Labor Exploitation and Health Inequities Among Market Migrants: A Political Economy Perspective

Iffath Unissa Syed ()
Additional contact information
Iffath Unissa Syed: York University

Journal of International Migration and Integration, 2016, vol. 17, issue 2, No 8, 449-465

Abstract: Abstract Previous discourses have recognized institutionalized forms of racism and pointed to structural violence embedded in Canadian policies, institutions, and labor markets. However, there is limited connection of these experiences to health. This paper theorizes a novel connection of health inequities experienced by racialized and immigrant peoples in Canada as a result of globalization and market liberalism. Beginning with a brief historical overview of the slave trade and indentured workers’ experiences, it is suggested that today there is a new variant of slave labor and indentured work. Employing a political economy perspective, this paper suggests the exploitation of “Market Migrants” in Canada. Racialized and migrant workers in Canada experience high levels of precarious work, denizenship, social exclusion, social inequality, and eventually health inequities, which is a result of discrimination experienced by these groups. It reveals that the government has failed to address these issues because of control and lobby through powerful economic and political structures that benefit from the situation as it stands. However, given that there are economic losses to migrant skill underutilization and the growing frustrations manifest in uprisings against these systems of dominance, the current situation is unsustainable and transformation is expected.

Keywords: Colonial theory; Immigration; Class; Health; Workplace violence; Social history; Slavery; Political economy; Neoliberalism; Marxism; Migrant workers; Worker health; Social determinants of health; Working conditions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s12134-015-0427-z Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:joimai:v:17:y:2016:i:2:d:10.1007_s12134-015-0427-z

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.springer ... tudies/journal/12134

DOI: 10.1007/s12134-015-0427-z

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of International Migration and Integration is currently edited by Lori Wilkinson

More articles in Journal of International Migration and Integration from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().