Reconstituting the affective labour of Filipinos as care workers in Japan

Abstract

AbstractAs Japan has started to come to terms with the emergence of an ageing society with a low birth rate, it has also had to face a shortage of care labour. Both the state and individuals have mobilized new sources of care work, and in so doing have transformed relations between Asian countries. Within this context, there has been a change in that long‐term Filipina residents in Japan are now seen as an alternative source of care workers. Previous relations between Japan and the Philippines were structured through the experience of Filipina entertainers and hostesses. Yet, a shift to Filipina migrant care workers in response to labour market demands has been accompanied by a discursive transformation that affect long‐term Filipina residents in Japan. Based on ethnographic observation of a course run for caregivers, in this article I examine how foreign nationals' affective labour can be perceived. I further propose locating care within a broader transnational sphere, a ‘curo‐scape’ that is to say, a transnational sphere of administering and managing care at not just a transregional and global level but also at a local state one.