A boss who does not hesitate to encourage civil disobedience is not common. Even less when it comes to the CEO of a multinational, in this case Uber. And even despite warnings about potential violent slippages. The American boss of the VTC giant, Travis Kalanick, had this arsonist behavior, according to the revelations this Sunday evening from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which had access to 124,000 internal documents at Uber, dated from 2013 to 2017.
In 2015, while French taxi drivers were protesting against the wild development of VTCs, in particular via the Uber Pop application, Travis Kalanick would have himself proposed to organize a counter-movement of VTC drivers in France. “Kalanick asked his French executives to encourage Uber drivers to mount a counter-protest with massive civil disobedience,” Write the Guardianwho procured the documents on behalf of the ICIJ.
“I think it’s worth it”
That’s not all. Warned internally of the danger of exposing the VTC drivers in question to violence, in particular from “far-right thugs” who would have infiltrated the taxi demos and would be “looking for the clash”, Travis Kalanick wouldn’t have taken his foot off the pedal. On the contrary. “I think it’s worth it”, would he have responded to these warnings, arguing that “Violence is the guarantee of success. Besides, these guys are worth resisting, aren’t they? You just have to think about the right place and the right time.
In France, several demonstrations by taxi drivers were marred by violence. On June 25, 2015, clashes erupted in Paris between drivers and CRS. Seven police officers had been injured, 70 cars – supposedly belonging to VTC drivers – had been degraded and there had been ten arrests. Counter-demonstrations by VTC drivers had actually taken place, notably on February 3, 2016 in Paris.
According to the Guardian, the decision to send Uber drivers to potentially violent protests was made with full knowledge of the facts. The British daily quotes a former senior manager of the box, who speaks of “strategy of using drivers as a weapon” and to exploit violence against them to “maintain controversy”. In a press release sent to Guardiana spokesperson for Travis Kalanick said today that he “never suggested that Uber profit from violence at the expense of driver safety” and that any statement suggesting otherwise would be completely false.