Asymmetric Information under the Kafala Sponsorship System: Impacts on Foreign Domestic Workers’ Income and Employment Status in the GCC Countries
| Published date | 01 October 2016 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12269 |
| Date | 01 October 2016 |
Asymmetric Information under the Kafala
Sponsorship System: Impacts on Foreign
Domestic Workers’Income and Employment
Status in the GCC Countries
Froilan T. Malit Jr.*
,
** and George Naufal***
ABSTRACT
This article examines the legal and policy implications of information asymmetry for foreign
domestic workers employed under the Kafala sponsorship system in the Gulf Cooperation
Council (GCC) countries. Drawing from ethnographic and field-based observations in large
GCC migrant destinations –including Kuwait, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) –
we investigate the information flows and market uncertainties between five key stakeholders:
labour-receiving governments, labour-sending governments, recruitment agencies (subagents),
sponsors (employers), and social networks. Several factors contribute to asymmetric informa-
tion: the lack of bilateral labour agreements and government policy coordination, programs
between and among government entities, the absence of labour law for domestic workers, and
the laissez faire approach of the labour-receiving government. These sources of asymmetric
information create serious market vulnerabilities for the domestic worker population, often
resulting in loss of employment and early deportation. The concluding section further outlines
policy implications and areas of methodological research on GCC migration.
INTRODUCTION
When I came to the UAE, I thought I would work as a beauty manicurist. But when I arrived here,
my recruitment agency pushed me to work as a domestic worker. I did not have training, but I had
to do it. I borrowed US $2,000 in order to come to the UAE, and now I am in debt before I even
start my job. (Martina, 28, a Filipina runaway domestic worker in Qatar)
1
One of the main challenges we face is the lack of coordination between sending and receiving
countries. There is lack of procedure for addressing domestic workers’rights. There is no labour
law and this puts us in a tricky, unregulated labour market, where labour violations are high. (Send-
ing-country official in Kuwait)
In the GCC countries, domestic work migration is a critical policy discourse.
2
In 2010, 18 mil-
lion out of 41 million constituted labour migrants, representing 40 per cent of the GCC total
* Cornell University, New York
** American University of Sharjah, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates
*** Texas A&M University, College Station IZA, Bonn
doi: 10.1111/imig.12269
©2016 The Authors
International Migration ©2016 IOM
International Migration Vol. 54 (5) 2016
ISS N 00 20- 7985 Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
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