Algorithmic matching: a new institution of exchange

The Economic Governance session welcomes Melchior Simioni and Philippe Steiner, who will give a presentation entitled :

Algorithmic matching: a new institution of exchange.

Melchior Simioni is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Strasbourg and a researcher at the SAGE laboratory, and Philippe Steiner is Emeritus Professor of Sociology at Sorbonne University.

The session will take place on 4 October from 10am to 12pm, both face-to-face at Sciences Po, on the Saint-Thomas campus, in room K008, and remotely on zoom. If you would like to attend, please contact Samia Ben.

Summary:

In contemporary societies, algorithmic matching platforms provide access to certain essential resources, such as education (with Parcoursup or Affelnet), a love partner, certain types of care or a job. These platforms are based on sorting algorithms that apply a very singular scheme: you choose and are chosen at the same time.

After defining the social contours of matching, the presentation proposes to enrich the cartography of exchanges developed by Karl Polanyi by introducing algorithmic matching. Finally, it shows that matching constitutes the material infrastructure of a new type of social solidarity, which we call the ‘matching society’.