Split Labor Market Research Articles

Macao’s Split Labour Market

Abstract Edna Bonacich’s split labour market states that socio-political factors generate differential outcomes for workers in a region, generally as the result of ethnic antagonism. This ethnic antagonism, Bonacich argues, does not require open violence or even verbal confrontation but can operate through exclusion movements and “caste” systems. In this paper, we use Bonacich’s framework to analyse the production of a split labour market in the Macao, Special Administrative Region of China. Macao depends on an abundant supply of low-skilled migrant workers to remunerate the workforce. While many migrant workers are foreigners, most are ‘internal’ migrants from Mainland China, meaning that a conventional explanation of ethnic differences is insufficient. Bonacich had observed that “exclusion attempts and caste-like arrangements are found among national groupings within a racial category” giving the example of ‘whites’ in the United States excluding other ‘whites’ from different parts of Europe. However, Macao as a part of China constitutes a unique example in that an exclusion attempt and caste-like arrangement is to be found within the same national grouping of the same racial category in the same country. As this research considers how ethnic and quasi-ethnic differences are produced and sustained in Macao through government policy; social attitudes and the social practices of workers and businesses, we find that permanent Macao id card holders, which gives out numerous benefits and rights, is as a form of exclusion movement. Moreover, local workers act as a labour aristocracy: they extract concessions from businesses and suppress migrant workers economically, politically and socially. Edna Bonacich’s split labour market helps explain how a labour aristocracy is maintained subtly at the interest of local workers through concessions from the businesses.

At the zero degree / Below the minimum: Wage as sign in Israel’s split labor market

Marx conceived of the reproduction of labor-power as a circuit in which the wage must suffice to purchase the commodities necessary to meet the worker’s “so-called necessary requirements,” which are “products of history.” In this article, I argue that, through ethnographic investigation of the wage as a sign of these requirements, we can arrive at a wealth of knowledge about how the wage helps to construct different groups of workers as belonging to different human types, which are often “bundled” together with categories such as race and citizenship. I make my case through the investigation of two groups of workers: young Jewish-Israeli citizens engaged in logistics work and earning the minimum wage, and migrant farmworkers from Thailand who are paid far below that minimum for their labor. I argue that the first group represents a “zero degree” of labor-power, defined by the legal and biopolitical concern of the state for its reproduction, while the latter is understood by its members, their employers, and the surrounding society as undeserving of such concern. Deploying the Marxist-feminist problematic of the social reproduction of labor power, I argue that, by affording different groups of workers, and their children, different standards of living and opportunities for integration into labor markets, the wage works together with other forces to lock people into embodied, inherited “types.” From this perspective, I suggest, some categories of oppression do not “intersect” at right angles but rather run almost parallel, and at times coming close to cohering—a finding with implications for both analysis and political practice.

What explains the rise of majority–minority tensions and conflict in Xinjiang?

ABSTRACTIn the past few years there has been a rise of inter-ethnic violence in China. While ethno-cultural repression and ineffective state policies are correctly attributed as key culprits behind this reality, this article suggests that socio-economic factors play a fundamental contributory role as well. Using the Xinjiang case, the article maps ethnic tensions and violence as a manifestation and expression of a growing and heightened ethno-cultural consciousness stemming from ethnic minorities’ low socio-economic status due, in part, to internal Han migration, and a labour market process – involving agency and structure – that has shaped a split and segmented labour market.

Representing foreign workers in the private security industry: a South African perspective on trade union engagement

ABSTRACTIn recent years South African cities have become home to a large number of undocumented migrant workers. If trade unions do not organise undocumented migrant workers, it opens up such workers to exploitation and maltreatment by employers, thereby creating a split labour market that undermines the entire labour movement. This article focuses on the responses of the national trade union movement in the private security sector to the presence of undocumented workers at the grassroots level. Using a case study approach, we find that the pressures of labour market informalisation in the industry prompt unions to seek to maintain and advance their position from their traditional support base of citizen workers rather than attempt to include new groups. The failure to engage is reinforced by anti-immigrant attitudes which link foreigners with problems in the industry such as low wages and portrays such workers as co-conspirators rather than comrades. While justice and solidarity have always been the foundation of trade unionism in South Africa, the movement is in danger of failing this test if the current situation in terms of the exclusion of undocumented foreign workers persists.

Segmented Assimilation, Split Labor Markets, and Racial/Ethnic Inequality

Assimilation and split labor market dynamics are core foci in research on immigration, race/ethnicity, and inequality. Little work, however, systematically analyzes how assimilation and group-level power dynamics within labor markets intersect relative to employment trajectories and rewards. In this article, we do so by offering integrated analyses of racial/ethnic inequalities for an important case, New York City from 1910 to 1930. Our multi-method analyses draw from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS) and content-coded coverage from the New York Times for the period. Quantitative and qualitative results demonstrate a clear racial/ethnic hierarchy as well as group-level variations in opportunity relative to industrial concentration, segregation, and discrimination. Assimilative attributes and generational status mattered, yet certain inequalities were more firmly entrenched. Most pronounced, as seen in our qualitative analyses, were processes of social closure, discrimination, and related exclusionary constraints—constraints encountered and eventually alleviated, to some degree, for new white ethnics but not for African Americans. We conclude by discussing the theoretical and empirical utility of considering the embedded nature of assimilation within broader contexts of racial/ethnic closure in labor market opportunities and also relative to historical and contemporary eras.

The Military as a Split Labor Market: The Case of Women and Religious Soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces

A conflict between religious male soldiers and secular female soldiers has emerged since the 2000s within the Israel Defense Forces. This clash has gradually taken the form of religious rhetoric, articulated by rabbis and other religious activists, that has moved from refraining from publicly questioning the fitness of women as combatants to discourse that gradually delegitimized women’s service. Based on the theoretical theme of the split labor market, I will argue that there is a link between the extent to which the growing introduction of women into field units threatens to devalue the religious youth’s symbolic rewards and the escalation in anti-feminist rhetoric, whose ultimate goal is to exclude women from the military.

日本人の排外意識に対する分断労働市場の影響

日本の排外意識の研究においては, 外国人住民の規模が排外意識に与える効果が, その国籍によって異なることが指摘されてきた. しかし, なぜそのような差が生じるのかについては, 十分に検証されていない. 本稿は, 外国人住民と日本人の間の労働市場の分断に注目することにより, この国籍による効果の差の説明を試みる.労働市場分断仮説によれば, 外国人住民がホスト社会住民よりも低い賃金の職に集中している場合に, ホスト社会住民の賃金や労働環境の悪化への懸念が生じ, 排外意識が高まると説明される.この仮説のもと, 日本版総合的社会調査の2006年度のデータ (JGSS-2006) を分析したところ, 以下の結果がえられた. 第1に, 労働市場の分断状況と排外意識には関連がみられ, 労働市場の分断状況が顕著であるほど, 排外意識が強くなる傾向があった. 第2に, 労働市場の分断状況をモデルに投入することにより, 国籍別の外国籍割合の効果が有意でなくなることから, 先行研究において指摘されてきた国籍別の外国籍割合の効果が, 労働市場の分断の程度によって説明されることが示された. 本稿の結果からは, 日本人の排外意識を考えるうえで, 個々人としての日本人側の要因だけでなく, 日本の労働市場の構造とそこにおける外国人労働者の位置づけという, マクロな視点をとる必要があることが示唆される.

“Foreign Brides” Meet Ethnic Politics in Taiwan

A great number of women from China, Vietnam, and Indonesia recently arrived in Taiwan to marry men of lower social strata. Such an unusual pattern of migration has stimulated debates about the status and the citizenship of the new arrivals. This study analyzes Taiwanese responses toward these marriage migrants by using a national survey conducted in 2004. Three aspects of restrictive attitudes were tapped concerning these newcomers: (1) rights to work; (2) access to public health insurance; and (3) full citizenship. Immigrants from China were most opposed, compared to women with other origins (Southeast Asia, Japan, Europe, and the US). The seemingly unrelated regression estimation regression results do not support the split labor market hypotheses, as marriage migrants do not appear to be economic threats toward members of the lower classes. In contrast, ethnic nationalism plays a key role in determining the natives’ restrictive attitudes. The case of Taiwan represents a special genre, where ethnic politics selectively arouses the social rejection of women immigrants of certain origins.

The impact of robots on socio-environmental fields

Robots – machines with artificial intelligence, physical movement, and environmental awareness – are increasing in sophistication and areas of use. Robots entered society in substantial numbers only 40 years ago as factory labour. They now occupy homes, hospitals, farms, and battlefields as an unpaid caste in a split-labour market. Their capacity for autonomous behaviour and experiential learning permits them to team with humans in some tasks while replacing them in others. Task sharing has shaped robot evolution toward an android model. As they displace humans, robots will thin out the social capital upon which human solidarity depends. While not a ‘species’ threat, their use as industrial and military tools concentrates wealth and power, sharpens class conflict, and increases international inequality. Because they lack the biological dependence that is the structural basis for environmental care, their deployment tends to erode environmental sustainability as well as reciprocity-based human social solidarity.

Ethnicity and Class, Transitions Over a Decade: Ontario, 1861‑1871

Suite aux travaux pionniers de Pentland, un grand nombre d'historiens canadiens du 19e siècle ont postulé l'existence d'un marché du travail partagé pendant la période cruciale s'étendant de 1850 à 1870. D'après cette hypothèse, on assiste à cette époque à la création d'un prolétariat sans terres, élément essentiel à la transformation du pays, d'une économie agricole et commerciale à une économie industrielle et capitaliste. Ce groupe naissant était partagé suivant l'ethnie, les travailleurs Anglais et Ecossais occupant les emplois spécialisés, les Irlandais étant relégués aux emplois non spé- cialisés. On soutient que ce partage interne, s ajoutant aux salaires élevés versés aux travailleurs les plus prévilégiés, permit au Canada d'éviter en grande partie le radi- calisme ouvrier, alors que la réserve de personnel compétent épargna aux industries canadiennes les coûts élevés de la formation. Cependant une étude des recensements de 1861 et 1871 dans le centre-sud de l'Ontario indique que, en majorité, les immigrants irlandais catholiques et protestants travaillaient non pas à des emplois industriels peu rémunérés, mais bien à Vagriculture. Une enquête informatisée sur 10,000 hommes cou verts par les deux recensements et dont l'emploi est connu, fournit des renseignements sur un certain nombre de questions. L'analyse des données révèle les différences suivantes dans la composition de la population active masculine entre 1861 et 1871: a) la proportion de personnes nées en Ontario passer de 27 à 40 pour cent, alors que le nombre de personnes nées en Irlande baisse de 24 à 15 pour cent; la proportion de personnes nées en Ecosse et en Angleterre demeure essentiellement inchangée: b) pour ce qui est des emplois, il y aun mouvement du travail d'ouvriers vers iagriculture et, dans une moindre mesure, vers les occupa- tions artisanales et non-manuelles; la grande majorité des fermiers (84 pour cent en 1871) est propriétaire et non locataire; c) ni l'ethnicité ni la religion ne déterminaient l'occupation; à l'exception d'une concentration d'Irlandais d'origine dans les milieux ouvriers, la population active ne semble pas avoir été départagée suivant l'ethnicité ou Vappartenance religieuse. Une proportion relativement élevée de travailleurs nés en Ontario (30 pour cent en 1861 et 25 pour cent en 1871) était constituée de fermiers et de leurs fits; d) pendant cette période les différences entre nationalités au sein des groupes occupationnels s'aténuent, quoique les Irlandais catholiques continuent d'être sur- représentés chez les ouvriers, tout comme les Anglais d'origine dans les occupations bourgeoises et artisanales. S'il y a une certaine spécialisation occupationnelle par groupe ethnique, la concertration n'est pas assez prononcée pour appuyer l hypothèse selon laquelle la population était profondément partagée suivant l'ethnicité; e) une analyse des emplois par groupes d'âge laisse croire qu'il n'y a pas de mouvement d'abandon de l'agriculture et, conséquemment, pas de prolétarisation de la population au cours des années 1860. Au contraire, il y eu un accroissement de la proportion de fermiers et une diminution de la proportion d'ouvriers. Chaque groupe occupationnei suit un modèle de croissance particulier, avec des variations dans le temps; f) i établisse- ment de liens entre les données des deux recensements permet certaines conclusions sur la question de la permanence dans l'emploi. Près de 90 pour cent de ceux qui étaient fermiers en 1861 se réclamaient du même groupe occupationnei une décennie plus tard, alors que seulement un tiers des ouvriers faisaient de même. Dans l'ordre, les artisants, les professionnels et les marchands/fabricants se situent au centre de l'échelle pour ce qui est de la permanence. Un nombre relativement peu élevé de fils de fermiers (7 pour cent) sont devenus ouvriers ou artisans. Le groupe occupationnei le moins stable est celui des travailleurs non-manuels, où seulement 30 pour cent ont gardé le même genre d'emploi. Les données indiquent une mobilité occupationnelle assez élevée dans le temps, et l'absence de dépeuplement rural ou d'une crise de l'agriculture; g) sauf pour les travailleurs non-spécialisés, la mobilité semble dépendre plus de l'occupation que de l'âge. Le taux de mobilité est le plus élevé pour les travailleurs âgés de moins de 25 ans, particulièrement chez les ouvriers, alors qu'il est moins prononcé entre 25 et 54 ans. Au delà de cet âge, seuls les artisans ont une certaine mobilité. En tenant compte de l'ethnicité dans les calculs, un seul phénomène important peut être identifié: les ouvriers Irlandais catholiques avaient plus fortement tendance à demeurer dans cette catégorie pendant assez longtemps. A une époque où Vindustrialisation urbaine prenait de l'ampleur, la production indé- pendante de produits de base pas des familles d'agriculteurs devint également plus courante. La mobilité occupationnelle était généralisée, ce manifestant particulière- ment du groupe des ouvriers, vers celui des agriculteurs.

Social Network Approach to Understand the Ethnic Economy: A Theoretical Discourse1

In this paper we suggest how social network analysis, in contrast to looking at physical space, can be used to trace the social and economic location of ethnic enclaves. Taking skilled workers immigrating to Canada from China as an example, we analyze critically how split labor market theories describe materialist and structural factors that determine immigrants’ limited options. Cultural theories play up immigrants’ interest in using their cultural resources to pull themselves ahead. We propose that social network analysis as a single framework can bring together elements from materialist–structural and cultural theories. The position of people and firms in these networks gives us a view of the kinds of jobs immigrants get and the businesses they set up. To understand the ethnic economy, we discuss how networks of social and economic relations intersect each other. By seeing the ethnic economy embedded in social networks, we can provide a more general explanation of the social space of the ethnic economy in contrast to its physical location. We use three cases of ethnic entrepreneurs to illustrate how the social and economic relations locate their businesses in the enclave and how they are also linked to the mainstream economy.

European Labour Mobility: Challenges and Potentials

European Union economies are pressed by (i) a demographic change that induces population ageing and a decline of the workforce, and (ii) a split labour market that is characterized by high levels of unemployment for low-skilled people and a simultaneous shortage of skilled workers. This lack of flexible high-skilled workers and the aging process has created the image of an immobile labour force and the eurosklerosis phenomenon. In such a situation, an economically motivated immigration policy at the European level can generate welfare improvements. A selective policy that discourages unskilled migrants and attracts skilled foreign workers will vitalize the labour market, foster growth and increase demand for unskilled native workers. The paper summarizes the available economic insights, and suggests (i) the need to harmonize the single-country migration policies across Europe and (ii) that the European Union needs to become an active player on the international labour markets by providing competitive institutional settings for European companies.

European Labour Mobility: Challenges and Potentials

European Union economies are pressed by (i) a demographic change that induces population ageing and a decline of the workforce, and (ii) a split labour market that is characterized by high levels of unemployment for low -skilled people and a simultaneous shortage of skilled workers. This lack of flexible high-skilled workers and the aging process has created the image of an immobile labour force and the eurosklerosis phenomenon. In such a situation, an economically motivated immigration policy at the European level can generate welfare improvements. A selective policy that discourages unskilled migrants and attracts skilled foreign workers will vitalize the labour market, foster growth and increase demand for unskilled native workers. The paper summarizes the available economic insights, and suggests (i) the need to harmonize the single -country migration policies across Europe and (ii) that the European Union needs to become an active player on the international labour markets.

Labor Market Competition, Perceived Threat, and Endorsement of Economic Discrimination against Foreign Workers in Israel

The research examines the impact of labor market competition and fear of economic competition on support for economic discrimination against outgroup populations. The data, obtained from a national representative sample of 1,100 Israeli citizens, focus on attitudes toward foreign workers in Israel. The findings revealed by the analysis lead to the following conclusions. First, a considerable number of Israelis view foreign workers as posing a threat to their economic interests (i.e., wage level, employment opportunities). Second, endorsement of economic discrimination against foreign workers is substantial. The analysis lends firm support to socio-psychological explanations of discrimination, suggesting that fear of economic competition (i.e., perceived threat) is more pronounced among the disadvantaged, subordinate, and vulnerable populations; and that support of economic discrimination against foreign workers is affected first and foremost by perceived threat. Further analysis provides considerable support for the split labor market model. It reveals that most of the effect of socioeconomic and employment status on the endorsement of discrimination is mediated via perceived threat of economic competition. The effect of ethnicity on endorsement of discrimination, however, is not consistent with the split labor market model. Other things being equal, Jews-the superordinate ethnic group in Israel-express higher support of economic discrimination than Arabs-the subordinate ethnic group. These findings are understood and discussed within the context of Israel as an ethno-national state.

Anti-Chinese Politics in California in the 1870s: An Intercounty Analysis

This article uses a combination of qualitative and quantitative historical data from all California counties to assess the efficacy of variables derived from the split labor market, cultural division of labor, and ethnic competitive models, as well as variables related to the organizational capacity of majority group workers, to predict efforts in late-nineteenth-century California to institutionalize discrimination against the Chinese through the political system. The results suggest that anti-Chinese voting and support for anti-Chinese legislation are best predicted by presence of large numbers of urbanized majority group workers and the level of organization they achieved and that this was especially true during the period of greatest conflict at the end of the 1870s.

Democratizing with Ethnic Divisions: A Source of Conflict?

This article investigates the conditions that are conducive to extreme political violence in ethnically heterogeneous nations. Theories of resource mobilization, ethnic competition, and split labor market propose that democratization and economic modernization encourage ethnic competition, increasing the likelihood of extreme political violence within nations experiencing political and economic change. In the light of these theories, the conditions that possibly foster conflict in multi-ethnic nations are identified with respect to levels of democracy, political change (or democratization), and levels of economic development. The effects of these variables on extreme political violence are examined with several logit regression analyses on a pooled time-series sample of 126 nations from 1948 to 1982. The findings show that ethnic heterogeneity is not associated with higher levels of violence within nations, except under certain political conditions. Both democracy and economic development relate to political violence in a curvilinear inverted U-shape form. For ethnically heterogeneous societies, however, the inverted U-curve for democracy is asymmetric, with democracy's pacifying impact relative to semidemocracies only about half as potent as in ethnically homogeneous societies and less than that of strict autocracy.

The Role of Employers in Split Labor Markets: An Event-Structure Analysis of Racial Conflict and AFL Organizing, 1917-1919

This articlefocuses on employers' responses to AFL organizing efforts in the meatpacking industry in Chicago and the steel industry in Gary, Indiana, between 1917 and 1919. First, I develop a typology of split labor markets that incorporates the insights of the neo-Marxist divide-and-rule perspective. Second, I use event-structure analysis (ESA) to systematically examine causal sequences in the Chicago and Gary union campaigns. The analyses suggest that (1) both capitalist and state actors meditate conflicts between racial groups in the labor market and that (2) employers actively contribute to racial antagonism when emergent interracial coalitions threaten to increase labor costs and polarize class struggle. The revised split labor market theory explains how thefeatures of industrial labor markets affect the strategies of employers as well as majority and minority workers.

The Power and Collapse of Paternalism: The Ford Motor Company and Black Workers, 1937-1941

In this comparative historical analysis, I examine the significance of paternalism in two interracial labor organizing drives at the Ford Motor Company's River Rouge plant during the Great Depression. The first drive resulted in ongoing interracial antagonism among Ford workers and the union's failure. The second drive generated interracial labor solidarity and led to the union's recognition. One of the distinctive aspects of the setting was Henry Ford's paternalistic relations with the black community of Detroit. Drawing from Mary Jackman's (1994) research, I examine the dimensions of paternalism and how it contributes to split labor market dynamics, in particular, and power relationships, in general. This analysis suggests that a split labor market based on paternalism can only be overcome by workers when another political actor intervenes in ways that challenge the stratification (whether by design or not).

The Scope of General Theory

A “holy war” is being fought within comparative historical sociology between deductivists and inductivists over the scope of general theory. The issues include broad versus narrow scope conditions, explicit versus contingent theorizing, and theory testing versus theory building. The irony of the conflict is that each side makes ample use of the other's product, despite condemning its progenitor. The authors offer a hierarchical approach to qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) as a method for linking deductive and inductive approaches, and link QCA to game theory as a way to design more dynamic comparative studies. The authors illustrate this method through a split labor market analysis of interracial conflict and cooperation in nine U.S. labor organizing drives.

The Split Labor Market and the Origins of Antidrug Legislation in the United States

Edna Bonacich's (1972) theoretical formulation of Split labor market dynamics as underlying the content and process of ethnic antagonism is expanded and applied to an historical analysis of the development of antidrug laws in the United States. The campaigns and resultant legislation against opium, cocaine, alcohol, and marijuana are subjected to a split labor market analysis that incorporates the notion of moral panics and an understanding of the ways in which law may be used as a “weapon” in the furtherance of class interests. The article concludes that each of these campaigns came about as the result of an underlying split labor market dynamic and adds to Bonacich's original formulation the response of criminalization of the threatening labor group by the higher-paid labor group.