4.2 Non-communitarian immigrant women in the work market in spain  (Page 2/18)

The globalization as a macro-process is the frame that allows understanding the conformation of women immigrants who are directed towards postindustrial economies to be used in the domestic service. Global Capitalism and patriarchate operate as macro-structural forces that, together, determine the immigrant workers’ positions (Salazar 2001:62). The “division of the reproductive work” under racial or ethnic lines, operates in a context of incorporation of women from peripheral countries to the global economy. It is a distinguishing form of international division of work, fruit of the interaction between global Capitalism and the systems of gender inequality, that takes place in societies of origin as in those of destination, and that establishes a connection among women through interdependence relations. The international transference of reproductive work has to do with social, political, and economic relations among women in a market of global work. This division is based in a structural relation of inequality on the basis of social class, gender, ethnic group, and citizenship, that relegates them to those occupations more emblematic of discrimination of gender, in particular, to all those tasks linked to social reproduction.

The objective of this chapter is to offer a panoramic view of the non-communitarian immigrant woman in Spain, through an approach to the different profiles and migratory projects and from its labor trajectories in the work market of the Spanish society. For the analysis, different statistical sources have been used, as well as a compilation of the main results of the most outstanding investigations made in Spain on this matter, and of the studies on immigrant women and the work market in which the authors have participated throughout their investigating trajectory.

The feminization of the migratory flows towards spain in the context of “internationalization of reproduction”

The triple discrimination of female immigrant workers – because of their social class, gender, and ethnic group – relegates them to a very concrete labor niche – that is to say, domestic service and prostitution – which is translated to precarious and maximumly marginal labor participation (Morokvasic 1984). In all the post-industrial societies there is a remarkable increase in the demand of remunerated works dedicated to the tasks of social reproduction. Although some countries have developed regulated programs by the government, that have institutionalized the recruitment of migrant domestic employees, others – as is the case of South Europe or the United States – follow less formalized guidelines at the time of hiring and recruiting. The effects are similar in both cases: the incorporation of female immigrants as domestic employees, coming from the poorest countries, than often must separate from their families and emigrate alone to be able “to fulfill” their functions in the countries that demand them (Hondagneu-Sotelo, Avila 1997).

Although the migratory policies are more restrictive every time, and the entrance of legal migration towards the European countries has been prevented, the arrival of female immigrants to work in domestic services grows exponentially, as a result of the alarming aging of the population – mainly in European countries and especially those of the south, such as Spain –, the change in family structures, the transformation of the social and economic roll of woman, as well as the emergency of new ways of life in which the time for leisure and for oneself are valued more every time.