Abstract
Much has been written already about precarious working conditions and labour regulation issues in the platform economy both from the Global North and Global South contexts. However, little is known about the role of social capital in enabling Global South workers to enter the platform economy and the ways in which platforms workers leverage their social networks to navigate and survive. This paper uses the social capital framework to address this gap. Drawing on data from in-depth interviews with 27 ridesharing drivers in Dhaka and 32 ridesharing drivers in Nairobi, this paper argues that social capital remains spatially contingent and how workers leverage their social capital to navigate their everyday lives in the platform economy depend on their socio-political contexts.