Uber and fellow rideshare companies like Lyft are now ubiquitous in US cities, a symbol of the success of Silicon Valley capitalism and the growth of precarious, low-wage gig work in the twenty-first century. Uber’s rise was far from peaceful; under the banner of “disruption,” the company has displaced traditional taxicabs and conquered markets by violating labor law and other regulations with impunity.

In their book, Disrupting D.C.: The Rise of Uber and the Fall of the City, Katie J. Wells, Kafui Attoh, and Declan Cullen chart how Uber overcame early resistance to its operations in Washington, DC, a victory that provided a model for the company’s conquest of other cities around the globe. The authors argue that failed neoliberal policies by city governments in DC and elsewhere helped lay the groundwork for Uber’s rise — in large part by undermining citizens’ confidence that government could solve long-standing problems like broken public transit and underemployment. Jacobin contributor Sara Wexler recently interviewed Wells, Attoh, and Cullen about the conditions that allowed Uber to flourish, the false “solutions” it has offered to policymakers, and how we might restore faith in the public sphere.