Migrant workers in the East Midlands labour market 2010

This report is an update of previous intelligence (Migrant Workers in the East Midlands Labour Market 2007) on the profile and economic impact of migrant labour in the East Midlands economy

The role of corporate social responsibility and soft law options in the protection of migrant workers' interests in host countries: the case of Malaysia

This article examines the potential for corporate social responsibility (CSR) and other soft law initiatives in generating change for blue-collar migrant workers in the Malaysian workplace. We explain the absence thus far of adequate protection for blue-collar migrant labour in formal law and corporate governance from a 'path-dependence' perspective and examine the potential of soft law options and government policies on labour migration as possible catalysts of change. The impact of the 1997 Asian fijinancial crisis in creating new corporate governance rules and government support for the development of CSR is discussed along with international initiatives, such as the United Nations Global Compact, whereby Malaysian companies have committed to playing a positive role in creating favourable outcomes for labour and human rights. Avenues of development vis-a-vis CSR and other soft law mechanisms for blue-collar migrant workers are offered. We conclude with a comment on the trajectory for CSR, soft law options and blue-collar migrant employee relations in Malaysia by highlighting the potential for hybrid labour regulation, whereby soft law may be hardened through creative methods of interpretation by the courts

Work related rights of foreign migrant workers in Viet Nam

Viet Nam today is deeper integrating into the global economy. In 2012/2013 the new Labour Code and amended Trade Union Law were promulgated and enacted. Numerous implementation Decrees and Circulars were introduced and enacted accordingly, which directly relate to the lives and work of the workers including foreign migrant workers. This article aims at examining and discussing the issues on foreign migrant workers in the contemporary Viet Nam. It is shown that despite positive changes in the new policies and laws the Vietnamese authority bodies have remain ineffectively responded to the issue of foreign labour in the context of significant economic growth

The making of a new working class? A study of collective actions of migrant workers in South China

In this study, we argue that the specific process of the proletarianization of Chinese migrant workers contributes to the recent rise of labour protests. Most of the collective actions involve workers' conflict with management at the point of production, while simultaneously entailing labour organizing in dormitories and communities. The type of living space, including workers' dormitories and migrant communities, facilitates collective actions organized not only on bases of locality, ethnicity, gender and peer alliance in a single workplace, but also on attempts to nurture workers' solidarity in a broader sense of a labour oppositional force moving beyond exclusive networks and ties, sometimes even involving cross-factory strike tactics. These collective actions are mostly interest-based, accompanied by a strong anti-foreign capital sentiment and a discourse of workers' rights. By providing detailed cases of workers' strikes in 2004 and 2007, we suggest that the making of a new working class is increasingly conscious of and participating in interest-based or class-oriented labour protests

Migrant Rights are Human Rights

Although it is the case that a rights discourse has become part of everyday language, the discourse remains relatively weak when it comes to migrant workers in Canada and around the world. Most certainly, the rights discourse has not been translated into everyday practices that protect the rights of migrant workers and their families worldwide. In fact, although we have the language of rights clearly articulated in the 1990 UN International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families (ICMW) which offers significant protections for migrant workers, Canada and most other receiving countries have yet to ratify this agreement. Similarly, Canada has not ratified the two International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions that pertain to the rights of migrant workers, C97 Migration for Employment Convention (Revised) (1949) and C143 Migrant Workers (Supplementary Provisions) Conventions (1975). By ratifying these agreements, receiving countries would send a signal that the rights discourse applies to migrants as well as citizens, and it would also indicate a commitment to taking concrete steps towards protecting migrant rights. striking feature of contemporary patterns in international migration is the rising number of migrant workers leaving their homes in the global South for jobs in high‐income countries. Many high income states have turned to immigration policy to meet employer labour needs through temporary migration, creating new programs or increasing the volume of older versions. The United States, for example, now has over 80 types of temporary visas. In the UK, the liberalization of labour mobility has led to an estimated one million migrant workers arriving from EU accession countries in three short years. While some of these managed migration schemes provide a stepping stone for permanent residence, which is particularly the case with skilled workers, those in so‐called low‐skilled or unskilled occupations are generally designed to prevent settlement and restrict mobility. However, as evidenced by the history of temporary migration schemes in Europe and the U.S., temporary migration schemes are never temporary and tend to lead to long term settlement and a growth in undocumented migration. Since the significant demand for workers often exceeds the capacities of legal programs, and there are limited permanent migration channels for many migrants from developing countries (particularly those living in poverty), means that there is significant growth in undocumented migration as well

Imagining and producing the 'good' migrant: the role of recruitment agencies in shaping bodily goodness

This paper focuses on representations of labour migrants and interrogates how such imaginaries shape migrant recruitment and employment regimes. The recruitment and employment of labour migrants inevitably involves a range of knowledge practices which affect who is recruited, from where and for what purposes. In particular this paper seeks to advance understandings of how images of ‘bodily goodness’ are represented graphically and how perceptions of migrant workers influence the recruitment of workers from Latvia. The analysis results in a schema of the ‘filtering’ processes that are enacted to ‘produce’ the ‘ideal’ migrant worker

Foreign Labour Migration and the Economic Crisis in the EU: Ongoing and Remaining Issues of the Migrant Workforce in Germany

This paper provides an evaluation of the status of migrant workers in Germany amidst the global financial crisis. Findings of the study are drawn from the latest available data on the labour market performance of native-German and non-German migrant workers as well as other socioeconomic integration measures of the receiving state. Compared to the experience of migrants in most of the major receiving states of the EU, the status of the predominantly low-skilled sector-employed migrant workers in Germany, where primarily the skilled-workforce concentrated industries of high-value products is affected, has remained unchanged during the crisis. On the other hand, marginalisation of the ethnic and national minority population appears to be a persistent phenomenon marked by long-standing labour market exclusion. This is manifested in over two decades of double-digit unemployment rates of the foreign migrant population in the former ‘guest-worker’ importing country. This implies for the economy the need to settle long-term problems and implement strategies towards a better labour market integration of the minority migrant population beyond the recent recession.global financial crisis, low-skilled sector, migrant workers, guest-workers, labour market integration, minority migrant population

No. 23: Labour Migration Trends and Policies in Southern Africa

Since 1990, there have been major changes to longstanding patterns of intra-regional labour migration within the Southern African Development Community (SADC). At the same time, new channels of migration to and from the region have opened. Labour migration is now more voluminous, dynamic and complex than it has ever been. This presents policy-makers with considerable opportunities and challenges. In order to understand the exact nature of these challenges, it is important to have a good grasp of current labour migration characteristics and trends. Unfortunately, reliable, accurate and comprehensive data on labour migration is not available. The quality and currency of data varies considerably from country to country. A regional labour migration observatory would make the future writing of an overview of migration trends a much easier task. The primary objectives of this overview of labour migration trends and policy implications is fourfold: (a) to review recent characteristics and trends in labour migration within and from the SADC region. Official statistics as well as recent survey data are drawn on to generate an overall picture of current characteristics and trends in the region; (b) to highlight some of the critical and urgent issues pertaining to labour migration in the region; (c) to discuss the main features of labour migration strategies and policies and legislative and regulatory frameworks in countries covered by the Southern African Development Community (SADC); and (d) to review the prospects for the freer circulation of migrant labour in the Southern African region. This brief focuses primarily on the period since 1990 and restructuring of labour migration in the wake of the collapse of apartheid, new global migration forces, the end of the wars in Mozambique and Angola and the current economic and political situation in Zimbabwe. Although the brief provides an overview of the region as a whole, the report concentrates on the major labour migration channels in the region (from countries such as Lesotho, Swaziland, Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe to South Africa). The report also considers the nature and implications of new migrant movements to and from SADC

The Effect of Work Migration on Domestic Labour Supply in Albania

Using information from the Albania Panel Survey 2002-2003, we study the determinants of labour market states (market work, home production, inactivity) of married women in Albania, looking in particular on the effect of husbands’ migrant work activity and the receipt of remittances. We further explore the determinants of joint labour market states of spouses considered in our sample, distinguishing the above three states and work migration abroad in the case of husbands, to account for the possibility that the migrant state of the husband may be endogenous with respect to the state of the wife. Our findings shot what wives of working migrant husbands are most likely to pursue home production, which may be due to weaker labour market attachment of the households sending working migrant men abroad. Our results do not support the view that wives receiving income from family members working abroad choose to consume more leisure as compared with wives lacking such income.work migration, labour supply, remittances, Albania

Spaces of work and everyday life: labour geographies and the agency of unorganised temporary migrant workers

In this study, I focus on the agency of unorganised temporary migrant workers' people who travel away to work for just a few weeks or months. Such workers have been relatively neglected in labour geography. Perhaps surprisingly, given the focus on the agency of capital in much of his writing, I build on two arguments made by David Harvey. First, workers' spatial mobility is complex and may involve short as well as longer term migrations, and secondly that this can have significance both materially and in relation to the subjective experience of employment. The spatial embeddedness of temporary migrant workers' everyday lives can be a resource for shaping landscapes (and ordinary histories) of capitalism, even though any changes may be short-lived and take place at the micro-scale. The article is illustrated with case study material from research with workers in the agriculture sector in India and the UK, and concludes with more general implications for labour geographers engaged with other sectors and places