The Biggest Problem We Are Facing Is the Running Away Problem

Recruitment and the Paradox of Facilitating the Mobility of Immobile Workers

Bibliographic Data

ID2374656
AuthorsKatharine Jones (0000-0003-4649-1098, Coventry University, corresponding author), Leena Ksaifi (Independent Scholar, Lebanon), Colin Clark (0000-0002-6028-5197, University of the West of Scotland)
Year2023
Volume37
Issue4
Pages841-857
Publication date2023-08-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueWork Employment and Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0950-0170 • E-ISSN: 1469-8722
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/09500170221094764
OpenAlexW4290615003
LanguageEN
Citations received10
References cited31

Fee-charging recruitment industries in Asia have become gatekeepers to temporary employment in low-wage occupations for millions of migrant workers. One of these jobs is live-in domestic work in private households. Increasingly, workers' recruiters are depicted as contributing to their precarious, sometimes exploitative, working conditions. However, these narratives misunderstand the systemic and regulatory functions of agencies as transnational labour market actors. This article analyses the relationship between domestic work placement agencies in Jordan and Lebanon and their clients (the employers) as they negotiate the recruitment of women from Bangladesh. Drawing on data from 146 qualitative interviews, it addresses the mechanisms of how exploitative, controlling practices are constructed and normalised by agencies in their everyday interactions with their clients as well as with workers. The article argues that placement agencies play a paradoxical role; whilst facilitating global mobility they also broker worker immobility

Business · Economics · Labour economics · Narrative · Negotiation · Political science · Public relations · Qualitative research · Social science · Sociology · Wage · Work (physics · Employment and Welfare Studies · Engineering · Law · Migration and Labor Dynamics · Migration, Ethnicity, and Economy