Global Labour Migration: How Norway’s Migrant Farm Workers Became Integrated into the Formal Labour Market

• In Event: 127 - Section on Inequality, Poverty and Mobility Roundtable Session (one-hour).
  In Paper Session: Table 14. Policy and Welfare

Abstract

At the turn of the 21st century, migrant farm workers in Norwegian agriculture were offered precarious wage and work conditions. However, conditions have improved substantially since then; for example, today most farmers pay a minimum wage of USD$17.9 per hour. I discuss how different forms of “formalisation” of globalised labour arrangements brought about this change, emphasising a combination of dominant discourses of social equality and cohesion, state regulatory programmes, industrial interests and media/public attention. I argue for a more context-sensitive approach in analysing low-skilled migrant workers’ positions in high-income countries’ labour markets and identify three contextual dimensions that need particular attention: a) national level policies: migration laws, regulation of industrial relations and wider welfare state arrangements are informed by global trends but these are implemented, transformed and often countered at the national level; b) rural/urban dimension: objective work and welfare conditions and the migrant workers’ evaluations of them are different in the countryside and the cities; c) characteristics of productions: The low-skilled character of labour in tertiary rural industries defines important parameters of migrants’ experiences; however, there are also variations between production lines (e.g., dairy, fruit), in part due to goods’ biological qualities. In conclusion, the Norwegian agricultural case adds important nuances to the overall story of neo-liberalisation of labour markets and global work migration, including a demonstration of the possibilities for counteracting dominant trends.

Author

• Johan Fredrik Rye, Norwegian University of Technology and Science