Global Labor Migration

New Directions
Author: Edited by Eileen Boris, Heidi Gottfried, Julie Greene, and Joo-Cheong Tham
Expanding the scope of how we study labor migrants
Cloth – $125
978-0-252-04470-0
Paper – $32
978-0-252-08679-3
eBook – $19.95
978-0-252-05374-0
Publication Date
Paperback: 12/27/2022
Cloth: 12/27/2022
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About the Book

Around the world, hundreds of millions of labor migrants endure exploitation, lack of basic rights, and institutionalized discrimination and marginalization. What dynamics and drivers have created a world in which such a huge--and rapidly growing--group toils as marginalized men and women, existing as a lower caste institutionally and juridically? In what ways did labor migrants shape their living and working conditions in the past, and what opportunities exist for them today?

Global Labor Migration presents new multidisciplinary, transregional perspectives on issues surrounding global labor migration. The essays go beyond disciplinary boundaries, with sociologists, ethnographers, legal scholars, and historians contributing research that extends comparison among and within world regions. Looking at migrant workers from the late nineteenth century to the present day, the contributors illustrate the need for broader perspectives that study labor migration over longer timeframes and from wider geographic areas. The result is a unique, much-needed collection that delves into one of the world’s most pressing issues, generates scholarly dialogue, and proposes cutting-edge research agendas and methods.

Contributors: Bridget Anderson, Rutvica Andrijasevic, Katie Bales, Jenny Chan, Penelope Ciancanelli, Felipe Barradas Correia Castro Bastos, Eileen Boris, Charlie Fanning, Judy Fudge, Jorge L. Giovannetti-Torres, Heidi Gottfried, Julie Greene, Justin Jackson, Radhika Natarajan, Pun Ngai, Bastiaan Nugteren, Nicola Piper, Jessica R. Pliley, Devi Sacchetto, Helen Sampson, Yael Schacher, Joo-Cheong Tham, and Matt Withers

About the Author

Eileen Boris is Hull Professor of Feminist Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and author of Making the Woman Worker: Precarious Labor and the Fight for Global Standards, 1919–2019. Heidi Gottfried is an associate professor of sociology at Wayne State University and author of Gender, Work and Economy: Unpacking the Global Economy. Julie Greene is a professor of history at the University of Maryland, College Park, and Founding Director of the Center for Global Migration Studies. She is the author of The Canal Builders: Making America's Empire at the Panama Canal. Joo-Cheong Tham is a professor at Melbourne Law School and author of Money and Politics: The Democracy We Can’t Afford.

Reviews


Blurbs

“This volume does exactly what the title promises: it puts labor and labor relations worldwide in the center and reveals the way employers, state, empires, and supranational institutions shape migration patterns, then and now. The editors succeed in putting together a highly interesting collection of essays that talk to each other and open new venues, approaches, and perspectives, while finding striking similarities between the continents. But this book also shows how migrants--despite ongoing exploitation and exclusion--find their own loopholes and chase their dreams. A must -ead for those interested in how the past structures current day trends, discussions, and daily practices from Beijing to Detroit.”--Leo Lucassen, Director of the International Institute of Social History