Precarious Irregular Migrants and Their Sharing Economies: A Spectrum of Transactional Laboring Experiences

Abstract

There is growing interest in the sharing economy as a different way of living in neoliberal capitalist societies, but this discussion is frequently heavily classed and the ethos generally rests on excess capacity of goods and services. This article intervenes in this emerging body of writing to argue that it is equally important to explore the types of sharing and exchange that are survival-compelled among those with precarious livelihoods. Precarious migrants are a group facing significant livelihood pressures, and we are concerned here with a particular category of insecure migrants: irregular migrants including refused asylum seekers in the United Kingdom. Such migrants are especially shaped by their sociolegal status, and without rights to work or welfare they are susceptible to exploitation in their survival-oriented laboring. Existing literature from labor geographies and the subdisciplinary area of unfree and forced labor has not generally focused on the experiences of these migrants as house guests in domestic realms, nor has it thoroughly explored their transactional labor. As such, this article argues that the moral economies of gifting and sharing within such labor create and reproduce particular social structures, cultural norms, and relationships that position people along a spectrum of freedom and exploitation.

有越来越多的兴趣，关注共享经济作为新自由主义资本主义社会中的另类生活方式，但此般讨论往往高度阶级化，而其精神通常是基于过度的货品与服务能力。本文介入此一浮现中的着作，主张探讨生计不稳定者出自生存动机的共享和交换类别是同等重要的。生活不稳定的移民，是面临重大生计压力的群体，而我们于此考量一个特定的不稳定移民类别：英国的非常规移民，包括被拒绝的寻求庇护者。此般移民特别是由其社会法律身份所形塑，且因无权工作或领取社会福利，他们很容易在以生存为目标的劳动中受到剥削。劳动地理学和研究不自由且被迫劳动的学门次领域之既有文献，尚未普遍聚焦这些移民在居家领域中作为家庭访客的经验，而他们的交易劳动亦尚未受到充分探讨。本文于此主张，此般劳动中的礼物交换与共享的道德经济，创造并再生产了特定的社会结构、文化常规，以及将人们置放于自由与剥削的光谱两端的关係。

Existe un creciente interés por la economía del compartir como una diferente manera de vivir en sociedades capitalistas neoliberales, aunque esta discusión a menudo está fuertemente sesgada por clase y el ethos generalmente descansa sobre el exceso de capacidad de bienes y servicios. Este artículo interviene en el emergente cuerpo de escritos para argüir que es igualmente importante explorar los tipos de compartir e intercambio que están compelidos hacia la supervivencia entre quienes solo disponen de sustentos precarios. Los migrantes precarios son un grupo que enfrenta significativas presiones por la supervivencia, y aquí nosotros estamos preocupados por una categoría particular de migrantes inseguros: migrantes irregulares que incluyen a quienes han estado aplicando por asilo en el Reino Unido. Esos migrantes están especialmente configurados por su estatus sociolegal y, al carecer de derechos laborales y de acceso a los servicios del bienestar social, son susceptibles de explotación en su lucha por el trabajo orientado a la simple supervivencia. La literatura disponible sobre geografías laborales, y el área subdisciplinaria de trabajo irregular o forzado, en general no se han enfocado sobre las experiencias de estos migrantes como huéspedes hogareños en los reinos domésticos, ni tampoco han explorado cuidadosamente su fuerza laboral transaccional. En ese sentido, este artículo sostiene que las economías morales de regalar y compartir dentro de tal trabajo crean y reproducen estructuras sociales particulares, normas culturales y relaciones que posicionan a la gente a lo largo de un espectro de libertad y explotación.

Key Words:

• migrants
• sharing economy
• transactional labor
• unfreedom

关键词：:

• 移民，共享经济，交易劳动，不自由。

Palabras clave:

• migrantes
• economía del compartir
• trabajo transnacional
• servidumbre

Acknowledgments

We thank all of the participants who agreed to be interviewed for this project: refugees and asylum seekers who spoke out about their experiences and provided valuable views and insights that informed our approach to research and analysis. We further wish to thank our colleagues who worked with us on this project—Dr. Stuart Hodkinson (University of Leeds) and Professor Peter Dwyer (University of York). Finally, our thanks go to the anonymous reviewers and editor Nik Heynen for their insightful comments on earlier drafts. All errors remain our own.

Funding

This work was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council (Grant Number RES-062-23-2895).

Notes

1. The sharing economy has even made it into Time magazine's top ten list of “ideas that will change the world” (“10 Ideas That Will Change the World” 2011) and is the focus in the United Kingdom of a specially commissioned Department for Business, Innovation & Skills (2014) report entitled “Unlocking the Sharing Economy.”

2. This is not to present “tech” millennials as homogenous however; Ross (2008) suggested, for example, that there might be some common experiences of precarity between workers in low-end sectors and those in the creative class temping in high-end knowledge sectors. Thus, experiences of the sharing economy for members of the latter group might also, at particular times for certain individuals, be driven less by excess and more by necessity.

3. See Community Economies (2009).

4. RES-062-23-2895, with collaborators Dr. Stuart Hodkinson, University of Leeds, and Professor Peter Dwyer, University of York.

5. It is not permitted for those in receipt of asylum housing to have guests to stay or for them to stay away from their accommodation. If found by housing workers with a house guest, an accusation of subletting can lead to withdrawal of asylum support.

6. It is sad to note that this already fairly limited support that vulnerable migrants access through voluntary sector organizations is further becoming more insecure as the UK public expenditure cuts bite. Agencies providing temporary shelter and basic necessities for destitute migrants are being forced to reduce their services as local authority funding is cut or withdrawn.

7. More recently, Fassin (2005) used these ideas of injustice to analyze contemporary French immigration policies from a moral economy perspective.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Louise Waite

LOUISE WAITE is Associate Professor in Human Geography at the University of Leeds, Leeds, LS2 9JT UK. E-mail: [email protected]. Her research interests span migration, citizenship, and belonging, with a particular focus on discourses of modern slavery, intersections of faith and antitrafficking initiatives, unfree labor, and exploitative work among asylum seekers and refugees in the United Kingdom.

Hannah Lewis

HANNAH LEWIS is a Vice-Chancellor's Fellow in the Department of Sociological Studies, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, S10 2TN UK. E-mail: [email protected]. Her research centers on how policies shape the daily lives of people who migrate; she has explored the destitution of refused asylum seekers, “race” and multicultural strategies, and how immigration status shapes community, family, and transnational relationships among migrants and people seeking asylum.