Control at Work in the Age of AI /w Nicole Aschoff

This is the 2025 edition of the Leo Panitch School for Socialist Education’s annual winter lecture! We are overjoyed to be welcoming Nicole Aschoff to deliver this year’s lecture. This event marks the third edition of the school’s annual winter lecture, held in the memory of the late Leo Panitch.

Artificial intelligence will bring the final destruction of good jobs. Soon all jobs will be subject to elimination or degradation! Or so we are told. This technologically determinist vision, while pervasive, ignores the power of working people to shape the future.

What exactly is artificial intelligence? And how is it being used to restructure work? More importantly, how can ordinary people fight for, and win, control in the workplace?

This wide-ranging discussion examines the modern landscape of work, drawing on the lessons from the past to better prepare for the struggles over automation and artificial intelligence ahead.

0:00 Introduction by Matt
3:30 Nicole Aschoff
41:10 Roundtable with Sam and Tori
1:02:35 Q+A with audience

Recorded in Toronto, 1 March 2025.