1,720,965 research outputs found
Defying the “Illiberal” Gig Economy: Coping Strategies of Freelance Domestic Workers in the United Arab Emirates
Full text linkHow do low-skilled migrant workers navigate restrictive gig economies in illiberal host states of the Global South? Despite the growing gig economy, scholars have yet to examine the linkage between the politics of the gig economy and migrant resilience in illiberal host states in the Global South. Using a single case study of freelance Filipina domestic workers in the UAE (N = 20), I argue that, despite facing legal and economic risks (penalties), freelance migrant workers have produced an informal freelancing visa system to contest the formal and hierarchical segmentation of the gig economy via three diverse strategies: co-optation, tapping and brokering. These evasive social coping strategies mirror their collective resistance against structural labour exploitation and reinforce their autonomous role in the social (re)production of community solidarity within informal gig economies. Overall, this study contributes to empirical and theoretical discourse on the politics of illiberal migration management and the gig economy by featuring female migrant freelancers’ complex social agency within illiberal gig economies in the Global South
A new capital pipeline to the Gulf? Geopolitical conflicts, capital flight, and the Russian exodus to the United Arab Emirates
Full text linkHow do geopolitical conflicts affect ‘illiberal’ host states’ domestic and foreign policy processes in the Global South? Despite such critical relevance, scholars have yet to examine the complex geopolitical effects of the Russia–Ukraine war on the global exodus of Russian emigrant populations, specifically towards the Gulf states, the largest regional host of migrants in the Global South. Using the UAE as a single case study, we argue that geopolitical conflicts simultaneously rejuvenate illiberal host states’ domestic and foreign policy power in the Global South, as well as facilitate three capital transfers to the UAE: economic capital, human capital, and political capital, all of which are crucial to their long-term regime survival. These interstate capital transfers shape—either temporarily or permanently—the UAE-based Russian diaspora formation, and long-term state (origin/host)-diaspora relations. Methodologically, we use semi-structured interviews with Russian expatriates (N = 12), field observations, and secondary analysis of newspaper publications to substantiate our analysis. This study contributes to empirical and theoretical debates surrounding the linkage between geopolitics and migration in the Middle East, featuring the role of diverse capital transfers in the survival of illiberal host state regimes in the Global South
Diaspora mobilisation in the Global South: deterritorialised mobilisation strategies, ‘informal’ Filipino diaspora organisations, and the politics of social welfare protection
Full text linkHow and why do ‘informal diaspora’ organisations cope with domestic restrictions in the illiberal host states of the Global South? Despite their central relevance and contributions, scholars have yet to examine the complex transnational agency of ‘informal’ diaspora organisations and their institutional mobilisation strategies for seeking sociopolitical claims on diaspora welfare protection in the Gulf region, the largest host of diaspora in the Global South. Using informal Filipino diaspora organisations in the United Arab Emirates, I offer two arguments: firstly, informal diaspora organisations have institutionally deterritorialised their mobilisation strategies to navigate domestic restrictions and precarious temporary status to survive in the illiberal host states. Secondly, despite domestic restrictions, informal diaspora organisations employ three institutional mobilisation strategies – unauthorised, virtual, and proxy – to extend welfare for marginalised populations. These institutional strategies reflect the growing complexity of illiberal host states’ ‘tight grip’ over formal/informal diaspora organisations and the informal diaspora organisations’ bottom-up institutional resistance. Methodologically, I employ process tracing, semi-structured interviews with informal Filipino diasporas, and secondary analysis of newspaper/media publications. Overall, this study enhances our understanding of the global politics of diaspora mobilisation and illiberalism by elucidating deterritorialised diaspora mobilisations as survival mechanisms within the Global South’s illiberal host states
Exploitation and the Decision to Migrate: The Role of Abuse and Unfavorable Working Conditions in Filipina Domestic Workers’ Desire to Return Abroad
Full text linkThe Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries host at least 2.4 million foreign domestic workers, who are legally excluded from national labor laws and regulations, thus placing them in precarious social, legal, and economic conditions in the GCC labor markets. Despite the recent growth of academic scholarship on domestic work in the GCC and beyond, little attention has been paid to absconding foreign domestic workers and the complex role abuse plays in determining their future decision to migrate. This paper examines the likelihood that Filipina domestic workers will migrate after absconding from their previous employer. Applying a unique dataset of absconding Filipina domestic workers collected at the Philippine Labor Office (POLO) in Qatar between 2013 - 2015, we find that abuse and poor working conditions do not act as deterrents for future migration. Paradoxically, absconding domestic workers who have been financially abused are more likely to want to return and seek employment abroad. This study offers empirical and theoretical insights into the connection between migrant exploitation and domestic workers\u27 desire to migrate once again
Asymmetric Information under the \u3ci\u3eKafala\u3c/i\u3e Sponsorship System: Impacts on Foreign Domestic Workers’ Income and Employment Status in the GCC Countries
Full text linkThis paper examines the legal and policy implications of information asymmetry on foreign domestic workers employed under the Kafala sponsorship system in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries. Drawing from ethnographic and field-based observations in large GCC migrant destinations—including Kuwait, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE)—we investigate the flow of information and market uncertainties between five key stakeholders: labor-receiving government, labor-sending government, recruitment agencies (subagents), sponsors (employers), and social networks. Several factors contribute to asymmetric information: the lack of bilateral labor agreements and government policy coordination, programs between and among government entities, the absence of labor law for domestic workers, and the laissez faire approach of the labor-receiving government. These sources of asymmetric information do not only create serious market vulnerabilities for the domestic worker population, but often lead to loss of employment and early deportation. The concluding section further outlines various critical policy implications and potential areas of methodological research on GCC migration
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Weapons of the weak? South-south migration and power politics in the Philippines-GCC corridor
Full text linkHow do labor migrants serve as instruments of leverage against countries of destination across the Global South? Although international studies scholars are paying increasing attention to the interplay between power politics and cross-border mobility, scant work exists on the intricacies of South–South migration. This article expands research on migration interdependence by examining the range of strategies available to countries of origin, and the factors that determine their success. The argument put forth is two-fold. First, weaker countries of origin can use two sets of strategies to coerce stronger countries of destination, namely “restriction,” the curbing of the outflow of labor migrants, or “repatriation,” the forced return of labor migrants. Second, target countries’ degree of compliance is determined by their migration interdependence vulnerability, with repatriation being more potent than restriction. We test this empirically by drawing on a variety of primary and secondary sources as we examine how the Philippines successfully coerced the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait between 2014 and 2021. Selected within a least likely research design, the two cases demonstrate how a weaker country of origin may use labor migration as a successful instrument of leverage against two stronger countries of destination. Overall, the article adds a missing component to existing theorization of migration interdependence, enhances existing understandings of cross-border mobility and power politics, and provides original insights into overlooked processes of South–South migration
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
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