In her new book, We Are Not Machines, Financial Times journalist Sarah O’Connor examines the collision of artificial intelligence, automation, and human labour, asking what the future of work might look like and who will shape its terms. The title comes from signs carried by striking Swedish miners in 1969: “Vi är ej maskiner” – “We are not machines.”
Historical Roots of Modern Threats
O’Connor argues that many threats AI poses to workers’ dignity and safety are reconfigurations of old battles. She highlights Frederick Winslow Taylor, the father of management consulting, whose “Taylorism” – breaking production into measurable systems – still dominates workplaces today. The real issue, she writes, is not new technology but the assumptions that accompany it, such as the interchangeability of human and machine contributions.
Inside an Amazon Warehouse
O’Connor visits the EMA4 Amazon Warehouse in Sutton Coldfield, where robots and humans work side by side picking and stowing items. Remote workers in Costa Rica and India monitor video feeds, auditing AI camera systems. They work nine-hour shifts, screening up to 8,000 videos a week. O’Connor questions whether this is progress, noting that “seemingly neutral technological tools can smuggle powerful ideas into a marketplace by the back door.”
Worker Resistance and Hope
The book highlights hopeful examples of workers taking action: the Writers Guild of America screenwriters striking to set terms on AI use in scripts, and Dutch care workers establishing their own practice to tailor care without strict time constraints. O’Connor concludes: “The goal might be to make machines in our image, but what I fear is that – perhaps without even quite noticing – we remake ourselves in theirs.” She emphasizes that the future of work is still something we have the power to shape.
