Lecturer: Dr. Babette P. Resurreccion

Description: The session brings gender to the centre of analyses of migration processes. Gender is embedded in various instances in the migration process: in crucial household decision making to eventual settlement and employment, influenced by policy regimes of immigration, creating new transnational spaces and opportunities in host societies, simultaneous with continuous linkages with left behind households. A gender optic to migration studies and policy opens up a complex template of identity, power, and insecurity that operate in multiple scales of analyses. For instance, female migrants grapple with the new impositions posed by their feminized work and by immigration policies on female subjects in host societies. At the same time, they remain obliged to address feminized obligations to address the needs of left behind kin and households in remote places of origin. In short, the session will attempt to provide a holistic view of the gender embeddedness of migration by citing some of the discussions in the literature and the implications for feminist responses and emancipatory ways forward.

Readings:

1.         Jørgen Carling (2005). Gender Dimensions of International Migration. Global Commission on International Migration. Global Migration Perspective No. 35.

2.         Thanh-Dam Truong and Des Gasper (2008) Trans-local Livelihoods and Connections: Embedding a gender perspective into Migration Studies, Gender, Technology and Development Volume 12 (3): 285-302.

ASEAN Institutional framework

Lecturer: Prof. Dr. Supang Chantavanich

Description:

This session will discuss the ASEAN Declaration on the Protection of Migrant Workers, which has been translated into actions by the civil society groups. Its coverage and the mutually developed plan of actions will be analysed under the institutional framework.

Readings:

4  International Migration in the ESCAP Region: Key policy Implications http://www.unescap.org/esid/committee2005/English/CESI2_2E.pdf

5.  Wui Ling Cheah (2009) ‘Migrant Workers as Citizens within the ASEAN Landscape: International Law and the Singapore Experiment’ Chinese Journal of International Law Vol. 8 (1): 205-231

The Return and Reintegration of Trafficked Victims in the Mekong Region

Lecturer: Mr. Jerrold W Huguet

Description: The session will draw on the information provided in the IOM report on the return and reintegration of trafficked victims in the Mekong Region, supplemented by information from theses written by graduate students at Chulalongkorn University. The session will scrutinize government policies and practices with regard to the return of victims of trafficking, noting areas of concern and making specific recommendations in several areas.

Reading:

Links to publications:

http://www.iomseasia.org/index.php?module=pagesetter&func=viewpub&tid=6&pid=489

Additional sources:

http://www.humantrafficking.org/publications/289

Lecturer: Dr. Thanh-Dam Truong

Description:

This session draws on the case of migration policy in selected countries in the Asia-Pacific Region and compares them with those pursued in the European Union. The aim to show how the securitisation of migration is related movements toward the regionalisation of economies and politics – exacerbated by concerns for national security arising from the post 9/11 event and leading to heightened exclusionary and restrictive practices with regards to rights and entitlements. The convergence of a neo-liberal tendency that emphasizes markets over societies and a rising fear for the ‘other’ has dramatically altered solidarity and political agency. The rising practices of ‘detention’ and ‘rescue’ across the world are a major concern for human rights advocates, social workers and professionals engaged with migration issues. Although their effectiveness is doubtful to scholars and government officials, there is distrust – rather than co-operation – between those who occupy a technocratic position in policy making and those who queries the ethical and political premises behind securitization tendencies. The session will open up the debate on how progressive politics seeking to enhance the rights of migrant workers must draw on human rights norms but must read them from a socially and politically embedded perspective in order to make sending and receiving states more accountable.

Reading:

8.         Kaur, Amarjit and Metcalfe, Ian, 2007: “Migration Matters in the Asia-Pacific Region: Immigration Frameworks, Knowledge Workers and National Policies”, in International Journal on Multicultural Studies, 9 (2): 135-157. (This issue deals with different aspects of migrations in this region)

9         Andrew Geddes (2005) ‘Europe’s Border Relationships and International Migration Relations’, in Journal of Common Market Studies, Volume 43 Issue 4, Pages 787 – 806.

10.         Dennis Broeders and Godfried Engbersen (2007) ‘The Fight Against Illegal Migration: Identification Policies and Immigrants’ Counterstrategies’ American Behavioral Scientist. Volume 50 (12): August, 1592-1609  Accessible at: http://ncbr.ruhosting.nl/html/files/broeders.pdf

11.         Godfried Engbersen and Dennis Broeders (2009) ‘The State versus the Alien: Immigration Control and Strategies of Irregular Immigrants’ in West European Politics, Vol. 32, No. 5, 867–885.

12.         Balakrishnan, R., D. Elson and R. Patel (2009) Rethinking Macro Economic Strategies from a Human Rights Perspective, Marymount Manhattan College. Accessible: http://www.networkideas.org/featart/mar2009/MES2.pdf

Links: global detention project: mapping the use of detention

http://www.globaldetentionproject.org/

Regional policy dialogue

Lecturer: Mr. Jerrold W. Huguet

Consultant on Population and Development

Description:

This session will review the policy dialogue on international migration at the global, regional and bi-lateral levels.  The most visible global dialogue occurs in United Nations meetings and reports, and at the Global Forum on Migration and Development.  Several regional consultative processes include varying groups of Asian and Pacific countries.  ASEAN and COMMIT provide significant policy dialogue in South-East Asia.  The most detailed agreements are at the bi-lateral level, however.  Civil society also plays an important role in the regional policy dialogue.

Reading:

Labour Migration in the Greater Mekong Sub-region

Synthesis Report: Phase I November 2006

http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTTHAILAND/Resources/333200-1089943634036/475256-1151398858396/LM_in_GMSs_Nov06.pdf

Case for Reflection

Philippines’ Migration Policy: The role of social welfare attachés and the murder of such an official attached to the Philippines Embassy in Kuala Lumpur.

Moderator: to be nominated

Description:

This session reflects on the implications of this murder for migration policy, human rights protection and the nature of social support extended to migrant workers in distressed situation, including being trafficked. The main concern is placed on state accountability, the role of civic actors and the challenges posed by organized crime. The concept of ‘civil society’ and the relationship between state, civic actors and migrants will be open up for discussion to explore the context specific gender dynamics of migration and appropriate responses.  Links for background information:

http://www.indigenousportal.com/Human-Rights/Statement-on-the-Torture-and-Murder-of-Anti-Trafficking-Philippines-Social-Welfare-Attach-Finardo-C.html

http://www.bulatlat.com/main/2009/09/04/questions-linger-on-murder-of-attache/

http://www.ifsw.org/p38001880.html

Readings:

6.         Trafficking in Human Beings from the Philippines: A Survey of Government Experts and Law Enforcement Case Files, UNDOC –(no date).

7.         Jonathan Crush and Sujata Ramachandran (2009), Xenophobia, International Migration and Human Development, Human Development Research Paper 47. http://hdr.undp.org/en/reports/global/hdr2009/papers/HDRP_2009_47.pdf