A Price on her Head: How domestic work recruiters structure women’s migration and employment experience

Dr. Katharine Jones Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations, Coventry University, UK

Gendered Dimensions of Migration: Material and Social Outcomes of South-South Migration30 June – 2 July 2015, Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore

Why the study?

• Migrant recruitment industry has dramatically grown over past 20 years

• Vast majority of studies of migrant domestic / recruitment are conducted in one country only

• Little is known about transnational gendered business model and how it is embedded in wider regulatory regimes

• To inform ILO’s Fair Recruitment Initiative (commissioned by ILO Special Action Programme to Combat Forced Labour, DfID Work in Freedom)

About the study

• Study conducted across Bangladesh, Jordan and Lebanon by international team Nov 2013- June 2014

• 141 semi-structured qualitative interviews with heads of recruitment agencies, sub-agents, returned women migrant domestic workers, key informants

• Main objective to better understand the transnational business model of domestic work recruiters.

Gendered institutional & regulatory context

1199 recruiters registered; only 29 authorised to recruit women

National recruitment regulation

543 recruiters registered in Lebanon 100 recruiters registered in Jordan

National recruitment regulation

Bangladesh Jordan Agreement on Domestic Work (2012)

BANGLADESH

76,000+ women overseas for domestic work

JORDAN & LEBANON

250,000+ migrant domestic workers 70,000+ domestic workers

Emigration regulations

Immigration regulations

Labour law

Door-sign for a Beirut-based recruiter advertising

Ethiopian domestic workers

Selection of ‘bio-data’ forms

Constructing a gendered ‘cheap and compliant’ workforce

Recruiters advise employers to select a woman who can be easily controlled:

“Employers don’t like to employ someone who has worked in Lebanon before so that she doesn’t come with a social network, demands to leave the house and see friends.” (Recruiter, Beirut, March 2014)

Employers want a ‘cheap and

compliant woman’ because they invest a lot of money… ($)

“If they [employers] have financial constraints, it will have to be a Bangladesh domestic worker.” (Recruiter in Beirut, March 2014)

Recruiters in Jordan and Lebanon select their business partners in Bangladesh according to the following….

• Ability to deliver a high volume of women • Speed which women can be delivered• Ability of business owner to communicate in Arabic,

English, through Skype / Viber• ‘Good quality’ medical testing – “no sick or pregnant

girls” • Reputation for delivering and not cheating • Willingness to ‘replace’ women if they fail to arrive,

arrive sick, pregnant, run away or “refuse to work”

Source: ‘For a Fee: the business of recruiting Bangladeshi women into domestic work in Jordan and Lebanon’ (http://www.ilo.org/global/publications/working-papers/WCMS_377806/lang--en/index.htm)

Role of recruiters in Bangladesh

Source: ‘For a Fee: the business of recruiting Bangladeshi women into domestic work in Jordan and Lebanon’ (http://www.ilo.org/global/publications/working-papers/WCMS_377806/lang--en/index.htm)

“Refund and replace” regulation

JORDAN: Regulation no 12/2015. Regulation on organizing the private agencies for recruitment of non-Jordanian domestic workers.

Recruiters are bound to replace domestic workers (at no cost) for employers in three circumstances:

1. Women who “refuse to work” for their employer in the first 30 days to the employer

2. Women who “fail to arrive” 3. Women who arrive pregnant, or otherwise certified “sick” or “unhygienic” by the

Ministry of Health.

LEBANON: Order number 1/1, governing the work of placement agencies, 2011. Recruiters are bound to replace women who are unable to “fulfil the tasks required for the job; refuses to work; is pregnant; or absconds from the employer.”

Extended to 6 months in certain circumstances.

Recruiters advise employers to control their domestic workers

“I take the phone from the domestic worker and give it to the employer. We do this to prevent running away.” (Recruiter, Jordan, February 2014)

“I advise them [employers] to monitor them [domestic workers] a lot in the beginning and to lock the doors. You can tell if a domestic worker’s eye is always wandering, always on the balcony, then that means she wants to run away.” (Recruiter, Beirut, January 2014)

Recruiters also take direct action in attempt to control women …

“If there is a problem I have the agency in the origin country speak to her to scare her, tell her she has to pay $2000 if she wants to go home. It is true it is harsh, but it works.” (Recruiter, Beirut, January 2014)

“[k]ept them in the office for about a week so that they can readjust their attitude so I can go back to work…If the employer has the right, I yell at the domestic worker and tell her that I will keep them in the office until they change their attitude. I give them some food like potatoes, rice and eggs. Eventually they will get bored and want to work again.” (Recruiter, Beirut, February 2014)

A gendered business model

Source: ‘For a Fee: the business of recruiting Bangladeshi women into domestic work in Jordan and Lebanon’ (http://www.ilo.org/global/publications/working-papers/WCMS_377806/lang--en/index.htm)