A Confucian Case for Equal Membership for Foreign Domestic Workers
| Date | 01 February 2019 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12539 |
| Author | Sungmoon Kim |
| Published date | 01 February 2019 |
A Confucian Case for Equal Membership for
Foreign Domestic Workers
1
Sungmoon Kim
City University of Hong Kong
Abstract
Daniel A. Bell, a leading Confucian and communitarian political theorist, objects to equal membership to foreign domestic
workers (FDWs) in East Asia on two Confucianism-inspired normative and practical grounds. Bell’s core argument is two-
fold: first, that liberal-democratic demand for equal membership, despite its good intention, is likely to backfire, driving
the current and potential FDWs into a far worse economic situation and second, that in a Confucian culture what is
important is not so much justice but family-like affective relationships, which, in Bell’s view, can be better fostered
between employers and FDWs in the absence of equal membership. In this paper, I challenge Bell’s two objections from a
Confucian perspective by highlighting that the Confucian appreciates the value of equal membership both for intrinsic rea-
sons, finding the unequal citizen status morally demeaning, as well as for instrumental reasons in terms of its contribution
to one’s moral self-cultivation.
Policy Implications
•The denial of equal membership to foreign domestic workers in East Asia cannot be justified in terms of their economic
well-being alone.
•The denial of equal membership to foreign domestic workers in East Asia cannot be justified on the argument about
affective ties.
•Foreign domestic workers working in East Asia should enjoy equal (social) membership.
•Confucian ethics of moral self-cultivation justifies foreign domestic helpers’equal membership accompanied by basic
rights and social obligations.
As of 28 May 2016 in Hong Kong, a city with roughly seven
million, there were 346,027 registered foreign domestic
workers (FDWs), most of whom from the Philippines
(185,673) and Indonesia (151,996).
2
FDWs are predominantly
women from the less affluent Southeast Asian countries
who have left their families (usually including children) in
search for better jobs and ultimately a better life for their
family. They live in their employer’s home and take care of
children or elderly family members. Unlike so-called high-
skilled migrant workers, however, who are eligible to apply
for permanent residence in Hong Kong after seven-years of
stay, FDWs have no such option, even if they have been
working and living in Hong Kong over twenty years. They
must renew their two-year contract repeatedly as long as
they wish to stay and continue to work in Hong Kong. Hong
Kong law requires employers to pay FDWs no less than the
minimum allowance wage, which is HK$4,210 per month
(approximately US$540), and to provide health insurance as
well as ‘suitable accommodation’for their privacy and rest
(most commonly thirty square feet or less). However, it is
often reported that many FDWs do not have a room of their
own and some of them even sleep in the kitchen or in the
bathroom. Moreover, many of them casually work more
than fifteen hours a day. According to Hong Kong Helpers
Campaign, more than half of FDWs in Hong Kong have
been either physically or sexually abused and Charity Mis-
sion for Migrant Workers reports that in 2015 alone over
4,000 FDWs sought support from this NGO.
Instantly, one may find various forms of abuse and
exploitation that FDWs commonly experience morally unac-
ceptable and further feel that something must be done
about it. To be sure, abuse and exploitation are not only
immoral by any measure but also illegal in light of Hong
Kong Basic Law. Everybody thinks that legal rectification for
that sort of ‘wrongdoing’is necessary. But some seek a dee-
per and more fundamental solution for it, not merely for the
occasional abuse or exploitation but for the very injustice
implicated in the working and living conditions of all FDWs.
These critics tend to find FDWs’unequal social status –not
only vis-
a-vis Hong Kong citizens but also relative to other
immigrants especially those involved in high-skilled profes-
sions –the root of injustice and demand equal membership
as its rightful solution. According to this view, not only
should abuse and exploitation be prohibited and rectified
by law, which ought to treat citizens and noncitizens
equally, but FDWs should eventually be entitled to
©2018 University of Durham and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Global Policy (2019) 10:1 doi: 10.1111/1758-5899.12539
Global Policy Volume 10 . Issue 1 . February 2019
122
Special Section Article
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