How Good Are Networks for Migrant Job Seekers? Ethnographic Evidence from North Carolina Farm Labor* Camps

Bibliographic Data

ID2274877
AuthorsRafael Balderrama (Central University of Venezuela), Hilario Molina (Mitchell Institute), Hilario Molina Ii
Year2009
Volume79
Issue2
Pages190-218
Publication date2009-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSociological Inquiry (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0038-0245 • E-ISSN: 1475-682X
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/j.1475-682x.2009.00281.x
OpenAlexW1975319052
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited36

Migrant farmworker networks are vital components in their job seeking and underemployment minimization strategies. Yet, farmworker cultural, physical, and institutional isolation along with the itinerant and clandestine features of farmwork have become major obstacles in the development of robust lateral communitywide network ties that would otherwise favor reciprocity and resource sharing. Thus, contrary to the positive social capital assumption, we argue that the paucity and fragmented features of farmworkers' lateral ties have increased their vulnerability and locked them in exploitative relationships in a hostile social environment that makes impractical or impossible the formation of alternative ties. Our study is based on participant observation through a 6-week stay in three North Carolina farm labor camps. On-site evidence shows that the two larger groups of solitary male farmworkers and farmworking families break up into smaller groups, each group in pursuit of its own short-term goals. We conclude that, even though farmworker networks help them to find and ensure temporary jobs, their inability to use the networks to share resources is ultimately detrimental for participants' long-term socioeconomic prospects

Computer security · Demographic economics · Economic growth · Economics · Ethnography · Interpersonal ties · Isolation (microbiology) · Norm of reciprocity · Participant observation · Political science · Reciprocity (cultural anthropology) · Resource (disambiguation) · Seekers · Social capital · Social science · Sociology · Underemployment · Unemployment · Vulnerability (computing) · Diaspora, migration, transnational identity · Law · Migration and Labor Dynamics · Migration, Ethnicity, and Economy

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub