Digital Capital’s Private Penalties and the Disembodying of the Underclass: A Constructivist Grounded Theory Study of Food Delivery Riders in Beijing

Abstract

This study examines private penalties imposed by digital platforms and stratification among platform laborers, focusing on how algorithms extract surplus value and reproduce digital proletarians. Drawing on Charmaz’s constructivist grounded theory, the study analyzes in-depth interviews with 63 food delivery riders in Beijing conducted between May and July 2026, supplemented by quantitative statistics and interpreted through a neo-Marxist economic anthropological framework of digital class analysis. Findings indicate that unauthorized monetary deductions constitute a predatory mechanism characteristic of digital capitalism. Combined with algorithmic violence, inadequate commercial insurance, gendered physical exploitation, and bodily depreciation, these penalties contribute to the institutional disembodiment of frontline workers. Failures in state regulatory oversight further enable the reproduction of digital proletarians, among whom emerging class consciousness is evident. Theoretically, the study identifies private penalties as a key micro-mechanism driving socioeconomic downward mobility and refines indicators for digital class stratification. Practically, it proposes three regulatory interventions: legal codification of platform fines, regular algorithmic auditing, and retrospective employer liability attribution. These recommendations support platform labor governance and contribute Chinese empirical evidence to digital-era class analysis.