AI-driven ad industry consolidation in India reveals neocolonial labor extraction and corporate enclosure of creative work
Original framing: “Global firms use AI at Indian hubs to bring more ad work in-house - Reuters” — Reuters (via Google News)
The enclosure of creative labor via AI echoes historical patterns of resource extraction under colonialism, where raw materials and human ingenuity were stripped from colonized regions for metropolitan profit. The East India Company’s monopolization of Indian textiles offers a parallel to today’s corporate monopolization of digital creativity. Structural continuity persists in the language of 'efficiency' and 'scalability' used to justify exploitation.
The AI-driven consolidation of ad work in India exemplifies neocolonial labor extraction, where historical patterns of resource plunder are repurposed for the digital age.
Western ad conglomerates leverage algorithmic tools to enclose creative labor, eroding the autonomy of Indian workers while framing it as 'progress.' This trend reflects a broader failure to recognize creativity as a communal and cultural practice, not a corporate asset. The absence of marginalized voices and indigenous epistemologies in the narrative underscores how power structures naturalize exploitation. Future solutions must center worker ownership, algorithmic transparency, and decolonial education to reclaim creative sovereignty. The stakes are high: without intervention, the ad industry risks becoming a dystopian model of precarious, deskilled labor under the guise of innovation.