The rapid development of artificial intelligence has not only brought advantages – it has also created new opportunities for mass surveillance, both in society at large and in the workplace.
Even today, unscrupulous employers use AI to monitor and map every second of their employees’ working day in real time – a development that former Social Democratic politician Kari Parman warns against and calls for decisive action to combat.
In an opinion piece in the Stampen-owned newspaper GP, he argues that AI-based surveillance of employees poses a threat to staff privacy and calls on the trade union movement to take action against this development.
Parman paints a bleak picture of how AI is used to monitor employees in Swedish workplaces, where technology analyzes everything from voices and facial expressions to productivity and movement patterns – often without the employees’ knowledge or consent.
“It’s a totalitarian control system – in capitalist packaging”, he writes, continuing:
“There is something deeply disturbing about the idea that algorithms will analyze our voices, our facial expressions, our productivity – second by second – while we work”.
“It’s about power and control”
According to Parman, there is a significant risk that people in digital capitalism will be reduced to mere data points, giving employers disproportionate power over their employees.
He sees AI surveillance as more than just a technical issue and warns that this development undermines the Swedish model, which is based on balance and respect between employers and employees.
“It’s about power. About control. About squeezing every last ounce of ‘efficiency’ out of people as if we were batteries”.
If trade unions fail to act, Parman believes, they risk becoming irrelevant in a working life where algorithms are taking over more and more of the decision-making.
To stop this trend, he lists several concrete demands. He wants to see a ban on AI-based individual surveillance in the workplace and urges unions to introduce conditions in collective agreements to review and approve new technology.
“Reduced to an algorithm’s margin of error”
He also calls for training for safety representatives and members, as well as political regulations from the state.
“No algorithm should have the right to analyze our performance, movements, or feelings”, he declares.
Parman emphasizes that AI surveillance not only threatens privacy but also creates a “psychological iron cage” where employees constantly feel watched, blurring the line between work and private life.
At the end of the article, the Social Democrat calls on the trade union movement to take responsibility and lead the resistance against the misuse of AI in the workplace.
He sees it as a crucial issue for the future of working life and human dignity at work.
“If we don’t stand up now, we will be alone when it is our turn to be reduced to an algorithm’s margin of error”, he concludes.
