. 2003). This study leveraged the flexibility of the framework approach, which allows for structured analysis based on existing theory while remaining open to emergent insights, thereby ensuring analytical transparency and rigour. The specific analytical procedure involved first gaining an overview of the data as a whole through a perusal of the interview transcripts and identifying the main themes. Next, based on the components of platform parasitism, three axes of analysis were set up to code the statements: utilisation of institutional ambiguity, involvement in institutional design and integration into the institutional infrastructure. The coded data were subsequently converted into a matrix to provide a bird’s-eye view of the degree of institutional connectivity and differences. Finally, the structure and meaning of the institutional relationships exhibited by each case were theoretically interpreted (Rabiee 2004).

By adopting this analytical approach, the study provides a perspective from which to reconsider the traditional argument that the institutional behaviour of platform firms has consistently been described as outside the system (de-institutionalisation). In other words, it empirically substantiates the theoretical claim that platform firms do not merely operate outside institutional frameworks, but rather exploit the plasticity, fragmentation, and multi-layered nature of regulatory capitalism as a resource. Drawing on insights from both workers (micro) and regulatory experts (macro), the study demonstrates how platforms reinforce their control structures by parasitically embedding themselves within the system.

Findings

To examine how the concept of platform parasitism manifests itself in practice, this study collected multi-qualitative evidence of interview data and legal documents from 25 Malaysian car-delivery and food delivery gig workers (Table 1) and a total of five experts in the Malaysian gig economy, employment law and transport law. To protect participant anonymity, all respondents are anonymised and cited using coded labels: ride-hailing drivers (R-k), food-delivery riders (F-k), and expert interviewees (E-k), with k matching the respondent numbers in Table 1. The experts are: E-1, university lecturer in employment and labour law; E-2, university professor in employment and labour law; E-3, university professor and practising lawyer in corporate and transport law; E-4, university lecturer and lawyer in employment and labour law; and E-5, university professor specialising in the gig and platform economy. The results show that the data in and around the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, show consistent institutional patterns in which platform firms do not circumvent the state but rather consolidate their power by embedding themselves in fragmented regulatory structures. These patterns are analysed within the framework of the three elements of platform parasitism: (1) exploitation of institutional ambiguity, (2) involvement in institutional design and (3) integration into the institutional infrastructure.

Table 1. Demographics of respondents.

Type of platform work ID State Gender/Age Working period Working hours Employment type

Ride-Hailing R-1 Selangor Female/30 2 years 4 h Part time

R-2 Selangor Male/39 3 years 11:30 h Full-Time

R-3 Kuala Lumpur Male/24 3 years 9 h Part-time

R-4 Kuala Lumpur Male/41 3 years 12 h Full-Time

R-5 Kuala Lumpur Male/42 5 years 8 h Full-time

R-6 Kuala Lumpur Male/57 2 years 10 h Full-time

R-7 Kuala Lumpur Male/58 1 year 6 h Full-time

R-8 Selangor Male/60 4 years 3 h Part-time

R-9 Kuala Lumpur Male/60 5 years 6 h Part-time

R-10 Kuala Lumpur Male/22 1 year 6 h Part-time

R-11 Selangor Male/22 2 years 4 h Part-time

R-12 Kuala Lumpur Male/26 4.4 years 7:30 h Full-time

R-13 Kuala Lumpur Male/30 2 years 5 h Part-time

R-14 Kuala Lumpur Male/41 3 years 12:30 h Full-time

R-15 Kuala Lumpur Male 32 1 month 5 h Part-time

R-16 Kuala Lumpur Male 34 3 years 12 h Full-time

Food Delivery F-1 Kuala Lumpur Female/28 1 year 4 h Part time

F-2 Kuala Lumpur Male/38 3 years 2 h Part time

F-3 Kuala Lumpur Male/25 2 years 8 h Full time

F-4 Selangor Male/26 2 years 12 h Full-time

F-5 Kuala Lumpur Male/23 4 months 5 h Part-time

F-6 Kuala Lumpur Male/23 4 years 4 h Part-time

F-7 Selangor Male/21 1 year 14 h Part-time

F-8 Kuala Lumpur Male/27 2 years 8 h Full-time

F-9 Selangor Male/23 3 years 10 h Full-time

Regarding gender composition, the proportion of female participants in this study was relatively low. This aligns with trends observed in prior research, given that the occupation in question is a labour market segment with a high proportion of male workers (Churchill 2025, Micha et al. 2022). R-1 suggested that religious and cultural norms in Malaysia may influence women’s participation in employment as drivers. However, these are exploratory findings from the Malaysian context, and caution is required regarding generalisation. This study included both full-time and part-time platform workers, yet no significant institutional or regulatory differences were observed between the two groups. However, full-time workers who primarily relied on platform income exhibited a higher degree of dependence on algorithmic management and were more strongly affected by fluctuations in demand and rating scores. Conversely, part-time workers, who often use platforms as a source of supplementary income, were relatively passive in the face of institutional exclusion. This suggests that workers’ precarity and exposure to control are determined less by employment classification than by the degree of dependence on the platform.

Exploitation of institutional ambiguity: redefining the employment relationship

Most gig workers interviewed identified themselves as independent contractors, and some chose this job for its schedule flexibility and freedom from subordination to their bosses. However, in reality, they operate in a contradictory position – nominally independent yet effectively subordinated to algorithmic control and performance evaluation systems. While some drivers work under this contradiction without concern, many workers are sceptical about their actual employment relationship with the platform. R-2 states that ‘there are almost no clear employment contracts or agreements, and we are just told to call ourselves independent contractors’. This implies that the opacity of the contractual structure functions to avoid employer liability. According to R-1, the actual contract exists not in paper form but within the app, allowing the platform to unilaterally modify its terms – thus rendering the platform’s asymmetrical control visible. F-2 stated that the status is that of an independent contractor, but that his work opportunities are structured in such a way that they are reduced according to the app’s rating. Riders are forced into a subordinate work pattern, even though there is essentially no explicit employment contract with the platform and labour flexibility should be guaranteed. F- 7 highlighted that all insurance and social security is self-funded and that they are not held responsible for anything that happens to them on the app, putting them in a position of institutional exclusion.

This ambiguity is institutionally preserved by the labour law system itself in Malaysia. The Employment Act 1955 (as amended in 2022) extends labour protections exclusively to those classified as ‘employees’; those designated as ‘independent contractors’ are consequently excluded from statutory entitlements such as the Minimum Wages Order 2022 and the Employees’ Social Security Act 1969 (SOCSO). Platform workers are not recognised as workers under employment law and are excluded from the protection of the Employment Provident Fund (EPF) and SOCSO under the legal status of ‘service contracts’ (E-4). Furthermore, E-5 clearly states that the boundary between the legal protection of independent contractor gig workers and employees is ‘legally invisible’, emphasising that the state legal framework functions in affinity with the profit structures of platform firms. This institutional ambiguity creates a dual structure in which gig workers are excluded from employment law protection but are forced to integrate to a certain extent at the periphery of the system. This structure is emblematic of the strategic behaviour of platform firms seeking to secure institutional legitimacy while avoiding legal obligations.

Involvement in institutional design: co-constitution of regulations and construction of self-serving rules

For ride-hailing drivers, the lack of transparency and unilateral governance issues were highlighted, as the platform’s remuneration structure is often opaque and unstable. R-7 stated that ‘Grab’s remuneration system changes abruptly and only they know the rules’. Furthermore, R-2 stated that ‘Grab takes a 20 per cent commission, but the basis or breakdown of this deduction is never disclosed’, highlighting how unilateral rulemaking and a lack of accountability contribute to institutional asymmetry. In response to these algorithmic controls, drivers address real-time information asymmetries through informal exchanges on Facebook and WhatsApp groups.

On the other hand, the unilateral involvement of companies in the design of the system is more evident among food delivery riders. F-1 explained that ‘the platform often changes how earnings are calculated – sometimes new rules are suddenly announced, and other times they change without any prior notice’. This highlights the unilateral and opaque nature of the platform’s reward management. F-3 similarly observed that their earnings had decreased regardless of delivery distance or the number of orders completed, suggesting that the payment system lacks both consistency and transparency. These accounts reveal how unpredictable and opaque pay structures leave workers in a precarious, disempowered position. Platform firms have batch rewards and peak incentives based on the number of deliveries, but the criteria and changes are kept private by the companies and are difficult for workers to grasp.

The allocation of dispatches/deliveries and the management of account ratings also rely on algorithms. Drivers are less likely to get work if their account rating drops, but they are not told the specific reason for the drop in rating (F-4). This reveals the existenceof mechanisms by which companies limit work opportunities based on their own rating indicators. These black-boxed governance structures severely restrict workers’ discretion, especially in platform work, where order routing and efficiency are critical.

Involvement in institutional design is also observed at the national level. The Malaysian government’s involvement in the institutional design of gig worker protection – through the establishment of SEGiM (Suruhanjaya Ekonomi Gig Malaysia) and the introduction of the 2021 social security scheme, PenjanaGig – is premised on the continued classification of gig workers as independent contractors. E-1 and E-2 criticised that these schemes remain based on the assumption that gig workers are considered independent contractors, and that being bound by this employer classification has not led to substantial worker protection. Governments place too much trust in the institution-building capacity of companies, which has led to company-led rather than co-constitutive policy formation (E-4).

Furthermore, platform firms have developed their own algorithm transparency guidelines and safety standards codes, which are formally self-regulatory but in effect occupy institutional space as quasi-public norms. The government not only tacitly endorses these company-led norms but also participates in institutional co-construction as a policy partner, structuring an asymmetrical collaborative relationship in institutional design.

Integration into institutional infrastructures: selective absorption of public resources and reconfiguration of meaning

This study identified that Malaysian platform firms, including Grab and Foodpanda, are partially integrated into national infrastructure such as tax systems, national ID systems, and transport policies. This section specifies what is internalised from the system and what is retained externally (externalised) along three main interfaces: licensing of status and qualifications, taxation and information reporting, and urban mobility and public services.

Firstly, with respect to identity, qualifications and licensing, R-3 and F-3 note that although institutional touchpoints exist, social security remains self-funded. According to F-5, registration with Grab requires Malaysian citizenship and the registration of a national identity card, while onboarding as a GrabFood rider necessitates the submission of a health certificate. In effect, compliance with national ID and Public Service Vehicle (PSV) requirements functions as a gate for account activation, eligibility for dispatch and the scope of operations. Unilateral revisions to the app’s terms of service, linked to public certification, internalise legitimacy and access from the system. Conversely, compensation and social insurance for drivers remain externalised. This structure demonstrates the simultaneous pursuit of access and legitimacy acquisition alongside the avoidance of employer responsibilities.

Secondly, regarding taxation and information reporting, R-3 and F-3 state that taxes are deducted, but medical insurance and pensions are self-funded. By contrast, while the public functions of taxation and reporting are internalised, employer-side contributions to social insurance and compensation are not, revealing a dual structure (E-5). Specifically, income data flows from the app to detailed statements and tax processing, yet insurance and pension burdens are retained outside the platform.

Thirdly, in urban mobility and public services, as E-3 indicates, the platform is publicly positioned as a complementary actor within the broader transport infrastructure. This is achieved through technical collaboration with the Road Transport Department, an integrated framework for urban transport policy, and a municipality-led system for registering delivery personnel. Conversely, F-8 reports the absence of compensation in the event of accidents, leaving safety and compensation-related costs externalised to the firms. Here too, the internalisation of preferential access to public infrastructure is paired with the externalisation of risks and costs. This cannot be reduced to the general externalisation of corporate risk.

Its specificity as an institutional strategy for platform parasitism lies in selectively internalising access and legitimacy at the entry points of state infrastructure, such as public certification, identification, taxation, and transport operations, while externalising employer responsibilities like social insurance and compensation. These three layers, exploiting institutional ambiguities, engaging in institutional design, and selectively integrating into institutional infrastructure, reflect the characteristics of platform labour and the regulatory environment in Malaysia. They provide an empirical and theoretical foundation for understanding the co-constructive power relations between the state and platforms.

Discussion and conclusion

This study offers a critical reappraisal of the prevailing view that platform firms operate as regulation-evading entities situated outside institutional frameworks. It demonstrates that these firms are structurally dependent on the normative order, resources, and legitimacy produced by the state. Rather than bypassing institutions, they strategically reconfigure these elements to construct and maintain their profit-making architectures. Under this structure, the study names the mode of existence of platform firms as platform parasitism and explicitly theorises their intrinsic relationship with institutions, which conventional theories have failed to capture.

Traditional platform economic theory has converged on three main theoretical currents: algorithmic structures of labour domination (Srnicek 2017, Graham and Woodcock 2018), institutional redesign of market structures through platforms (Cohen 2017, Cutolo and Kenney 2021), and the strategic use of legal voids and institutional ambiguity (Kenney and Zysman 2020, Van Doorn and Badger 2020). Each of these debates has focused on the mediating, institutionally disturbing or arbitrarily mobile nature of platforms, many of which have positioned platform firms outside of institutions and as deviant from state governance. However, in practice, platform firms do not operate within a regulatory vacuum; rather, they are deeply embedded within institutional structures. They actively exploit the plasticity and fragmentation of these systems, participating in their co-constitution and strategic reordering.

In addition, to examine the theoretical applicability of platform parasitism, this study draws on semi-structured interviews conducted with gig workers in Malaysia’s ride-hailing and food delivery sectors, as well as with legal and regulatory experts specialising in the Malaysian gig economy. The empirical analysis follows a structural pattern in which platform firms partially combine with the legal system and infrastructure, but avoid burdens such as employment liability, compensation obligations and governance responsibilities.

Although workers are formally classified as independent contractors, in practice, they are subject to labour relations structured by algorithmic control over task allocation and remuneration. Platform firms unilaterally define pay structures and evaluation criteria, positioning themselves as de facto participants in institutional design by aligning these mechanisms with public regulatory frameworks. At the same time, firms integrate selectively into state systems, such as taxation and national identification, while deliberately circumventing obligations related to social insurance and compensation schemes.

This process, whereby platform firms absorb and reconfigure selected elements of institutional frameworks to establish asymmetrical relations of control, resonates with the notion of platform-dependent entrepreneurship (Cutolo and Kenney 2021)and the concept of dual appropriation of institutional capital (Van Doorn and Badger 2020). However, it extends beyond these accounts by offering a more integrated and comprehensive theoretical synthesis.

Theoretically, this study bridges the structures of domination characteristic of the digital realm, as theorised under platform capitalism (Srnicek 2017), with the co-constitutive institutional dynamics articulated by regulatory capitalism (Levi-Faur 2005, 2017), by examining the strategic role played by platform firms at their intersection. In this context, platform parasitism refers to a mode of institutional embeddedness through which actors reorganise governance structures into profit-generating architectures by redefining the meaning and boundaries of institutions from within, rather than operating from outside them. It thus serves as a novel conceptual framework for theorising the transformation of institutional order under contemporary capitalism.

Empirically, this study demonstrates that platform parasitism is not a uniform model of domination, but rather a structurally adaptive strategy that varies according to the form of labour and the degree of institutional embeddedness. This becomes evident through a comparative analysis of distinct labour models characterised by differing levels of institutional integration. In crowdwork, for example, the non-partisan nature of transnational payment infrastructures and digital platforms allows revenue structures to be established through disconnection from institutions. On the other hand, in on-demand app labour, through institutional junctions with urban transport policies and public services, firms transform their operations and definitions while partially internalising them in the system. In this respect, the study offers a distinct perspective from Kenney and Zysman’s (2020) characterisation of platforms as extra-institutional intermediaries. Rather than operating from outside the system, platform firms are shown to penetrate the institutional core and participate in the internal reconfiguration of the institutional order.

In conclusion, platform parasitism is retheorising the forms of domination in the platform economy from the perspective of reordering through regulatory reconfiguration. This parasitic logic reinforces asymmetrical power relations and institutional dependence, while closing off the possibility of democratic alternatives and collective worker agency (Masikane and Webster 2025). Rather than viewing domination as chaos resulting from the absence of regulation, this concept reinterprets the structure of domination from the perspective of reorganisation through the restructuring of existing institutions. By focusing on the processes of co-dependence with institutions and internal restructuring, this framework transcends the traditional regulatory avoidance model, overcoming the static constraints of institutions and providing a theoretical perspective that views institutions as reconfigurable governance resources. This framework clarifies how platform firms selectively internalise state institutions and redefine their meaning and functions in the areas of labour law, urban transport, regulatory design, and institutional political economy. Institutions are no longer external constraints on companies but rather variable instruments of control that can be strategically absorbed and repurposed.

However, this study is grounded in a single case study of Malaysia, and how parasitic structures vary across institutional contexts and platform types remain important avenues for future comparative research. Furthermore, this study observes an imbalanced gender composition in the sample, suggesting that occupational segregation in the labour market and religious or cultural norms may be implicated. Future research should comparatively examine how gender mediates the mechanisms of platform dependence and institutional internalisation. Going forward, it will be necessary to apply this theory to other countries and industries to empirically elucidate the evolution of new institutional structures created by the mutual reconfiguration of platforms and state institutions.

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Figure 1. Platform parasitism.

Source: Authors.