Affecting Lives: How Winning the US Diversity Visa Lottery Impacts DV Migrants Pre‐ and Post‐Migration

Usual debates about the diversity visa (DV) programme revolve around the impact of DV initiated mass migration on African countries’ development, on whether the programme sufficiently diversifies U.S. immigrant streams, and on whether there is a tradeoff in immigrant quality for diversity. This article seeks to extend the focus of these debates by examining the impact of the diversity visa programme on DV migrants at the micro‐level pre‐ and post‐migration. Based on in‐depth interviews with sixty‐one diversity visa lottery winners from Ghana and Nigeria, the article examines how this immigration policy has become a contextual determinant of immigrant incorporation. It argues that an account of the impact of immigration policies on immigrants pre‐ and post‐migration must be added to theorization of state agency in shaping migration flows. It concludes with a discussion on ways the diversity visa programme can be modified to facilitate incorporation of DV migrants in the United States.     

He Came, He Saw, He Stayed. Guest Worker Programmes and the Issue of Non-Return

Critics of guest worker programmes have pointed out that many temporary workers do not return home when their contracts expire and thus end up swelling the ranks of undocumented workers in a host country. This article argues that this outcome is not inevitable. Whether or not guest workers return home or stay behind depends to a large extent on how the guest worker programme is administered. By comparing the US Bracero Program with the Canadian Mexican Agricultural Seasonal Workers' Program, it is shown that three aspects of programme administration account for why so many Braceros stayed in the US illegally, while almost all temporary workers employed in Canada return to Mexico at the end of the season. The three aspects are recruitment policies and procedures, enforcement of employment and housing-related minimum standards, and the size of the programme. It is suggested that the administration of the programme, in turn, reflects various interests that shape the State's position on foreign labour. Whereas in the US the Bracero Program was tailored to meet the needs of agribusinesses, the Canadian state responds to a wider variety of interests, including its own concern with the definition of ideal citizenship, as well as the need to protect domestic workers and the Mexican Government's interest in assisting those who are most needy. Additionally, unlike the US, where braceros were employed mainly in agribusinesses, in Canada Mexicans are brought to work on family farms. While desertion was a frequent phenomenon in the US, the paternalistic relationships that Canada-bound workers develop with their employers make desertion unlikely.     

Absent men: paid domestic work,sexual exploitation and male domination in the family in the USA

This article analyzes the sexual exploitation of paid domestic workers in the US through the lens of male domination in employing families. Departing from the dominant tendency in studies of paid domestic work to focus on relationships between female employers and workers, the article addresses the role of male domination and patriarchal family structures within employing families in the sexual exploitation of domestic workers by male employers. Using materialist feminist approaches, the article argues that domestic workers’ experiences should be seen as embedded in the patriarchal environment created by male household heads who appropriate the labor of other household members, including wives, children and paid domestic workers. The sexual exploitation of domestic workers is then analyzed as being a result of the appropriation of women’s entire personhood by men within the relationship of sexage outlined by Colette Guillaumin.     

Local Produce,Foreign Labor: Labor Mobility Programs and Global Trade Competitiveness in Canada*

Abstract Temporary visa workers are increasingly taking on a heightened profile in Canada, entering the workforce each year in greater numbers than immigrant workers with labor mobility rights (Sharma 2006). This paper examines the incorporation of foreign workers in Canadian horticulture under the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program (SAWP). I argue that foreign labor supplied under the SAWP secures a flexible workforce for employers and thus improves Canada's trade competitiveness in the global agrifood market. Using multiple research strategies, I track the evolution of Canadian horticulture in the global market and the transformation of labor in this industry. I outline the steady growth in the employment of temporary visa workers in the horticultural industry and show how they have become the preferred and, in some cases, core workforce for horticulture operations. The benefits of SAWP workers to employers include the provision of a workforce with limited rights relative to domestic workers and considerable administrative support in selecting, dispatching, and disciplining workers provided at no cost by labor supply countries. I conclude that the SAWP is a noteworthy example of the role of immigration policy in regulating the labor markets of high‐income economies and thus ensuring the position of labor‐receiving states within the global political economy.     

Temporary Skilled Migration to Australia: Employers' Perspectives1

With the 1996 introduction of a new visa making it easier for employers to sponsor skilled foreign workers, temporary skilled migration has become a significant component of international migration flows to Australia. This paper examines employers' reasons for sponsoring skilled workers from abroad, their modes of recruitment, the occupational skills they require, and their industry profile. We also discuss issues relating to the perception of a shortage of skilled workers, the extent that sponsoring foreign workers substitutes for investing in local training, and the role of networks in recruiting overseas workers. Many employers' now have a global view of labour recruitment. While this is understandable for multinational companies with global operations, many small businesses and public sector institutions are adopting the same strategy to obtain skilled labour which they say is in short supply in Australia. With the internationalization of the Australian economy, there is also an increasing demand for people with specialized skills and knowledge that is not available in Australia's relatively small labour market. An understanding of the demand factors motivating temporary skilled migration is crucial to effectively managing Australia's migration and labour trends.     

Infrastructure of mobility: navigating borders,cities and markets

In this article, which is based on research conducted in Hong Kong from 2010 to 2013, and again in 2018, I analyse the region‐bound circulation of independent women sex workers from the Philippines across the Asian global cities of Hong Kong, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, and Macau. Migrating as visa‐free tourists, they maintain a valid immigration status and maximize their income in the informal economy by adopting a step‐down transient mobility pattern characterized by a downward hierarchical circulation to multiple city‐states and country destinations. As I show, their multinational migration is produced and structured through the instrumentalization of a mobility infrastructure constituted by a regime of visa‐free circulation, transportation developments, commercialized migration services, and social networks. In this article, I attempt to extend the contemporary analysis of unauthorized migration by moving away from the prevailing focus on incorporation and settlement and towards an examination of the logics and mechanics of migration flows that occur outside state‐sanctioned channels.     

Cross-border mobility,inequality and migration intermediaries: Labour migration from Nepal to Malaysia

This article aims to contribute to labour recruitment policy by demonstrating the relations between cross-border mobility and inequality through the lens of migration intermediaries. Drawing on thematic analysis of the MIDEQ project's in-depth interviews with Nepalese labour migrants (n = 20) in Malaysia, this research reveals the range of migration intermediaries along the recruitment chain, and shows contradictory roles played by migration intermediaries: they help migrant workers access employment and other opportunities thus overcoming inequality in mobility, whilst simultaneously reproducing socio-economic inequalities and the unequal power relations experienced by migrants. Hence, we identify a “middle space effect” that links migration processes with migration outcomes, reconstructing socio-economic inequalities in mediated migration. We highlight the role of state policies regarding migration and labour in co-producing such inequalities, and the embeddedness of middle space intermediaries in unequal global power dynamics, and we offer policy suggestions on regulation of labour recruitment and employment.     

Immigration reform,American style

This article reviews the background of the proposed Immigration and Reform Act (also known as the Simpson-Mazzoli bill), which seeks to overhaul US immigration law for the first time since 1952. This bill is consistent with President Reagan's hard line on border enforcement and mandates stiff penalties for those who transport illegal aliens for commercial advantage or private profit. It further offers Mexico preferential treatment in immigration (40,000 additional visas/year). It includes an amnesty program to offer legal status to qualified illegal residents. The bill directs the President to develop a secure national worker identification system and would create a large-scale temporary foreign agricultural program for perishable commodities. Agricultural workers' families would not be eligible to accompany them unless they also obtain temporary visas. Foreign temporary workers, employable only in cases where local domestic workers are not available, must be provided with wages and working conditions equal to those prevailing among domestic workers. Stiff penalties are stipulated for employers who fail to abide with the terms of the program. In the author's opinion, this bill fails to appreciate the global character of international migration and its complexity. It relects a fundamental ambivalence about a strictly controlled main gate versus a back door approach to immigration as well as the conflicting images of the US as a nation of immigrants versus the historical reality of American nativism and xenophobia. Needed are comprehensive initiatives whose mutually reinforcing components can address the multiple dimensions of the immigration problem within a framework that does not ignore workers who have contributed to the economic well-being of the US, regardless of their legal status.     

Contested Ground: Network Governance in Australia's Migration Industry

This article challenges current understandings of the Australian migration industry's position in a network governance framework by shedding light on Registered Migration Agents’ (RMA) lived experiences of their profession. Using qualitative interview data collected from ten migration intermediaries across Australia, this article examines their experiences of their role in relation to the state and industry bodies. Placing migration intermediaries at the meso‐level of analysis, between macro‐level forces of the state and micro‐level agency of their clients, I argue primarily that the migration industry of Australia is a “contested ground” where intermediaries are embedded within complex negotiations with the state and legal frameworks, whilst also negotiating their legitimacy in a stigmatised profession. The findings of this study reveal migration intermediaries’ experiences of network governance as pivotal stakeholders, operating within a space characterized by complex configurations of autonomy and bureaucratic control.     

The Canadian temporary visa programme as an alternative to the European guest worker scheme

This article analyzes Canada's employment visa program, through which foreigners enter the Canadian labor market for relatively short time periods. It further demonstrates some major differences between this policy and the European guest worker scheme. Governments in Western Europe viewed guest workers' benefits as preventing wages and inflation from rising, allowing profits and investments to increase, and sustaining economic growth. A question to consider is whether guest workers' demands on social services, in relation to their tax and other contributions, exceed those of the indigenous population and thus reduce their profitability. Canada, in contrast, has avoided the need to provide services for the children of foreign workers or jobs for their spouses by limiting visa length to a maximum of 1 year. The majority of employment visa holders to Canada enter without dependents. Another difference is the far smaller scope of the Canadian program. Canada's employment visa program provides only about 0.5% of total employment, whereas guest workers in European countries may comprise up to 23% (Switzerland). The occupations of service and teaching account for the majority of workers included in the Canadian visa program, while manufacturing subsumes a large share of European guest workers. It is important to stress that, with relatively low levels for permanent immigration to Canada, the employment visa program rivals that flow as a yearly contributor to labor supply, indicating a need for closer attention to the evaluation of this policy.     

Traffickers,Brokers, Employment Agents,and Social Networks: The Regulation of Intermediaries in the Migration of Ethiopian Domestic Workers to the Middle East

This paper examines the regulatory regimes surrounding the operations of intermediaries who facilitate Ethiopian women's employment as contract domestic workers in the Middle East. Drawing on empirical research in Ethiopia, Lebanon, and Kuwait, the paper focuses on the commonly observed problem of “regulatory failure,” as states and international agencies frequently fail to achieve their objectives in the regulation of intermediaries of migration. This paper argues that a decentered approach to regulation can provide a productive diagnosis of regulatory failure, one that recognizes how power may be dispersed between social actors and (non‐unitary) state actors and how it is differentially exercised across multiple regulatory regimes within this migration trajectory.     

EMPLOYER CHOICES IN EAP DESIGN AND WORKSITE SERVICES

In today's complex private healthcare market, employers have varied preferences for particular features of behavioral health products such as Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs). Factors which may influence these preferences include: establishment size, type of organization, industry, workplace substance abuse regulations, and structure of health insurance benefits. This study of 103 large employer purchasers from a single managed behavioral healthcare organization investigated the impact of such variables on the EAP features that employers select to provide to workers and their families. Our findings indicate that for this group of employers, preferences for the type and delivery mode of EAP counseling services are fairly universal, while number of sessions provided and choices for EAP-provided worksite activities are much more varied, and may be more reflective of the diverse characteristics, organizational missions and workplace culture found among larger employers in the US.     

OLIGOPOLY CAPITALISM, LABOR ORGANIZATION, AND WAGES OF WORKERS IN AMERICAN MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES

This article investigates the interaction between oligopoly power, labor unionization, and worker wages. Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics for workers in manufacturing industries little evidence is found that workers are exploited by oligopolistic employers, but rather wages for production workers increase with both unionization and employer's market power. There is evidence, however, that unionization reduces variation in wages due to increased oligopoly power.     

Bringing in State Regulations,Private Brokers,and Local Employers: A Meso‐Level Analysis of Labor Trafficking in Israel

This article examines the intersection of state policies, private brokers and local employers that fuels trafficking practices and forced labor of legal labor migrants. Focusing on the Israeli case of labor migration, we offer a meso‐level institutional analysis of the modes by which private brokers's actions combine with state regulations and policies in creating labor trafficking. More specifically, we stress the active role official labor migration schemes play in the growth of a private brokerage sector driven by profit considerations and in the privatization of state capacities regarding migration control and management. Our analysis demonstrates how systemic features – and not necessarily or solely criminal activities – catalyze trafficking practices taking place first and foremost within the realm of legal migration.     

Unauthorized workers and immigration reform: what can we ascertain from employers?

The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 attempts to curb unauthorized migration by requiring employers to screen the authorizing documents of all workers. Many different documents may be used, with employers required to simply attest to the face validity of workers' documents upon an I-9 form. The authors report findings from their study estimating the unauthorized US labor force and exploring employers' initial reactions to the passage of the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) of 1986. The findings are based upon hiring practices information supplied by a sample of businesses in an evaluation of the IRCA impact. A selectivity correction model is used to impute 2.6 million unauthorized workers in the entire sample. The estimate, which compares favorably with other estimates, is tabulated by questions about IRCA. Findings suggest that a large proportion of the unauthorized labor force uses fraudulent documents, many without the knowledge of their employer. It appears that Immigration and Naturalization Service-targeted establishments hire 20% of unauthorized workers and that the employers of unauthorized workers are no more likely than other employers to believe that they can be sanctioned under IRCA. This may be associated with the apparent lack of marked change in patterns of unauthorized hiring in the period immediately following IRCA passage. There was some change in hiring behaviors in establishments hiring unauthorized workers, affecting wage offers and documentation, but US employers do not seem to perceive changes in the supply or availability of authorized workers. Study findings indicate only marginal IRCA-related changes in the characteristics of unauthorized hires during the very initial phase of IRCA's implementation. The combination of readily available fraudulent documents, the difficulty in detecting such documents, and the steady demand for low-skilled workers creates conditions which are not conducive to markedly changed hiring behavior.     

The return of international labour migrants in the ESCAP Region

The social phenomenon of massive temporary international labor migration from the ESCAP region has emerged extremely rapidly. Within 10 years, the number of persons from ESCAP countries grew from a negligible one to 3.5 million. Related research and government policies have lagged behind this latest surge in migration. Most research conducted has been small-scale and lacks an analytical or theoretical framework. Policy formulation for temporary labor migration is difficult because most of the rapid growth in the industry has occurred as a result of private efforts, with a minimum of government intervention. It is now difficult, for the government to provide effective regulations or measures to stimulate and assist the process. Regulations on compulsory remittances or overseas minimum wages have proved to be unrealistic and, if not rescinded, are routinely circumvented. The most effective policies to assist return migrants may not be those which are intended to do so, but those which control the earlier stages of the migration process, such as recruitment, working conditions, and banking arrangements. The most valuable policies may also include those affecting education, training, employment, and general socioeconomic growth. Governments are recommended to provide social services for migrants and their families who are experiencing problems, and to institute community programs in areas with a large number of labor migrants. Governmental efforts to promote forms of labor migration beneficial to the workers would be valuable and should include measures to identify overseas labor markets for employing its nationals, government ot government labor contracts, and government participation in joint-venture projects. International migration should be analyzed in the context of theories and social change in order for governments to formulate effective measures for the reintegration of returning workers. Labor migration on the current scale has many social implications for the sending countries; relationships between employers and employees, the government and private sectors, and white and blue collar workers are affected. Social change and technological innovation will become more rapid, women's status and family roles will change markedly, and behavior is likely to become less conformist and more individualistic.     

In the Shadow of Working Men: Gendered Labor and Migrant Rights in South Korea

Based on ethnographic research in South Korea, this article investigates the gendered production of migrant rights under the global regime of temporary migration by examining two groups of Filipina women: factory workers and hostesses at American military camptown clubs. Emphasizing gendered labor processes and symbolic politics, this article offers an analytical framework to interrogate the mechanisms through which a discrepancy of rights is generated at the intersection of workplace organization and civil society mobilization. I identify two distinct labor regimes for migrant women that were shaped in the shadow of working men. Migrant women in the factories labored in the company of working men on the shop floor, which enabled them to form a co-ethnic migrant community and utilize the male-centered bonding between workers and employers. In contrast, migrant hostesses were isolated and experienced gendered stigma under the paternalistic rule of employers. Divergent forms of civil society mobilization in South Korea sustained these regimes: Migrant factory workers received recognition as workers without attention to gender-specific concerns while hostesses were construed as women victims in need of protection. Thus, Filipina factory workers were able to exercise greater labor rights by sharing the dignity of workers as a basis for their rights claims from which hostesses were excluded.     

A Model for Managed Migration? Re‐Examining Best Practices in Canada’s Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program

This paper situates Canada’s Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP) within the policy and scholarly debates on “best practices” for the management of temporary migration, and examines what makes this programme successful from the perspective of states and employers. Drawing on extensive qualitative and quantitative study of temporary migration in Canada, this article critically examines this seminal temporary migration programme as a “best practice model” from internationally recognized rights‐based approaches to labour migration, and provides some additional best practices for the management of temporary labour migration programmes. This paper examines how the reality of the Canadian SAWP measures up, when the model is evaluated according to internationally recognized best practices and migrant rights regimes. Despite all of the attention to building “best practices” for the management of temporary or managed migration, it appears that Canada has taken steps further away from these and other international frameworks. The analysis reveals that while the Canadian programme involves a number of successful practices, such as the cooperation between origin and destination countries, transparency in the admissions criteria for selection, and access to health care for temporary migrants; the programme does not adhere to the majority of best practices emerging in international forums, such as the recognition of migrants’ qualifications, providing opportunities for skills transfer, avoiding imposing forced savings schemes, and providing paths to permanent residency. This paper argues that as Canada takes significant steps toward the expansion of temporary migration, Canada’s model programme still falls considerably short of being an inspirational model, and instead provides us with little more than an idealized myth.     

The UK Migrant Cap,Migrant Mobility and Employer Implications

Advocates of the “borderless world” thesis suggest that migrant workers can benefit from employment opportunities available everywhere, with workers simply migrating towards these opportunities. However, as global inequalities widen and potential global mobilities develop, states are “managing” migration. Individual migrant “agency”, its structuration, and the subsequent experiences of migrants and employers, can restrict such mobility. Consequently, there is a need to describe and problematize the new strategies. This article considers these issues with reference to the emerging impact of the migrant cap on non‐European Economic Area (EEA) migrants to the United Kingdom (UK). It explores the links between immigration and employment rights and the implications for migrant mobility. Policies of “managed migration” frequently do not take into account issues of geography and intra and inter regional competition for migrants by employers operating in sectors with skill shortages, or differential migrant “agency” in the form of their skills and attributes. This may impinge on the effectiveness of such approaches and on economic prosperity at a national, regional and local scale.     

Migration processes among the highly skilled in Europe

"This article seeks to show that the migration process for highly skilled workers in contemporary Europe is part of the structuring of European business. It focuses on the employer's perspective and role in articulating movement, using data from various official sources as well as survey evidence from the United Kingdom. It suggests that the increasing importance of this form of mobility is related to the process of internationalization by large employers and that the particular form of movement is dependent on the evolution of corporate business."