ABSTRACT

The digitisation of work poses global challenges but also offers new employment opportunities. This article explores the experiences of refugees and migrants who study at coding schools in Berlin to pursue digital careers. Attracted by the promise of coding as a fast lane to decent work, these newcomers hope to circumvent barriers of the local labour market, such as the need for local language skills and accredited qualifications. But many coding students realise that the fast lane they have entered is not so fast after all, and that it is scattered with obstacles and uncertainties. The ostensibly inclusive tech sector emerges as highly competitive and demands total commitment, passion, and a ‘culture fit’: alongside learning to code, they must learn to decode the behavioural and cultural specifics of an international tech sector. Coding thereby becomes a digital extension of the demands and expectations of national integration. As migrants and refugees hope that digital skills will lead to decent work, respectability, and middle-class status, they experience a contradiction between aspirations that are said to be universal, because anyone can in theory succeed as a coder, and recurring experiences of discrimination and precarity.

摘要

工作的数字化带来了全球性挑战，但也提供了新的就业机会。本文探讨了在柏林编码学校学习以追求数字职业的难民和移民的经历。被编码为体面工作的快速通道所吸引，这些新来者希望绕过当地劳动力市场的障碍，例如对当地语言技能和认可资格的需求。但是很多编程的学生意识到，他们进入的快车道毕竟并没有那么快，而且到处都是障碍和不确定性。表面上具有包容性的科技行业竞争激烈，需要全心投入、热情和“文化契合”：除了学习编码之外，他们还必须学会解读国际科技行业的行为和文化细节。因此，编码成为国家融合需求和期望的数字化延伸。由于移民和难民希望数字技能能够带来体面的工作、受人尊敬和中产阶级地位，他们遇到了一种矛盾，即所谓普遍的愿望，因为理论上任何人都可以成功成为一名编码员，而歧视的经历反复出现和不稳定。