“환영할만한” 은퇴이주자의 탄생: 필리핀, 말레이시아, 태국의 비자정책을 중심으로

Abstract

This study explores how the idea of “welcomed” retiree migrants has been shaped in developing economies in Southeast Asia by analyzing the retirement migration visa programs of selected countries in the region, namely the Philippines, Malaysia, and Thailand. Furthermore, by examining how Korean visa applicants take advantage of each program, this article unpacks how such visa programs are promoted and consumed in the sending countries. Thus, this research has two aims: first, to reveal the processes of how the state actors in the selected Southeast Asian countries established a specific mobility regime that widely opened their borders to foreign retirees, and second, to demonstrate how the visa applicants - Koreans - created unexpected outcomes under this mobility regime. By situating a mobility regime created by the developing states in Southeast Asia within the neoliberal global economic system, this study explores the ways in which the developing countries reconfigured their national territory to welcome foreign retirees. Although the countries in Southeast Asia facilitated the transnational relocation of foreign retirees from Euro-America and Japan, the promotion of retirement migration programs actually led to an increase in Asian migrants (except Japanese), particularly Koreans. By examining how Korean visa applicants and the migration agencies creatively re-interpret the values and purposes of the visas, I reveal how people disrupt the prearranged social relations the state actors set out to manage.