11. The Global Structuring Of Gender, Race, And Class: Conceptual Sites Of Its Dynamics And Resistance In The Philippine Experience

Abstract

Reproductive labor-which was generally an unpaid labor done mostly by women in the confines of their homes-becomes a waged commodity for exchange in the global labor market, bringing forth the interplay of various actors and processes. The Philippines is one such country. This chapter shows how the Philippine labor export that concentrates women in domestic service work creates sites enabling the global structuring of gender, race, and class interlock. In so doing, it can be seen how Filipino migrant domestic workers turn these sites into spaces of resistance. Neo-liberal structural adjustment policies have had a devastating impact on the economies of poor countries and they also contribute to the global structuring of the gender-race-class interlock. Labor export has transnationalized the household as mothers migrate to do paid domestic work in the global labor market. Keywords: globalization of reproductive labor; neo-liberal structural adjustment policies; Philippine labor export; transnationalized household