From labour contractors to worker-agents: transformations in the recruitment of migrant labourers in India

Raj, Jayaseelan and Axelby, Richard (2019) From labour contractors to worker-agents: transformations in the recruitment of migrant labourers in India. Contributions to Indian Sociology, 53 (2). 272 - 298. ISSN 0069-9667

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Abstract

This article examines the circumstances in which the tasks performed by professional labour contractors may be passed on to worker-agents. It does so by critically engaging with the experience of migrant workers from the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand as they travel to work in the Peermade tea belt in the South Indian state of Kerala. Specifically, we identify shifts in economic and political contexts that have permitted these functions to pass from labour contractors to workers-agents and from a Sardari (top-down) to a Ristedari (kinship based) system. Outlining the functions of the labour contractor—as bridge, broker and buffer—the article details the complex processes and the series of negotiations that occur during the transition from labour contractor to worker-agent-led recruitment and the implications of this shift for labour relations in the production setting. We conclude by calling for further consideration of the ‘worker-agent’ as a key emerging figure in understanding the contemporary transformations in the reproduction of footloose migrant labour, which may have larger ramifications for other contexts in South Asia and beyond.

Item Type:	Article
Official URL:	https://journals.sagepub.com/home/cis
Additional Information:	© 2019 The Authors
Divisions:	LSE Anthropology
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor > HD8689 Working Class - India
Date Deposited:	07 May 2020 11:15
Last Modified:	01 Aug 2024 10:34
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/104299

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