Negotiating the Social Citizenship Rights of Migrant Domestic Workers: The Right to Family Reunification and a Family Life in Policies and Debates

Abstract

This paper discusses the right of migrant live-in, 24-hour-care, domestic workers to a family life, particularly in relation to recent efforts to strengthen their rights. My argument is that national and EU policies that tolerate the irregular work situation of migrant domestic workers are a functional response to the specific intersection of family and paid work in this field. The familialisation of work implies the defamilialisation of the worker and the deprivation of the right to a family life. In order to understand the experience of defamilialisation, I discuss the specific tensions entailed in familialised, paid, domestic and care work and how these motivate migrant domestic workers to develop specific coping strategies. Beyond these strategies, I argue that broader social structures sustain the defamilialisation of the workers. Finally, I ask how the right to a family life appears in recent debates about the realisation of rights for migrant domestic workers, especially at the level of the recent negotiations for an ILO Convention on ‘Decent Work for Domestic Workers’.