Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This paper examines the “governmentalization” of the Philippine state and the ways in which it is ‘managing’ and sustaining a culture of labor migration. I examine the strategy of worker empowerment as a way of governing the conduct of its citizenry and generating a specific type of worker/citizen who embody the neoliberal market rationality of economic competitiveness and entrepreneurship. In particular, the forms of worker empowerment I will analyze are the ways in which the state is: 1) designating Filipino workers as the modern day heroes and ambassadors of goodwill; 2) upgrading their work skills; and 3) promoting a culture of entrepreneurship. This paper shows that these strategies combine not only to sustain a culture of labor migration but to reframe the meanings of social citizenship for overseas Filipinos. As part of a multi-site ethnography of the recruitment business in Manila, Philippines which focuses on state-licensed private employment agencies brokering nurses and household workers conducted between September 2001-June 2002 , this paper is based on in-depth interviews with government officials involved in the labor recruitment business and participant-observations of pre-departure orientation sessions conducted by NGOs for Filipino workers.