"This study examines how digital platforms transform traditional patterns of grassroots labor mobilisation through a comparative analysis of two cases: the 2021 formation of Foreningen af Danske Sygeplejersker by nurses in Denmark and Las Kellys, an association of Spanish hotel chambermaids. While both organisations emerged from female-dominated sectors, their divergent trajectories show how institutional contexts and professional identities shape digital organising outcomes. Through analysis of social media data and interviews, we show how these groups used digital platforms to simultaneously maintain multiple forms of engagement: building collective identity among dispersed workers, challenging union leadership, and gaining public visibility.
In Denmark, FDS's targeted social media approach harnessed nurses' professional cohesion to successfully pressure their union into adapting wage demands, eventually leading to accommodation within existing structures. In Spain, Las Kellys' broader community-building strategy helped overcome worker isolation but resulted in organisational fragmentation, with some chapters becoming formal unions while others remained associations.
The comparison reveals how similar digital tools can produce different organisational outcomes depending on workers' structural position and unions' capacity for democratic renewal. Our findings contribute to understanding how digital platforms enable sustained grassroots engagement while highlighting the continued importance of institutional contexts and union democratic practices in shaping labor movement trajectories."

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