Producing Migrant Domestic Work: Exploring the Everyday Political Economy of Malaysia's ‘Maid Shortage’

Abstract

The article considers how the employment of domestic workers by middle-class Malaysian households has been thrown into flux by the imposition of bans on the sending of workers by states such as Indonesia and Cambodia, as well as the decline in numbers of women seeking employment as domestic workers in Malaysia and rising employment costs. This article does not seek to focus on the high-level policy negotiations and disputes that have come to characterize systems of temporary return migration for domestic work in Asia, but to focus in on the everyday political economies (of social reproduction, work, and everyday agency) that constitute the conditions of possibility within which bilateral disputes and labour agreements between Southeast Asian states take shape. We examine three dimensions of migration for domestic work in Southeast Asia in ways that bring together literatures on everyday life and social reproduction. These interconnected yet distinct dimensions are (a) the relationship between strategies to boost remittances and flows of workers from some of the most impoverished parts of Southeast Asia; (b) the centrality of low-cost migrant domestic workers to Malaysian middle-class ‘success stories’, and (c) the day-to-day production of ‘good’ worker subjects—a process that is actively and constantly resisted by workers themselves. The article provides important insights into the mechanisms through arenas of everyday life—and the household in particular—are transformed; becoming sites for the ever widening and deepening of the market economy.     

International migration,international relations and foreign policy

Recent literature on migration, international relations, and foreign policy is reviewed in this article, stressing applications of global systems paradigms, studies of state entry and exit rules, and anatomies of domestic policy-setting processes on migration. After a concise assessment of the contemporary theory of global political economy, the paper argues for seeking mid-range generalizations on the international relations of migration. It also suggests that analysis begin with the policy-setting processes of the state. Especially through the use of comparative perspectives available from domestic policy making studies and from the field of international comparative public policy, this approach offers the opportunity to fix empirically the political roles of transnational social forces, which often present themselves as participants in domestic policy contests. Promising future directions in the study of state-to-state relations are also evaluated, with the anticipation that verifying regional or other intermediate patterns of world migration politics may contribute to more general theories of international political economy.     

Knowledge,International Relations and the structure–agency debate: towards the concept of “epistemic selectivities”†

The aim of this article is to develop a framework within which the role and social construction of knowledge in International Relations can be understood and theoretically underpinned. In order to do so, the article discusses post-structuralist and neo-Gramscian answers to the structure–agency debate and argues that the role of knowledge remains rather implicit in both understandings on how structure and agency are mutually constituted. The main argument of the article is that the social construction of knowledge can only be understood, if International Relations are analysed in terms of a dialectically constituted relationship between structure and agency visible in and through processes whereby science and expert knowledge are referred to as true and policy relevant. On this basis, the article develops the concept of “epistemic selectivities”, which describes how the use of science and expert knowledge to underpin strategic action leads to hegemonic patterns in the way in which (scientific) expert knowledge is related to particular claims of policies and facts.     

Race-based affirmative action in Malaysia: Misrecognised subjectivities,enduring inequalities

Malaysia's race-based affirmative action is often studied within the objective domain of resource deficit and distribution. In this paper, I focus on the subjective domain to interrogate how the racial identity modes of Bumiputera Malay youths shape their social attitudes towards affirmative action in Malaysia. Drawing on in-depth interviews, I posit three racial identity modes that correspond to three social attitudes towards affirmative action. The findings point to the disjuncture between Malay subjectivities and their colonial construction; the contestations over affirmative action that go beyond redistribution to recognition; and the neglect of intersectionality in conceptualising Bumiputera disadvantages. I argue that affirmative action can be better understood by incorporating non-elite perspectives, featuring different sites, scales and actors in the reproduction of subjectivities; the politics of affirmative action has to be reconstituted as struggles for recognition and redistribution; and the intersectional disadvantages of Bumiputeras must be foregrounded in the reclaiming of this policy agenda in Malaysia.     

Foreign Labour Migration in Sarawak,East Malaysia

Foreign labour force participation in Sarawak is thirteen per cent (about 138,027) workers from Indonesia, Philippines, Myanmar, China and India, among others. This article attempts to describe the management of foreign labour employment in Sarawak. It also attempts to identify challenges and issues that current migration regulations have generated and which have impacted the society. Using the Filipino migrant workers as informants, a two-year period of fieldwork observation was conducted, using personal interviews and observations following the ‘mobile ethnography approach’. While Sarawak maintains its immigration control as part of the State safety net, the interplay between state and federal laws engenders contradictions that may be detrimental to the people and to society. This article argues that the claimed autonomous position of Sarawak in regard to immigration is not equated to better labour migration management in relation to the federal government’s approach to labour migration in Malaysia.     

The spatiality of social relations: an Indian case-study

Using ethnographic information, the paper asserts the significance of space–society relations in rural India. In particular, the paper shows that material interests of classes and other social groups are normally tied to particular geographical areas. So agrarian social relations are local relations. Similarly, given the territorial organization of the state, state–society relations are local relations too. Thus as locally dependent members of classes and other collectivities and as citizens dependent on local branches of the state, people often find themselves predisposed to interact locally. There is also a counter-tendency to this in that people try to escape local dependence and interact with distant places. In either case, social relations are spatial relations, and the fact that social relations are spatial relations makes some difference to the way society works, although the specific ways in which this spatiality makes a difference are place-specific. The paper shows that social processes such as economic development, class conflict, reproduction of caste and kinship relations and performance of public policies can be better understood if we analyse the spatiality of these processes in particular places.     

Social policy and population growth in South-East Asia

Social and population policies are considered for the 10 countries comprising Southeast Asia--Burma, Indonesia, the Khmer Republic, Laos, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, North Vietnam, and South Vietnam. All but Singapore have high fertility rates and Burma, Indonesia, the Khmer Republic, Laos and the two Vietnams have high mortality rates also. Government expenditures for education and social security systems is expanding throughout the region and it is hoped that their continued growth will contribute substantially to the effective implementation of population policies. Population policies in the 5 countries which have them are discussed. These are Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. It is noted, however, that declaration of policy is but the first step. Strategies and programs differ from one country to the next and depend very much on the stage of development, level of literacy, degree of urbanization, and other factors. Family planning activities generally are endogenous to urban social systems but exogenous to rural social systems. Thus, the rural elite has a large role to play in making population policies an integral part of rural life. The possibility is considered of developing workable incentive packages integrating health, education, and social security benefits with suitable emphasis on fertility reduction.     

‘Coming Down to the Shop’: Trajectories of Hadhrami Women into Indonesian Public Realms

This article is concerned with the trajectories of Indonesian women of Hadhrami-Arab descent into public realms. It enquires how their agency has developed out of a particular diasporic tradition that has brought a gender order to colonial Indonesia characterised by a rigid division of public and domestic domains. In Indonesia, Hadhrami concepts of the public and domestic encountered local and governmental gender regimes and experienced considerable transformations in recent decades. The article shows how Hadhrami women coped with this dynamic and manifold field of gender relations and examines the expansion of their agency into Indonesian public realms paying particular attention to their economic activities, their public roles as skilled employees and professionals, and their engagement in the women's wings of Hadhrami-Islamic organisations. The article concludes that their deployment of particular Islamic discourses stressing piousness through the construction of a gendered hierarchy in the domestic but not in the public sphere underpins their agency in today's Indonesia which witnesses a general trend towards the appearance of self-consciously pious Muslim women.     

Benefit–Cost Appraisals of Export Processing Zones: A Survey of the Literature

This article surveys research on the performance of Export Processing Zones (EPZs) using a benefit–cost analytical framework. Results suggest that zones in South Korea, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, China and Indonesia are economically efficient and generate returns well above estimated opportunity costs. On the other hand, the heavy infrastructure costs involved in setting up the zone in the Philippines resulted in a negative net present value. The zones have been an important source of employment in all cases and have promoted local entrepreneurs in some. However, as industrial development proceeds, the gap between the market and opportunity costs of labour narrows and the interest in EPZs tends to disappear. It may hold only if the zones generate private profit to domestic shareholders.     

TERROR AND THE COLONIAL IMAGINATION AT WORK IN THE TRANSNATIONAL CORPORATE SPACES OF JAKARTA,INDONESIA

This article examines the role of the imagination in the construction of meaningful places out of economically defined and organized spaces. It seeks to understand the processes through which a colonial imagery is deployed in the negotiation of a complex and continually transforming transnational corporate order. This article is based on research conducted while working as a cross-cultural trainer within a transnational corporate office space in Jakarta, Indonesia. I discuss cross-cultural training as a space within which a colonial discourse based on terror and uncertainty persists, producing an ambivalent understanding of foreign overseas labor. I argue that a colonial approach to the social relations that take place within trans-national spaces persists for both Western-born and Indonesian members of the transnational capitalist class and is central to their perspective on capitalist expansion.     

Rethinking the nation and international relations: The space of nation states

Efforts to move sociology beyond the nation state and international relations theory have both been plagued by several limitations and dualisms. Recent research has begun to find ways beyond the problems by turning to Pierre Bourdieu's relational conception of social structure and practice. Yet one specific relational structure forming a key part of the puzzle has been neglected or merely implicitly assumed so far: the space of nation states. After clarifying the structural-constructivist nature of this concept, we aim to specify it by constructing an empirical model of the contemporary space of nation states using a specially compiled dataset and tools of geometric data analysis. The analysis reveals the distribution of powers on the world scene, and more specifically, the uneven possession of two varieties of “meta-capital” understood as capacities to regulate the value and exchangeability of certain capitals and to decree what even defines a legitimate “state”. We argue that the nation state, which is accurately understood as a contingent construct and well-founded fiction from a Bourdieusian viewpoint, should not be excluded when analyzing the expression and reproduction of contemporary global power relations.     

Migrant female domestic workers: debating the economic,social and political impacts in Singapore

This article analyzes the impact of migrant female domestic workers on the socioeconomic and political context in Singapore. Although Singapore state policy opposes long-term immigration, there is a labor shortage which permits a transient work force of low-skilled foreign workers. In the late 1990s, Singapore had over 100,000 foreign maids, of whom 75% were from the Philippines, 20% were from Indonesia, and the rest were from Sri Lanka. Legislation ensures their short-term migrant status, restricts their numbers, and governs their employment. Migrant workers are also regulated through a stringent allocation system based on household income of employers and the need for caregivers for children. Work permits are conditioned on non-marriage to citizens of Singapore or pregnancy. Terms and conditions of migrant employment are not specified, which permits long hours of work and potential for inhumane treatment. Migrant women fulfill jobs not desired by natives and accept these jobs at lower wages. There is disagreement about the motivation for the maid levy and its need, fairness, and effectiveness in reducing demand for foreign maids. Most public discussion focuses on social values and morality of foreign maids. Politically, tensions arise over the legality of migration, which results from tourist worker migration to Singapore and circumvents Filipino labor controls. Most of the adjustment cases that come to the attention of OWWA are tourist workers. Policies should be gender sensitive.     

(Dis)unity and Diversity in Post-9/11 America

Drawing inspiration from the work of Robin M. Williams Jr., I map out the complexities of ethnic and racial relations in the contemporary United States by focusing on the impacts of 9/11—particularly in relation to immigration policy. Because the attackers entered the country through regular immigration channels (i.e., as foreign students) the U.S. government has introduced policies to enhance border security, restrict immigration, increase the surveillance of immigrant populations, and more actively enforce immigration policy. These national-security-related immigration policies, however, are exacerbating existing tensions and producing new sets of ethnic and racialized conflicts in the United States. In this article, I first provide an overview of the key national-security-related immigration policies that were passed in the wake of September 11, 2001. Then, I review some of the recent sociological literature, as well as draw from my own preliminary research in the State of New Jersey, to illustrate the social impacts of these policies on ethnic and racial relations. I conclude with an outline of the ways the sociology of ethnic and racial relations specifically, as well as other subfields of the discipline, might approach analyses of social conflict in the contemporary United States, post–September 11.     

NGOization,Foreign Funding,and the Nicaraguan Civil Society

A substantial section of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in the global South depend on foreign funds to conduct their operations. This paper explores how the availability of foreign funding affects their downward accountability, abilities to effect social change, and their relative influence in relation to traditional grassroots, membership-based organizations (GROs), which tend not to receive such funding. Drawing on a case study of Nicaragua, we challenge the notion that foreign funding of domestic NGOs leads to the evolution of civil society organizations, which have incentives and abilities to organize the marginalized sections of society in ways to effect social change in their interests. Instead, we find that foreign funding and corresponding professionalization of the NGO sector creates dualism among domestic civil society organizations. Foreign funding enhances the visibility and prestige of the “modern” NGO sector over traditional GROs. This has grave policy implications because foreign-funded NGOs tend to be more accountable to donors than beneficiaries and are more focused on service delivery than social change-oriented advocacy.     

Engineered Migration and the Use of Refugees as Political Weapons: A Case Study of the 1994 Cuban Balseros Crisis

This paper presents a case study of the August 1994 Cuban balseros crisis, during which more than 35,000 fled the island and headed toward Florida in the span of a few weeks. It argues that Castro launched the crisis in an attempt to manipulate US fears of another Mariel, and in order to compel a shift in US policy, both on immigration and on a wider variety of issues. The paper further contends that from Castro’s perspective, this exercise in coercion proved a qualified success – his third such successful use of the Cuban people as an asymmetric political weapon against the US. In addition, the paper argues that Castro’s success was predicated on his ability to internationalize his own domestic crisis and transform it into an American domestic political and foreign policy crisis. Finally, it offers a novel explanation of how, why, and under what conditions, states and/or non–state actors may attempt to use refugees as coercive political weapons. Although dwarfed in size by the larger 1980 Mariel boatlift, the 1994 crisis is important for several reasons. First, despite its brevity, it had far reaching consequences for US–Cuban relations. Without warning or preamble, it catalyzed a shift in US policy vis–à–vis Cuban immigration that represented a radical departure from what it had been for the previous three decades. Second, it influenced US domestic politics on the national level, by expanding the scope and salience of the issue, and mobilizing not only Floridians, but also the larger public concerned about illegal immigration. Third, the crisis illustrated the potential potency of engineered migration as an asymmetric weapon of the weak. Finally, the brief, but significant, interactions of international and domestic actors in this case warrant examination because, although the 1994 crisis was limited, in its dynamics it resembles myriad other international refugee crises, large and small. Thus the case offers valuable lessons that may aid in dealing with future (real or threatened) crises.     

The resonance of moderate feminism and the gendered relations of austerity

During the tenure of the UK Conservative‐led coalition government (2010–15) austerity policy was rolled out in response to the global financial crisis of 2007–08. In this article a discourse analysis of mainstream newspaper representations of austerity, which appeared throughout this period, is undertaken using the principles of Cultural Political Economy (Jessop 2004). Three key questions are posed: 1) How is gender drawn upon to render austerity intelligible? 2) How do these discursive constructions contribute to the reproduction of particular ideas regarding contemporary gender relations? 3) What do these gendered austerity discourses reveal about the institutionalisation of particular forms of feminism? A critical gender discourse which emphasised equality appeared alongside constructions of gender that reproduced problematic assumptions. Made meaningful in this way, austerity, as a strategy for restoring pre‐crash social arrangements, also restored particular aspects of gender relations. This is theorised as the product of the successful institutionalisation of a hegemonic, moderate liberal feminism prior to the financial crash. The findings contribute to debates within feminist scholarship about the dynamics of gender inclusion and extend our understanding of the associated implications for feminist critique.     

Stitching-up the labour market

In mainstream International Political Economy (IPE) writings on globalization, the multinational corporation (MNC) is placed at the centre of the emergence of a global market economy. Allied to this view is the normative position that these firms will have a positive, developmental impact on the states that they invest in. This article presents a gendered political economy perspective on the process of foreign direct investment (FDI), arguing that liberal IPE has failed to understand adequately the impact of the MNC on host states because of its attachment to ideas of rational action and modernization, and its assumption that the market is a gender-neutral space. By contrast, in this article, I argue that by looking at the gendered nature of recruitment practices within an MNC we are forced to confront the way in which firms work with existing inequalities embedded in the economy of the host state in order to secure a supply of low cost labour. The article presents case study research from an MNC operating in Malaysia, focusing on how company recruitment intersects with local social divisions based upon gender, ethnicity as well as age, rural–urban divides, class and education. I suggest that via its recruitment strategies, the firm plays a role in the construction of gendered and racialized inequalities. I argue that the MNC needs to be investigated as a site for the active construction of gendered identities across globalizing production lines, thus moving away from the traditional focus of feminist analysis of East Asian development on the experiences of the workers themselves.     

American foundations and the development of international knowledge networks

This article examines the role and influence of three American foundations – Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Ford – in developing international knowledge networks that significantly impacted upon the Third World, helping to consolidate US hegemony after 1945, fostering pro‐US values, methods and research institutions. The international networks were modelled on prior domestic initiatives resulting in the effective intellectual hegemony of ‘liberal internationalism’, of empirical scientific research methods, and of policy‐oriented studies. Such domestic hegemony constructed a key basis of America’s rise to globalism, which after 1945 required a continuing and enhanced foundation role, especially with the onset of the Cold War. The article, which examines the role of the US foundations in relation to intellectual hegemony construction in Latin America, Indonesia, and Africa, concludes that the evidence is best explained by Gramscian theory, and calls for further empirical research in this vital area.     

‘Our world was made by nature’: constructions of spontaneous order

ABSTRACT

This article explores the concepts of spontaneity and spontaneous order, in particular their deployment by Friedrich Hayek and Karl Polanyi. Although in many respects these thinkers were poles apart, the article identifies a point of convergence. They both mobilize the concept of spontaneity in a manner that naturalizes a particular social process: for Hayek, the market economy, for Polanyi, society’s protective movement that arises in reaction against the market economy. To contextualize the uses of spontaneity by Hayek and Polanyi, I trace its evolution, with reference to Leibniz, Mandeville, and the thinkers of the Scottish Enlightenment. Having sketched the ways in which earlier thinkers understood spontaneity, I turn finally to Hayek and Polanyi. I argue that their invocations of spontaneity and spontaneous order contribute to a downplaying of relations of domination and exploitation. While Hayek sees the market system as the exemplar of spontaneous order, for Polanyi, the concept of spontaneity underpins his belief that the protective countermovement is a ‘natural’ reaction to the evils of market society; as such, power relations pass beneath the radar.