Cross-Border Labour Markets and Gender

Labour migration patterns are highly segmented and gender-segregated. Although much research addresses gendered informal and formal care work at the global scale, and the term 'global care chain' is well established, it is often overlooked that gender also plays a decisive role in other professions and sectors. These professions are often considered 'global' based on the companies, the organisation of work, and the people involved. Given this context, the planned session will explore how labour market actors leverage and actively reproduce gender inequalities. They do so through relevant labour market institutions and various social and physical infrastructures. The session addresses theoretical and conceptual approaches for analysing cross-border labour market gender segregation. It also examines how legal frameworks, such as labour or migration law, or political programmes, like recruitment initiatives, place migrant workers by gender in specific, often precarious, labour market segments. Additionally, the session considers how gendered bodies—and ideas about women’s bodies and feminine traits—become commodities in this process, sometimes in an intersectional way.