Chiu Tuen Yi, The Chinese University of Hong Kong
August 2015 – paper removed from website; citation will be provided upon publication.
Abstract: A considerable amount of empirical evidence has revealed that women in cross-border families have lower labour force participation rates (Choi, Cheung, & Cheung, 2012; Morrison & Lichter, 1988; DaVanzo, 1976; Duncan & Perrucci, 1976; Long, 1974), underscoring the impact of migration context and immigrant status on marriage migrants’ employment status. Nevertheless, these figures might be obscuring the true picture of marriage migrants’ employment, as the majority of these studies have not considered involuntary non-employment when calculating employment and unemployment rates. Without inquiring into the causes of the potential incongruence between employment status (behavioral outcomes) and employment preference (intentions to work), one may run the risks of, first, assuming those non-employed are not working voluntarily; second, neglecting potential workers who choose not to work for involuntary reasons; and third, leading to inaccurate estimates of the unemployment rates. To fill these gaps, this paper uses data from ethnography including participant observation and 41 in-depth interviews with marriage migrants and their husbands in Mainland-Hong Kong cross-border marriages to examine whether marriage migrants’ employment status is in congruence with their employment preference. The findings reveal that migration has exacerbated features of the traditional system of marriage and family, rendering marriage migrants’ potential agency to incorporate breadwinning into motherhood and daughterhood not realized. The approach adopted in this paper adds insights into theories of gender, migration and work by explicating how immigration intersects with gender to intervene in marriage migrants’ employment and how such incongruence can become a significant source of marital conflict.
Keywords: employment status and preference, marriage migration, cross-border families
About the HYI Working Paper Series: The Harvard-Yenching Institute is pleased to make available working papers by HYI affiliated scholars on topics in the humanities and social sciences, with special attention to the study of Asian culture.
The HYI Working Paper Series welcomes submissions from all HYI-affiliated faculty and fellowship grantees (including graduate students). Scholars are invited to post papers either in English or in an Asian language. To submit a paper, please email strogatz@fas.harvard.edu.
The views expressed in the HYI Working Paper Series are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the Harvard-Yenching Institute. HYI Working Papers have not undergone formal review and approval. Such papers are included in this series to elicit feedback and to encourage discussion. Copyright belongs to the author(s). Papers may be downloaded for personal use only, and may not be cited without the author’s permission.