Thesis
Temporary foreign workers, labour mobility, and the effort bargain
- Creator
- Rights statement
- Awarding institution
- University of Strathclyde
- Date of award
- 2024
- Thesis identifier
- T17036
- Person Identifier (Local)
- 200989334
- Qualification Level
- Qualification Name
- Department, School or Faculty
- Abstract
- In developed and developing countries, employers' increasing demand for access to lowskilled temporary migrant labour is one of the most politically charged and complex phenomena impacting global labour markets and workplaces today. Temporary Migration Programmes, where employers control workers' labour mobility and access to permanent residency, are highly controversial yet under-researched. Regulatory controls shift power to capital away from labour and exacerbate migrant workers' vulnerability to exploitation, but critics fail to acknowledge migrant agency and motivations. The purpose of this research is to address a gap in the literature by examining the impact of regulatory controls through the lens of mobility power and the effort bargain, two terrains of struggle within the labour process. A comparative study of five case study organisations in the hospitality sector of a remote, rural tourism destination included 32 semi-structured interviews of managers, supervisors, and migrant workers. This research offers empirical support for capital's utilisation of regulatory controls as a transnational mechanism to access, construct, and control a more vulnerable labour pool to extract surplus value. Investigation of workers' motivations addresses a gap in the literature, offering detailed empirical knowledge of migrant workers as purposeful and strategic, embedded in diverse family relationships that inform their long-term goals of permanent residency and family reunification as well as their navigation of regulatory controls in the labour market and labour process. A key contribution is empirical evidence of mobilityeffort bargaining and the interplay between mobility power and effort power as resources for workers or employers, contingent on internal and external structural forces that contribute to shifting power dynamics. This research also builds on literature specific to labour market challenges of remote, rural destinations, highlighting how distance to density, density, and culture of a community influence labour recruitment, mobility, and employer bargaining power.
- Advisor / supervisor
- Baum, Thom
- Scholarios, Dora
- Resource Type
- DOI
关系
项目
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PDF of thesis T17036 | 2024-08-12 | 公开 | 下载 |