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doi:10.5477/cis/reis.190.41-60
Digital Society as Seen through The Work
Experiences of Software Developers
La sociedad digital a la luz de las experiencias de trabajo de los
desarrolladores de software
Eduardo Bericat and Julia Acosta
Key words
Digital Society
• Lived Experiences
• Analysis of Experiences
• Digitalisation
• Sociology of Work
• Digital Transformation
Abstract
Software developers, most of whom are young and male, play a
key role in the digital transformation of our societies. They translate
and transfer traditional analogue operations into their corresponding
digital counterparts. Despite the importance of this socially creative
process, it often goes unnoticed or remains hidden from the eyes
of the general public. Applying the analysis of lived experiences
method, the study analyses the digital transformation process
through the work experiences of software developers. Their life
stories shed light on key structural aspects of the digital society
and reflect the tensions inherent in this transformative process. At
the same time, they reveal the dual or Janus-faced nature of every
individual’s life experience during a period of profound socio-digital
transformation.
Palabras clave
Sociedad digital
• Experiencias de vida
• Análisis de experiencias
• Digitalización
• Sociología del trabajo
• Transformación digital
Resumen
Los desarrolladores de software, en su mayoría jóvenes y varones,
desempeñan un papel clave en la transformación digital de nuestras
sociedades. Ellos son quienes traducen y transfieren las operaciones
analógicas tradicionales a su correspondiente versión digital. A pesar
de su importancia, este inmenso proceso de creatividad social suele
pasar desapercibido o permanece oculto a los ojos del público en
general. Aplicando el método del Análisis de Experiencias de Vida
(AEx), el estudio analiza el proceso de transformación digital a través
de las experiencias de trabajo de los desarrolladores de software.
Los relatos de sus vivencias revelan aspectos estructurales clave de
la sociedad digital y reflejan las tensiones inherentes a este proceso
transformador. Al mismo tiempo, muestran la naturaleza dual o jánica de
la experiencia de vida de todos los individuos en una época de profunda
transformación sociodigital.
Citation
Bericat, Eduardo; Acosta, Julia (2025). «Digital Society as Seen through the Work Experiences of
Software Developers». Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas, 190: 41-60. (doi: 10.5477/cis/
reis.190.41-60)
Eduardo Bericat: Universidad de Sevilla | ebericat@us.es
Julia Acosta: Universidad de la República (Uruguay) | majulia.acosta@cienciassociales.edu.uy
Reis. Rev.Esp.Investig.Sociol. ISSN-L: 0210-5233. N.º 190, April - June 2025, pp.41-60
42 Digital Society as Seen through The Work Experiences of Software Developers
Reis. Rev.Esp.Investig.Sociol. ISSN-L: 0210-5233. N.º 190, April - June 2025, pp.41-60
INTRODUCTION
From the 1960s onwards, philosophers
and social scientists observed that mod-
ern society could not be explained by its
opposition to traditional society alone.
This gave rise to new theories of soci-
ety, such as post-industrial society
(Bell, 1973), post-modernity (Lyotard,
1979; Jameson, 1984) and liquid moder-
nity (Bauman, 2003). The new informa-
tion and communications technology (ICT)
emerged as the great transforming forces
of that era, leading to the concept of the
“information society” (Castells, 1996),
which eventually became established as
the reference standard for the emerging
social system (Bericat, 1996). There also
seemed to be close affinity between ICT-
based societies and the cultural, social,
economic and political features attributed
to post-modernity (Bericat, 2003).
However, ICT has continued to evolve,
leading to what we now call “digital soci-
ety” (Lupton, 2014). The first three books
published under the title Digital Sociology
(Orton-Johnson and Prior, 2013; Lupton,
2014; Marres, 2017) saw the light of day
approximately a decade ago. In her book,
Deborah Lupton (2014: 1) flatly stated that
“life is digital”, that “we live in a digital so-
ciety”, and that new digital technologies
profoundly alter everyday life, social rela-
tions, government, commerce, the econ-
omy, and the production and dissemina-
tion of knowledge. She also noted that
“we have reached a point where digital
technologies’ ubiquity and pervasiveness
are such that they have become invisible”
(Lupton, 2014: 2).
Digital society has been extensively
studied by scientists such as Carr (2010),
who analysed the impact of the Internet
on cognition, and Schwab (2016), who
explored the consequences of robotics
and artificial intelligence. Other studies,
including those by Pariser (2011) and
O’Neil (2016), have focused on the social
and ethical implications of algorithms and
personalisation on the Internet. Within
this new configuration, digital capitalism
(Schiller, 1999; Fuchs, 2014) and platform
capitalism (Srnicek, 2017) have emerged
as systems in which data and digital
information processing have been the main
economic resources that have transformed
both consumption and labour relations
(Casilli, 2021; Abdelnour and Medá, 2020).
Much recent research on work in the digital
society, such as that on the deployment
of algorithmic management and workers’
resistance to it (Dupuis, 2024; Floros,
2024), has adopted these approaches.
There are also many discourses against
the fate of social digitalisation, such as
Morozov’s (2015) criticism of technological
solutionism, a discourse that naively claims
that technology can solve all our problems
by itself.
This study aims to make a specific
contribution to the field of digital society
research by analysing the work-life
experiences of a group of mostly male and
young professionals who play a key role in
the functioning and digital transformation of
organisations and society at large. Coders,
computer programmers and software
developers are deemed to be the architects
and builders of this new society (Thompson,
2019; Himanen, 2004). They are, in effect,
in charge of translating and transferring all
traditional analogue operations and action
systems into their corresponding digital
counterpart; this is the essence of digital
transformation. It is our understanding that
digital transformation is a process that
reconfigures social and work structures,
and as such, it can be understood through
the experiences of these workers.
To visualise this process of ana-
logue-to-digital translation which is weav-
ing the infrastructure of the new soci-
ety and enabling digital transformation,
Eduardo Bericat and Julia Acosta 43
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a study was required that extended be-
yond a mere analysis of the objective con-
ditions of work activity. It was necessary
to study the nature of this work as seen
through the experiences of the workers
themselves. The analysis of their experi-
ences would provide objective and sub-
jective parameters to be combined within
a single view. It would also make it pos-
sible to see the worker not only as a pas-
sive subject exposed to multiple exter-
nal constraints, but also as a subject with
agency who incorporated their own sub-
jectivity into their work. Ultimately, the
narratives emerging from their experi-
ences would capture the meaning and
emotional content implicit in their work
tasks and practices, and would enable us
to outline a prototype or character of an
individual in digital transformation.
While the analysis of the lived experi-
ences of software developers was the first
objective of this research, it was not its ul-
timate goal. The selection of these profes-
sionals was justified because, given their
key role in this process of social transfor-
mation, an analysis of their personal expe-
riences could reveal some key structural
features of digital society. In other words,
we aimed to analyse the process of digital
transformation as seen through the expe-
riences of these professionals, and to pro-
vide a sociological reflection on it.
The article is organised in several sec-
tions. The first section provides a detailed
description of the lived experiences anal-
ysis method. This is followed by an ide-
al-typical synthesis of the work experi-
ence of software developers. The third
section engages in sociological reflection
on the digital society based on the eight
experiential foci revealed by the analysis.
After proposing three key features of dig-
ital society for academic discussion, the
article offers some conclusions that link
the findings to the current process of so-
cial digitisation.
THE METHOD: ANALYSIS OF LIVED
EXPERIENCES (AEX)
The central argument that Wright Mills
made in his classic work The Sociological
Imagination (1959) was that individual
(micro) experiences are inextricably linked
to the sociohistorical (macro) context,
and therefore, knowledge of individual
experiences necessarily leads to knowledge
of social structures. Using his terminology,
private personal troubles are connected to
public social issues. In short, for Mills, the
fundamental task of a sociologist is to make
the links between the two levels of reality
intelligible.
Although experience as an ontological
and epistemological category has given rise
to much philosophical reflection, as well as
to endless debates motivated by its inher-
ently polysemic nature (Jay, 2005), this is
not usually the explicit and primary object
of sociological research. So far, with some
exceptions, it has not been the focus of im-
portant methodological debates in the field
either.
The analysis of lived experiences that
was used in this research presupposes that
the observation and understanding of the
experiences of specific individuals offers a
distinctive way of understanding social phe-
nomena. This method is inspired by the idea
of experience that John Dewey developed
in Art as Experience (1934). Instead of refer-
ring to human existence in general, he re-
ferred to “an experience”, i.e. to specific life
experiences, lived by specific individuals.
Examples included going on a journey, solv-
ing a problem, enjoying a work of art, un-
dergoing an illness or having a job interview.
The lives of individuals do not consist
of an undifferentiated, continuous and cha-
otic flow of facts and events without unity,
order or meaning: human beings wrap our
lives into experiences. As we do when mov-
ing to another house, we organise all our
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things into boxes containing a diverse set
of items that bear a relationship to each
other within our life. Each experience, that
is, an individual experience, includes facts,
objects, people, relationships, ideas, emo-
tions, memories, actions, judgements, acci-
dents, desires, places or dreams that sub-
jectively configure a unified and coherent
life space, a timeline that can be captured
by a narrative or a story, and a meaning re-
flected in the emotional content of the expe-
rience.
The key methodological features of the
analysis of lived experiences are as follows:
- It gives primacy to subjectivity. It stud-
ies social reality as it is lived, perceived,
thought about, felt, imagined, evaluated
or desired by individuals (phenomeno-
logical perspective).
- It is based on the observation of con-
crete social realities, of facts or events
that happen to specific people (empiri-
cist principle).
- It considers human experiences as com-
plete and complex life processes, whose
nature and dynamics depend on the set
of elements they contain (holistic ap-
proach).
- It does not approach or prejudge the na-
ture of the phenomena under study us-
ing a closed system of pre-established
ideas or theories (principle of openness).
- It focuses on those aspects of the world
that the subject considers emotionally
relevant (individual-centred view).
Many social sciences and sociology
researchers have focused their work
on the individual and collective study
of experiences. Paradigmatic examples
include Thompson’s (1978) analysis of
experience in the formation of the English
working class; Collins’ (1986, 1990)
epistemological value of experience in
the empowerment of African American
women; Dubet’s (2010, 2011) studies of the
social experience of young people in the
French suburbs; and Rosa’s (2019) critical
sociology, which places resonant in contrast
to alienating experiences. In the field of
work, a variety of workers’ experiences
have been investigated. A classic study
is that by Burawoy (1979), who analysed
how workers consented to or resisted the
labour conditions imposed by capital in
factory processes. Similarly, Floros (2024)
examined how domestic cleaning platform
workers experience and resist algorithmic
management. Although our study on work
experience is more limited, we believe it is
still relevant.
The analysis of lived experiences, in-
spired by pragmatist and phenomenological
approaches, combines methodological ori-
entations from narrative analysis, grounded
theory and life history theory. However, it is
a distinctive approach, as it brings the fo-
cus of sociological research onto the study
of specific experiences. Unlike life histo-
ries, which usually take a biographical ap-
proach, the analysis of lived experiences
does not take the life of an individual as
its object of study. The article by Charriez
(2012) provided an excellent synthesis of
the life history method. This method seeks
to understand a person or persons by com-
piling each and every one of the changes
that have occurred throughout their lives,
combined with an analysis of their own in-
terpretations and life narratives. However,
unlike life histories, which are part of the bi-
ographical approach, the object of study
of the analysis of lived experiences is not
people or individuals, but the experiences
themselves, whether lived individually or
collectively. Although some practical areas
use the study of specific experiences, such
as consumer experiences (Caru and Cova,
2007) or empathy maps (Gray, Brown and
Macanufo, 2010), the analysis of lived ex-
periences does not pursue a commercial or
utilitarian purpose, but rather contributes to
Eduardo Bericat and Julia Acosta 45
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the knowledge and understanding of rele-
vant social phenomena.
The methodological design followed in-
cluded three phases: 1) selecting, contact-
ing and interviewing professionals; 2) con-
structing a work experience narrative for
each worker from the material collected
from these interviews; and 3) subsequently
analysing these lived narratives in order to
extract both an ideal-typical synthesis of
their experience and their key experiential
focuses.
In total, fifteen IT professionals in-
volved in software development were in-
terviewed and their work experiences re-
constructed. Most of them were engineers,
programmers or software developers, who
had work links with companies of differ-
ent sizes in Spain and abroad, mainly in
the United States and Germany. In this first
study, men aged twenty-three to forty were
selected. The choice of this type of sample
was due to the predominant demographics
in this technology sector, where the major-
ity of workers are young men. According
to data from the 2023 Stack Overflow De-
veloper Survey, 84.6% of developers were
under 44 years old, compared to 49.3%
of the total working population in Spain,
according to INE data (Q2 2023). In addi-
tion, the Stack Overflow Developer Survey
in 2022 revealed that 91% of developers
in Spain were male. This choice therefore
made it possible to accurately capture the
typical experiences of this group, which
currently lies at the operational core of dig-
ital transformation.
Recruitment was carried out via the
LinkedIn platform. The Sales Navigator
version enabled us to select the sector
(software development) and geographic
location (Spain). The semi-structured in-
terviews, which lasted between fifty and
seventy-five minutes, focused on work ex-
perience. They took place between 6 and
22 February 2023.
THE WORKING EXPERIENCE OF THE
SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS
In the book The Corrosion of Character,
Richard Sennett (2000) argued that a mere
change in the articulation of time in the new
capitalism, compared to the preceding in-
dustrial capitalism, has important personal
consequences. From a society based on
the long term, which made it possible to
implement stable personal projects, estab-
lish solid social ties and develop a sense
of ethics that could be transmitted across
generations, there has been a shift to a so-
ciety built around the short term, in which
people are at the mercy of changing winds,
weak social ties, lack of trust, lack of com-
mitments, multiple uncertainties, general-
ised vulnerability and a radical contingency
that affects all areas of existence. By con-
trasting the life experiences of Enrico, a
humble cleaner in an inner-city office build-
ing, with those of his son Rico, an electri-
cal engineering graduate who enjoyed more
than acceptable professional success, Sen-
nett presented the thesis of the corrosion
of character. In the temporal conditions of
the new capitalism, it is almost impossible
to feel or believe that personal experience,
now composed of a mere aggregation of
disjointed episodes, can articulate a com-
plete and coherent biographical narrative
that gives sufficient meaning and consist-
ency to life.
Following Sennett, and recognising the
central role they play in the operational core
of digital transformation, we analysed the
work experiences and personal qualities of
software developers. This was based on the
understanding that the tensions they ex-
perience may reveal some elements of the
ethos that characterise contemporary in-
dividuals. Therefore, we outline below the
ideal Weberian type of work experience of
these professionals. In general, given their
high qualifications, their high market power,
the demand for their services and the high
46 Digital Society as Seen through The Work Experiences of Software Developers
Reis. Rev.Esp.Investig.Sociol. ISSN-L: 0210-5233. N.º 190, April - June 2025, pp.41-60
intellectual content of their tasks, the in-
terviewees’ narratives provide an idealised
view of the profession. However, beneath
the idyllic tone of their aesthetic experi-
ences, major problems and job dissatisfac-
tion loom large.
The ideal-typical experience
The lived work experience of software de-
velopers essentially revolves around the
task of designing software by using appro-
priate languages and logical structures, the
code that underpins the operation of appli-
cations1.
This goal is unattainable by merely per-
forming routine tasks, as there are no reci-
pes or protocols applicable to the design
and construction of the software that each
customer demands. In general, they have to
create something from nothing, which requi-
res a great deal of effort, intellectual capa-
city and ingenuity.
They must find solutions and solve pro-
blems (solution-oriented job). These tasks
are usually as difficult as they are complex,
and continuously facing these challenges
puts them under constant stress.
As the technologies they work with are
constantly changing, they need to keep up
with new developments literally on a daily
basis. They must be self-taught and learn as
they go along. The sword of Damocles han-
ging over their heads is both professional
and personal obsolescence. The speed of
change is such that the fear of being left be-
hind, or stranded, causes them intense un-
certainty and anxiety.
1 This section provides a very concise synthesis of the
full analysis of the lived work experiences of these pro-
fessionals. In order to focus the reader’s attention ap-
propriately, all terms referring to conceptual categories
or key parameters of this ideal-typical experience are
included in italics.
However, their computer skills, as well
as their ability to design code using the
most advanced technologies, give them
considerable market power and a great deal
of satisfaction derived from the social utility
of their knowledge.
Achievements are a key element of their
experience. The passion they bring to their
work, the enthusiasm with which they tackle
their tasks and the enjoyment they find in
their profession are partly fuelled by the
self-esteem and emotional energy ‘boosts’
they experience from the success of their
projects. Achievements drive the commit-
ment and intrinsic motivation that is critical
in their professional roles, as these occupa-
tions demand strong engagement from the
worker’s subjectivity.
Software developers deeply admire col-
leagues who have been able to create very
complex, yet elegant, simple and functional
structures. They feel a kind of awe and de-
votion to a job well done. They value excel-
lence.
The logic of software is an incompre-
hensible mystery to the users of their pro-
grammes, but they know very well, and see
on a daily basis, that the magic is effective
and works. Thanks to apps, digital soci-
ety citizens can perform a multitude of ex-
tremely complex tasks in a simple or qua-
si-automatic way. When their customers or
users recognise the practical usefulness and
good functioning of their codes, they feel
special, important, useful and fulfilled, both
personally and professionally.
Being appreciated by customers is a
priceless emotional reward. It is also ev-
idences that they understood and ad-
dressed the customer’s exact requirements
successfully, proving that their programmed
creature has come to life and operates in
the real world. In this way, they feel like true
creators. Work, far from consisting of the
mere performance of a series of instrumen-
tal and objective tasks, is transformed into
Eduardo Bericat and Julia Acosta 47
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an authentic aesthetic experience (Dewey,
2005), the consummation of which pro-
vokes immense joy.
The successful completion of their pro-
jects depends strictly on this mutation of
their work, which now takes on a personal
and subjective nature. Software develop-
ers approach their work projects from a
strong, involved, free, creative and self-de-
termined I.
Companies, large or small, encourage
the subjectification and individuation of
workers by granting them broad autonomy
over their means of labour, but only pro-
vided that they apply them to the ends ex-
ogenously set by them. The codes they cre-
ate must serve the purpose set by some
boss or customer (power principle), and
they must predetermine sets of operations
that fit and function in objective reality (real-
ity principle).
Judging by their accounts, develop-
ers are not very aware of the contradiction
between worker subjectivity (autonomy of
means) and external, objective constraints
(heteronomy of ends). Although they feel
they are scientists and artists, they do not
enjoy the same freedom in their choice of
goals.
Developers assume that, like mathemat-
ics and logic, the codes they create are
pristine, pure and perfect. But their work
experience repeatedly confirms that they
are not without error. Code failures that can
cause serious malfunctions and dire con-
sequences for customers and users are
known as incidents. These are urgent prob-
lems that need to be tackled immediately
and cause them a high level of work-related
stress.
These professionals feel like they are de-
miurges. But, like the rest of the gods, they
never imagine that they will have to face the
evil that they themselves, albeit unknow-
ingly, bring into their creatures. The ideal
world to which computer codes aspire, like
genetic, moral or legal codes, exists only in
the mind of their creator.
Despite the strength of their “self”, and
the hegemonic discourses underpinning job
individuation, developers are acutely aware
of their personal limitations and their inabil-
ity to tackle projects alone. Hence the ap-
preciation they show for colleagues in their
work team and for the members of their
professional community.
Projects are the basic functional units of
their socio-productive system. They sup-
port their aesthetic experiences, keep intrin-
sic motivation alive and serve business pur-
poses as an individualised mode of labour
market entry that allows the fragmentation
of this powerful professional group.
While software developers tend to enjoy
good objective working conditions, they at-
tach great importance to the subjective na-
ture of work performance, which must be in
line with their values, desires and demands.
The job must offer them the opportunity to
experience the work as an aesthetic expe-
rience.
Flexibility at work, the sense of freedom,
the option of working from home, of feeling
respected, of doing truly useful things, the
balance between work and personal life, the
opportunity to travel, the ability to choose
projects they like and are interested in, and
the search for meaning are some of their
work demands, which they identify as being
life demands.
In addition to the value they place on
work teams, they have a deep sense of be-
longing to a global, open, free and collab-
orative community of programmers. These
individualised workers find in this commu-
nity the instrumental support they need to
overcome their professional challenges, in
the form of guides, knowledge, techniques
and ways of doing things.
In the face of the unease generated by
the construction of a world moving towards
an unknown destination, this imagined
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and ideal community, with its rules, strug-
gles between worldviews, gurus and even
prophets, instils in them a collective sense
of mission.
The weight of responsibility that these
professionals assume as architects of the
new digital society is also palpable in their
accounts of their work experiences.
FOCI OF EXPERIENCE IN DIGITAL
SOCIETY
Eight foci were identified in the accounts
made by the software developers about
their work experiences. These can be a
starting point from which to sociologically
reflect on digital society. The foci of experi-
ence are locations where life energies con-
verge from various fields and sources. They
emit enough light to illuminate aspects of
reality that might otherwise go unnoticed
or remain hidden. This is why Dubet (2010)
called for a fruitful dialogue between expe-
rienced reality and sociological knowledge.
Collins (1986: 29) argued that experiential
reality provides as a valid source of knowl-
edge for critiquing sociological facts and
theories, while “sociological thought offers
new ways of seeing that experienced real-
ity”. For them, experience and sociological
theory are on the same level and comple-
ment each other.
The principles of empiricism and open-
ness that characterise the lived experiences
method made it possible to capture contra-
dictory elements of experience simultane-
ously within the same point of the research
process, thereby revealing its fundamen-
tal duality. The four foci shown on the left in
Figure 1 belong to the domain of subjectiv-
ity, agency and individuation, and each of
them is placed in opposition to each of the
four foci on the right, belonging to the do-
main of objectivity, structure and collectiv-
ity. Each subjective focus is appears in op-
position to an objective one, and both are
constitutive parts of the experience.
The experience of individuals in socie-
ties that are experiencing a digital transfor-
mation has a Janus-faced nature. The met-
aphor of the god Janus, the god who gave
his name to the beginning of the year (Jan-
uary), the two-faced god, the god of doors
through which one enters and exits, the god
of changes, steps and transformations, the
god of beginnings and endings, makes total
sense here because all individuals, including
software developers, participate and play
a role of builders in the creation of a new
world.
The personal experience of the challenge
and the algorithmic code as a new social
institution
The Dictionary of the Royal Academy of
the Spanish Language (RAE) defines chal-
lenge as “an objective or undertaking that
is difficult to carry out, which therefore con-
stitutes a stimulus and a test for the per-
son who faces it”. Software developers find
overcoming a challenge very stimulating;
in their case, this takes the form of finding
programming solutions that make it possi-
ble to implement a predetermined chain of
operations (job-oriented job). Luis2 (12/16)
“likes challenges the most”, “overcoming
them gives him complete satisfaction”. Juan
(11/16) defined his work as “constantly fac-
ing new and different challenges”. And Alex
(5/22) compared his work to mathematics:
“there is a problem and you look for a solu-
tion”.
Without challenges, both life and work
slide dangerously down the slope of mean-
inglessness, monotony, boredom and te-
2 All names are fictitious. The data in brackets corres-
pond to the coding used in the narratives. The first digit
is the code allocated to the respondent, and the second
digit to the paragraph number.
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dium. Meeting challenges mitigates the dis-
enchantment of the world denounced by
Weber (1905) and masks the destruction of
experience anticipated by Benjamin (1973).
It aligns with the system’s need to foster in-
trinsic motivations that wholly engage the
subject and promotes the exploration of in-
novative approaches during the socio-dig-
ital transformation phase. Overcoming
challenges is a key focus of contemporary
experience. According to Dubet (2010), the
decline of institutions means that individuals
have to personally articulate multiple logics
of action and face the ensuing challenges.
In the same vein, Martuccelli and Santiago
(2017) rethought the contemporary individ-
ual from the perspective of the sociology of
social challenges.
The objective, structural and collective
dimension of experience appears as soon
as we focus our gaze on the product of
work. Codes (algorithms, programmes, plat-
forms) pre-order and predetermine infinite
chains of operations of the social system.
Software appears to be intangible, but it
paradoxically becomes materialised as an
extensive and dense network of codes that
make up the infrastructure of digital society,
a kind of underground sewage system. The
overflowing subjectivity of the challenge is
poured into the unappealable objectivity of
the code, which weaves coercive structures
into a peculiar iron cage.
Not only well-known apps and platforms
like Netflix, TikTok, Uber, Spotify, Tinder,
Photoshop and ChatGPT, but also thou-
sands of other digital operators we use daily
in specific activity environments, organise
available options, predetermine possible
actions, and subtly influence our decisions
without our being aware of it. Each of these
digital operators, be they algorithms, appli-
cations or platforms, introduce changes in
FIGURE 1. Foci of experience of software developers
Source: Prepared by the authors.
Challenges
CommunityIndividual
Achievements
Creativity
Errors
Utility
Codes
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Reis. Rev.Esp.Investig.Sociol. ISSN-L: 0210-5233. N.º 190, April - June 2025, pp.41-60
our ways of doing, thinking, feeling, relating,
working, consuming, enjoying or suffering.
Applications pre-order and auto-
mate complex tasks in order to make
them simple. These are the keys to their
success, and to the threats they pose.
Following Simmel (1911), we would ar-
gue that the tragedy of digital culture is
that the code, objectively, does things
for us that we are personally or subjec-
tively incapable of doing. Algorithms, like
so many other social institutions (hab-
its, mental frameworks, stereotypes, so-
cialisation, laws, norms, etc.) regulate our
behaviours and operations. For this rea-
son, and also because they remain hidden
in veritable black boxes, they should be
subject to public scrutiny and social criti-
cism (Gabelas-Barroso, García-Marín and
Aparici, 2023). For the time being, only the
interests of power penetrate the codes at
the time of their creation. Timid social reg-
ulation almost always operates a posteriori.
The pleasures of the creator and the
servitudes of utility
Software developers essentially consider
their work to be creative. Alex (5/34) felt
that “he is an artist in the computer world”,
what he does is “an art form because he is
creating something from scratch”. Pedro
(3/19) defined programming as “pure cre-
ativity”. And Mauro (7/23) confessed
that he “doesn’t know why creating new
things gives him such an intense pleasur-
able feeling”. Pure creativity, that is, pro-
ducing something totally new out of noth-
ing, provides quasi-mystical experiences
and epiphanies comparable to the aes-
thetic experiences characterised by Dewey
(1934), the flow described by Csikszentmi-
halyi (1990), or the resonances portrayed by
Rosa (2019). Developers bring to life previ-
ously non-existent logic creatures, codes
and algorithms that work in reality. They are
right to think of themselves as demiurges,
Platonic gods who organise the world.
We understand the pleasures of crea-
tivity because research, development and
innovation (R&D&I) is an inherent part of
the contemporary experience. All vectors
of change (technological, cultural, demo-
graphic, etc.) make creativity both a func-
tional prerequisite of the system and a
moral imperative for citizens. It is not that
individuals can be creative or that our cre-
ativity is rewarded. The decisive fact is that
we are obliged to be creative (Reckwitz,
2017) in all areas of life, including work, lei-
sure, school, social relations, consumption
and love.
Creativity is absolutely essential in so-
cieties marching towards an unknown des-
tination, such as those undergoing digital
transformation. However, in individuals’ ex-
perience, as explicitly stated by the partic-
ipating software developers, the need to
keep up with the very fast pace of change,
and to ensure that their knowledge is con-
tinuously updated, causes fear of obso-
lescence, of being left behind, obsolete,
stranded.
Raúl (8/15) articulates this anxiety by us-
ing a metaphor: going around a racetrack
at full speed in a car that we are building
at the same time. It is a double jeopardy.
We are not, as Azorín narrated, peaceful
cows that indifferently observe a train that
crosses at full speed in front of them. We
are on that train, in a world that is chang-
ing, and we have to change with it. As we
do not know its final destination, we have to
transform ourselves day by day along with
the world, discovering ourselves while forg-
ing an adaptive, mobile and non-normative
identity.
The Janus-faced character of contem-
porary experience is also manifested in the
value and utility that computer knowledge
acquires in these times of digital transfor-
mation. This knowledge is appreciated pro-
Eduardo Bericat and Julia Acosta 51
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portionally to people’s need and ignorance.
As developers provide true utility, they are
constantly thanked by many social actors,
something that makes them feel very good.
But it is the peremptory need for their ex-
pertise that leads to their knowledge being
ultimately subjugated . Utility makes them
servants because power is very interested
in experts submitting to its requirements
and demands. In David Riesman’s (1964)
terms, they cease to be internally driven and
self-piloted (inner-directed) and become
subject to external goals set forth by others
(other-directed). The obsession with put-
ting all personal and professional creativity
at the service of the customer is the basis of
this type of work alienation.
Personal achievements and errors
in digitisation processes
Personal achievements are a fundamental
focus of the experience of software devel-
opers. Matías (6/30) mentioned that:
It involves building an abstract machine, and when
the time comes to see if it works, and all the gears
start to turn, and the little ball goes in one side and
comes out the other, you say, I’ve got a little ball
to go in one side and come out the other: Hell, my
circuit works perfectly!
They experience successes as rituals
that recharge both their emotional energy
(Collins, 2004) and the passion, com-
mitment, involvement and high degree of
self-demand associated with a vocational
job. When realising their achievement, these
workers are particularly satisfied and proud,
and have a sense of inner growth and self-
realisation.
For Ruoppa (2019), the idea of a “con-
summatory overcoming of meaningful chal-
lenges”, i.e. the perfect completion of an
experience, serves as a simple but essen-
tial summary of Dewey’s aesthetic the-
ory. We argue that, following challenge
and creativity, achievement is the third fo-
cus of an aesthetic experience. But while
job enthusiasm can be very positive, it is
also a double-edged sword (Zafra, 2017).
For Sebastian:
There is a mix of what he likes and what he is paid
for. He is very happy with what he does. But he
thinks that with passion you go out of your mind.
In the end, your life is your work.
This is precisely the aim of greedy com-
panies and institutions, which unjustly de-
mand total commitment and involvement
from workers.
Each achievement is exactly the same
as a breakthrough, one step further in the
process of the digital transformation of so-
ciety. But it would be inappropriate to mis-
take the logical and functional perfection of
the code for goodness, for social, ethical or
moral perfection. Developers conceive of er-
rors as incidents because in their experiential
context they constrain the evaluative horizon
to the issues that emerge when code fails to
meet its functional purpose. These incidents,
which require urgent intervention because a
malfunctioning code collapses the founda-
tions of digital society, come as a great sur-
prise, but also causes them deep disappoint-
ment, sadness, shame and guilt.
The errors appear against the backdrop
of an implicit axiom that presupposes the
perfection of the digital world. The code is
a pure mathematical system, fully coherent,
seamlessly integrating a set of working op-
erations. However, the stubborn reality of
error shows that “evil” also exists in digital
society. Beneath the utopian social and in-
stitutional consensus lies a digital dystopia.
Rafael, a software developer, finally realised
that “things can fail, that not everything can
be perfect”, and comparing his work to that
of doctors, he said: “they do what they can,
but people die”.
In The Malaise in Culture Freud ques-
tioned himself about the sources of suffer-
ing and unhappiness. In addition to its many
achievements, beyond operational malfunc-
52 Digital Society as Seen through The Work Experiences of Software Developers
Reis. Rev.Esp.Investig.Sociol. ISSN-L: 0210-5233. N.º 190, April - June 2025, pp.41-60
tions, computer viruses or hackers, the dig-
ital transformation is undoubtedly sowing
many ills and problems to which we must
be alert. We are increasingly aware of, and
paying more attention to, the dysfunctions
of digital society. But the task of surveil-
lance and control ahead of us is so great
that any effort is insufficient.
Individual, group and community:
the reality and the illusion of social
individuation
The job of software developers is to find
computational solutions to problems or chal-
lenges that involve the creation, ex nihilo, of
code that institutes a predetermined struc-
ture of processes and operations geared to-
wards fulfilling a pragmatic function.
Developers attach great importance to
the character and virtues that make a per-
son an excellent worker. Work is not the
mere performance of a series of externally
imposed activities, but a personal commit-
ment that the individual acquires by making
the task their own. The “I” is closely engaged
with both the activity and its outcome.
Alex’s statement could serve as a ref-
erence, when he compared his work logic
to being an hydraulic pickaxe, the demoli-
tion hammer used by construction workers:
“try it, it doesn’t work, try it, change it, try it,
change it until it works”. Like Don Quixote,
they not only face the challenges of the
world from a strong “I” and an intense sub-
jectivity, but they themselves invoke the
challenges and recreate the experiences with
their imagination (in stark contrast to the atti-
tude of his squire Sancho Panza). This power
of the individual, characteristic of romantic
genius is the fourth component of an aes-
thetic experience, together with challenge,
creativity, and achievement.
We extracted from the software develop-
ers’ narratives their ideal-typical character,
akin to that of a model worker in digital so-
ciety. This model worker is a pragmatic and
versatile person when interacting with their
productive and natural environment; helpful
and collaborative when interacting with oth-
ers in their social environment; and creative
and enthusiastic in terms of their personal in-
volvement.
At a time when subjectivity is making a
comeback and seems to prevail over objec-
tivity, the status of reality achieved by the in-
dividual and individuation should not be un-
derestimated. Nevertheless, the experiences
analysed show that the hegemonic discourse
of a strong, self-determined, solitary, free
and autonomous individuality is an illusion.
Their experiences reveal three modes for en-
tering the work market and becoming so-
cially integrated: the individual, based on
projects; the group, based on work teams;
and the community, based on the profes-
sional community.
The project is the basic production unit of
the sector. As a mechanism, it has the magi-
cal power of merging two dual elements that
are in principle incompatible. It serves to un-
dertake the objective organisational func-
tions, while subjectively integrating the in-
dividuality of the worker. The link between
workers and projects is a personal one. Pro-
jects have an objective or mission, a begin-
ning and an end, a challenge and a mean-
ing. The project adapts to the contemporary
work ethos, which aims to turn work into an
aesthetic experience shaped by individuality.
But the success of this market entry mech-
anism is also due to the fact that attaching
workers so tightly to projects, firstly, makes
it difficult for them to become stably inte-
grated into the production organisations for
which they work and, secondly, prevents the
formation of stable groups of workers, which
provides greater control over their demands
and performance.
However, the importance that workers
attribute to work groups and teams contra-
dicts the individualistic framework that un-
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derlies projects. Mauro (7/64) held the col-
lective in high regard: “one person alone is
nobody, you know?” He emphasised that “in
the world of software, teamwork is essen-
tial”, “software is too complex to be done by
one person”. For Miguel (9/34), there seemed
to be no room for “going it alone”, “the po-
tential increases if you know how to commu-
nicate and how to work in a team”. Indeed,
the work team is an essential instrument in
order to meet the challenge that every pro-
ject poses. It is also the main group in which
developers work together, and in which they
can share ideas, goals, values and emotions.
Finally, integration into an open, collab-
orative, generous, free, egalitarian, mutually
supportive and open knowledge community
is another focus of their work life experience.
Guillermo (10/42) highlighted “the role of the
knowledge communities that are generated
in the sector, where people share their solu-
tions”. Sebastian (2/24) reported that he of-
ten relied on the open source community,
where “code is shared or open licences are
used”. Mauro (7/62) felt:
Supported by people who are just as crazy as you
are, and who can change the world, who aim to
somehow improve some aspect of people’s lives.
It is a supportive community in the face
of uncertainty, individuation, the speed of
technological change and obsolescence. In
the context of the moral vacuum surround-
ing digitalisation, its gurus and prophets offer
worldviews, doctrines of salvation and a col-
lective sense of mission linked to the advent
of digital society.
DISCUSSION: DIGITAL
TRANSFORMATION AND WORK
STRUCTURES IN THE DIGITAL
SOCIETY
From the analysis of the work experiences
of the software developers, as well as from
the narratives derived from the interview
material, a framework emerged that could
be used to think about digital society. This
framework, which we propose for academic
discussion, could be shaped by three funda-
mental parameters: transformation, creativity
and performativity.
Although it is undeniable that “life is
digital” and that “we live in a digital society”,
this has not yet been fully established.
Digitalisation is advancing at an unstoppable
rate, colonising more and more aspects
of our existence. Far from being a static
phenomenon, digital society is in a state of
constant transformation that profoundly alters
the social landscape. Global spending on
technologies and services linked to digital
transformation is estimated to reach USD
3.5 trillion in 2026, an increase of 354 %
over 2017 (Rueda, Méndez and Collado,
2023). Computer programming, once limited
to specific sectors such as the military or
finance, is now an integral part of everyday
life (Cocco and Vilarim, 2009). Moreover,
digitalisation continues to generate broad
social consensus. In 2021, the European
Commission presented the 2030 Digital
Compass, which highlighted the potential
of digitalisation to address a number of
European challenges (EU, 2023). In short, we
are in the midst of a vast digital transformation
process.
The second parameter, namely, the
creativity inherent in this process of so-
cial transformation, was clearly demon-
strated by the great pioneers of computer
programming (Thompson, 2019; Himanen,
2004). However, our analysis of experi-
ences with “normal” programmers in a
Spanish city also reveals that creativity is
a central element in their work. Accord-
ing to Himanen (2004, 2012), the hacker
ethic (in line with the name given to pro-
grammers by MIT in the 1960s) was not so
much based on the culture of effort or val-
uing work for its own sake, as it was in the
era of the Protestant spirit, but on creative
passion. These individuals enjoy interact-
54 Digital Society as Seen through The Work Experiences of Software Developers
Reis. Rev.Esp.Investig.Sociol. ISSN-L: 0210-5233. N.º 190, April - June 2025, pp.41-60
ing with others, striving for excellence, in-
tegrating their intelligence into the software
and see their work as an art form.
The immanent creative drive of the dig-
ital transformation shows that society does
not necessarily advance according to a
technological determinism towards a prede-
termined destination. It also demonstrates
that aspiring for digitalisation to be a tech-
nological solutionism capable of solving
all our social problems by itself is a fallacy
and an illusion. Morozov rightly pointed to
the folly of technological solutionism. The
fact that digital transformation as of itself
requires human creativity also raises ques-
tions about the various proposals for ac-
celerationism. Some, such as Land (2011),
supported the intensification of digital cap-
italism by suggesting that accelerating cap-
italist and technological development to the
point of reaching its limits could trigger a
radical transformation that could even re-
sult in the dissolution of human subjectiv-
ity and the emergence of post-human forms
of existence. Others, such as Williams and
Srnicek (2013), have taken a more critical
stance and proposed accelerating tech-
nological development to promote social
emancipation and economic justice. Solu-
tionism and technological accelerationism
are therefore inescapable keys to the public
debate on how to deal with the current mo-
mentum of digital capitalism (Jiménez and
Renduelles, 2020).
Finally, the accounts of computer pro-
grammers’ work experiences reveal that all
software has a performative character. This
means that software not only facilitates ac-
tion, but behaves as an active agent that
shapes and pre-determines social reality.
The algorithms and instructions that com-
pose it are constitutive, as they create op-
erational and symbolic structures that or-
ganise life in digital society. Several studies
have underlined the non-neutrality of algo-
rithms (Bucher, 2018) and highlighted this
performativity by demonstrating how they
create and organise social realities. In addi-
tion to its performative character, technol-
ogy has a pre-figurative character: digital
technologies not only organise current re-
alities, but also pre-figure possible futures,
anticipating emerging social interactions
and structures. Zuboff (2019) reinforced this
idea by arguing that, in the context of sur-
veillance capitalism, digital technologies not
only predict but also modify human behav-
iour, anticipating and shaping future social
scenarios. This pre-figurative character im-
plies that technologies not only respond to
present needs, but also impose a vision of
the future, pre-structuring opportunities for
action and social organisation.
In short, digitalisation is transforming so-
ciety by changing the set of operations by
which we conduct our activities. This is key
to understanding how the work of software
developers actively contributes to the cre-
ation and maintenance of digital society’s
infrastructure. Far from being passive sub-
jects, they play an active role, integrating
their subjectivity and creativity into tech-
nological development. This participation
demonstrates that digital transformation is
co-constructed by these workers, who in-
fluence the course of digitalisation through
their practices and decisions.
In digital society, as in any other social
configuration, a distinction can be made be-
tween infrastructure, operational core and
superstructure. Infrastructurally, digitalisa-
tion works with encoded messages that can
be instantly circulated over telematic net-
works; computed by powerful computers;
and stored in vast memory media. Opera-
tionally, this new society processes infor-
mation through the three mechanisms that
form its central operating core: algorithms,
applications and platforms. This core pro-
duces both artificial intelligence (AI) and vir-
tual reality (VR). At the superstructural level,
the incorporation of this new knowledge
and digital representations of the world rad-
ically alters the modus operandi of both the
Eduardo Bericat and Julia Acosta 55
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social system and the interactivity and inter-
communication of all its members.
Since this operational core can work in
any sphere of life, and in fact, is silently and
progressively laying claim to all of them, so-
ciology and sociologists must pay special
attention to the social processes of digital-
isation.
CONCLUSIONS
This final section will draw three conclu-
sions from the analysis of the work experi-
ences of software developers. This analysis
provides an excellent perspective to under-
stand the depth and complexity of the dig-
ital transformation process. It has allowed
us not only to explore the internal dynam-
ics of work in the digital age, but also to re-
flect on the wider implications for society as
a whole.
Research has revealed that both the
ethos and the life experience of contempo-
rary individuals have a dual nature that is
fraught with tensions and paradoxes. Thus,
faced with the challenges posed by digital
transformation, the “I” asserts itself as an
agent subject who, through its action and
struggle, is capable of changing the world.
At the same time, however, the network of
codes that the developer creates weaves a
dense spider’s web that ends up controlling
its will through infinite imperceptible prede-
terminations. On the other hand, although in
autonomous creativity people show them-
selves as imaginative and free beings, in
heteronomous creativity, subjected to the
principle of utility, even dreams end up be-
ing adjusted to the practical purposes of the
social order instituted by power. We have
also seen that the achievements of individ-
uals in successfully completing the projects
entrusted to them provide them with au-
thentic aesthetic experiences. But unease,
anxiety, stress, depression and panic come
with the errors that are inevitably commit-
ted, which open the door to imperfection
and can bring “evil” into the world. Finally,
although individuation dominates the sub-
jectivity of contemporary individuals, the re-
quirements of the practical order force them
to recognise the fragility of the “I”, to join
work teams and to seek the support of the
community.
The fifteen narratives drawn from the
experiences of these professionals, each
of approximately two and a half thousand
words, have demonstrated the value of
lived experience analysis for sociological
research, and in particular for work-related
studies. Digital society not only generates
new occupations and jobs, but profoundly
transforms the conditions and nature of ex-
isting ones. In this context, giving the floor
back to the workers themselves, and as-
suming that they are the only qualified in-
formants capable of showing the true na-
ture, content and meaning of the new jobs
they perform, is an unavoidable challenge
for knowledge. This study has highlighted
subjectivity at work, the central role of pro-
jects and the motivating power of achieve-
ments and aesthetic experiences. Contra-
rily, it has also highlighted the stress caused
by the imperative of creativity, the decep-
tion behind so-called individualisation, as
well as the high personal cost that workers
pay for their enthusiasm about work.
Finally, in contrast to the exclusively cul-
turalist, informational and relational per-
spectives, through the analysis of the lived
work experiences of the software develop-
ers, digital society emerges as a complete
system of action that is being institutional-
ised by leaps and bounds. This new social
system is underpinned by a vast and dense
network of computer codes, algorithms, ap-
plications and platforms that predetermine
both its systemic operations and the behav-
iours of all its members. Similarly to hab-
its, customs, socialisation, norms and le-
gal codes, which reduced contingency in
the traditional social order, the web of algo-
56 Digital Society as Seen through The Work Experiences of Software Developers
Reis. Rev.Esp.Investig.Sociol. ISSN-L: 0210-5233. N.º 190, April - June 2025, pp.41-60
rithms now constitutes the real institutional
infrastructure of the new digital society.
The charm of digitalisation lies in its ef-
ficiency, as it allows very complex tasks to
be carried out in a cost-effective, automatic
and simple way. But the greatest danger
comes from the fact that the black box at
its operational core is outside public con-
trol and that it drastically and rapidly trans-
forms the way we do everything. The so-
cial sciences must therefore redouble their
efforts to understand and make clear both
life in digital society and the social conse-
quences of any digitalisation process. In
short, we should encourage public attention
and social alert mechanisms that allow for
democratic and critical control to be placed
over this profound social transformation.
Given the socio-demographic profile
of today’s software workers, this process
of algorithmic creation is almost entirely
dominated by young, male IT professionals,
which results in women and older people
being excluded from the digital configura-
tion of society. The lived work experiences
recorded in this study are therefore the ex-
periences of the young, male developers
that the system uses for its development.
Regarding this blatant social exclusion, two
fundamental tasks remain to be addressed.
On the one hand, the work experiences of
women and older people involved in the de-
velopment of software should be analysed.
On the other hand, the conditions that ex-
plain this occupational segregation should
be investigated, as well as the educational
and social policies that could eliminate it. In
short, it is imperative to find ways of bring-
ing women and older people into the opera-
tional core of social digitalisation.
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RECEPTION: February 12, 2024
REVIEW: May 27, 2024
ACCEPTANCE: October 11, 2024
