Re-assembling the assembly line: AI, co-performance and the more- than-human in automotive production
BSA New Materialisms Study Group One-day Conference: Matter, Rhizomes, and More-than-Human Sociology Annual Conference 2026, London, England, 22 June 2026, pp.5, (Summary Text)
- Publication Type: Conference Paper / Summary Text
- City: London
- Country: England
- Page Numbers: pp.5
- Hacettepe University Affiliated: Yes
Abstract
This paper examines the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) in the Turkish automotive industry by conceptualising the factory floor as a socio-technical network. Drawing on the combined lenses
of Actor-Network Theory and more-than-human sociology, it argues for a shift from anthropocentric labour frameworks towards a notion of co-performance, in which agency and responsibility are distributed across human actors and AI as non-human actants. Within this production network, AI participates in the organisation of work through its material and algorithmic relations with workers. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork conducted in two large-scale manufacturing sites, an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) and a supplier, the study is based on interviews with blue- and white-collar workers alongside observations of AI-mediated processes. The analysis traces how workers and AI systems co-perform everyday production through interactions mediated by interfaces, alerts, and system outputs. In doing so, it examines the transformation of the production process and production relations. The paper contributes to more-than-human sociology by offering an empirically grounded account of how labour processes are reassembled through human-AI entanglements in contemporary industrial settings.