Learn more about the work of CMS Postdoctoral Research Fellow Dr. María Cervantes-Macías.
María Cervantes-Macías is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Centre for Migration Studies and an Affiliate Member of the Department of Geography at the University of British Columbia. Her research explores how migration and digital labour are transforming Canadian cities, focusing on the everyday experiences of immigrant workers in the platform economy. She is also a Non-Resident Fellow at the U.S.–Mexico Center at the University of California, San Diego, and a former Fox International Fellow at Yale University. Through her work, María examines how borders, technology, and inequality shape who gets to move, work, and belong across North America.
We spoke to Dr. Cervantes-Macías about her position as a CMS Postdoctoral Research Fellow and her research.
Could you share a bit about your academic background and the main themes that guide your research?
I completed my PhD in Geography at the University of British Columbia, where my dissertation, Credentialized Aspirations: The Mobility Journeys of Mexican Professionals in North America, examined how education and migration intersect to shape mobility strategies among Mexican professionals in Canada and the United States. My research sits at the intersection of migration, labour, and urban geography. Broadly, I’m interested in how global migration regimes and digital labour markets reshape cities, producing new forms of inequality and belonging. I approach these questions through ethnographic methods, with a focus on North American regional integration. In my postdoctoral project, I am expanding my research beyond Mexican migration, but I am still mostly drawn to the intersections of merit, class, and international mobility.
What are you currently working on in your role as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at CMS?
As part of the Bridging Divides Managing Occupational Balance in Platform and Remote Work project, my research explores how immigrant workers experience and navigate Canada’s platform and remote economy. I examine how digital infrastructures mediate newcomers’ access to employment, social protections, and belonging in Canadian urban centers. My current work looks at both gig workers and highly credentialized professionals and tries to understand how immigration regimes and digital economies jointly shape different forms of precarity. By comparing these groups, I study how borders, class, and technology intersect to produce uneven opportunities for integration, highlighting how platform work both enables and constrains mobility in Canada.
What are some of the key insights or findings that have emerged from your research so far?
Our research shows that immigrant workers are the backbone of Canada’s platform economy, yet they face persistent barriers to stability and belonging. Early findings reveal how newcomers navigate employment in the platform economy, from delivery, rideshare, and content creation to the technology jobs that sustain these platforms. Our focus on immigrant workers specifically allows us to observe how Canada’s immigration policies impact these workers directly. Many workers, including those with the “right” credentials and skills, are pushed into gig work as they face barriers such as credential recognition, lack of Canadian experience or no social networks in Canada. A key finding of our work is that platform work goes beyond delivery drivers and gig workers, although their work is essential to keep it going.
How do you hope these findings will inform policy or public understanding?
Through my study, I found that platform and remote work are not just economic arrangements—they’re social spaces where questions of identity, belonging, and inequality play out. Immigrant workers often turn to these forms of employment for flexibility and income security, but the very structures that make platform work appealing also reproduce precarity. At the same time, these workers do not have access, or have limited awareness to social protections in Canada. The flexibility they obtain in the platform economy creates tensions between autonomy and invisibility: they value the freedom to manage their time, yet struggle with isolation, lack of protections, and, in some cases, limited pathways for permanent settlement. Workers are building their own networks of support and solidarity in Canada and abroad, creating new social and transnational infrastructures of care that keep cities and digital economies running. I hope these insights contribute to more nuanced policy discussions about labour rights, credential recognition, and the social dimensions of digital work in Canada.
You often use visual and graphic methods to communicate your research. What role do these creative approaches—like your recent infographic—play in sharing your findings and engaging broader audiences?
I see visual and graphic methods as a bridge between academic research and public engagement. My goal is to make complex ideas about migration, labour, and inequality more accessible to a broader audience, especially to the communities that participate in my research. The infographic I co-created with visual interpreter Sofia Donner summarizes early findings from the Bridging Divides project, showing how immigrant workers in Canada’s platform and remote economy navigate flexibility, precarity, and belonging. I love working with Sofi because creative approaches make research more collaborative, even for those without an artistic gift. Being able to communicate complex ideas to a visual interpreter helps me think more clearly about how to convey the findings to those who can benefit most from engaging with them.
You’re also planning to organize a series of workshops as part of your fellowship—what will they focus on, and what do you hope to achieve through them?
The workshops are designed as creative, participatory spaces where gig and remote workers, as well as the community at large, can come together to reflect on their experiences of work, balance, and belonging. Using mapping and arts-based activities, participants are invited to visualize their daily routines and challenges within the platform economy. The goal is to generate dialogue that bridges research and lived experience, fostering conversations that can inform more inclusive employment policies and foster community for immigrant workers in Canada’s platform economy. Join us to be part of the conversation!
- Learn about our findings to support migrant labour
October 25, 1:30 to 3:30 PM, UBC Robson Square - Create and reflect on your experiences
October 27, 1:30 to 3:30 PM, UBC Robson Square
