Affective order of time discipline: The emotional foundation of time pressure in the online gig economy

This article examines how being pressed for time can be internalised as a compulsive and deeply entrenched experience through emotions in the Chinese online freelancing labour market. It advances EP Thompson’s concept of time discipline, while drawing on the literature of labour time, speed-up society and emotion. The analysis identifies three types of affective dispositions – anxiety, pride and contentment – that underpin the cultural notations and disciplinary power of time discipline. They are termed affective order of time discipline . This theorisation reasserts the centrality of the ‘inward notation’ of time and demonstrates how they are sustained through emotional mechanisms, thus explaining the internalisation depth and breadth of time discipline. These insights imply that the reproduction of time pressure on platforms is not just an artefact of technological infrastructures. Rather, to reclaim time, time-related feelings constitute key sites to be ‘undisciplined’.