Migrants for Export
How the Philippine State Brokers Labor to the World
Will be published approx. on 18. March 2010
Book
Hardback
208 pages
978-0-8166-6527-3 (ISBN)
Description
Migrant workers from the Philippines are ubiquitous to global capitalism, with nearly 10 percent of the population employed in almost two hundred countries. In a visit to the United States in 2003, Philippine president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo even referred to herself as not only the head of state but also "the CEO of a global Philippine enterprise of eight million Filipinos who live and work abroad." Robyn Magalit Rodriguez investigates how and why the Philippine government transformed itself into what she calls a labor brokerage state, which actively prepares, mobilizes, and regulates its citizens for migrant work abroad. Filipino men and women fill a range of jobs around the globe, including domestic work, construction, and engineering, and they have even worked in the Middle East to support U.S. military operations. At the same time, the state redefines nationalism to normalize its citizens to migration while fostering their ties to the Philippines. Those who leave the country to work and send their wages to their families at home are treated as new national heroes. Drawing on ethnographic research of the Philippine government's migration bureaucracy, interviews, and archival work, Rodriguez presents a new analysis of neoliberal globalization and its consequences for nation-state formation.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Minnesota
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 216 mm
Width: 140 mm
Thickness: 20 mm
ISBN-13
978-0-8166-6527-3 (9780816665273)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Robyn Magalit Rodriguez is assistant professor of sociology at Rutgers University.
Content
Abbreviations, Introduction: Neoliberalism and the Philippine Labor Brokerage State, 1. The Emergence of Labor Brokerage: U.S. Colonial Legacies in the Philippines, 2. A Global Enterprise of Labor: Mobilizing Migrants for Export, 3. Able Minds, Able Hands: Marketing Philippine Workers, 4. New National Heroes: Patriotism and Citizenship Reconfigured, 5. The Philippine Domestic: Gendered Labor, Family, and the Nation-State, 6. Migrant Workers' Rights? Regulating Remittances and Repatriation, Conclusion: The Globalization of the Labor Brokerage State, Acknowledgments, Appendix: Mapping an Ethnography of the State, Notes, Index