Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies Vol. 33, No. 4, May 2007, pp. 655 669
From Mining to Garment Workshops: Bolivian Migrants in Buenos Aires Tanja Bastia
Based on case-study material from Bolivian migration to Argentina, this article analyses the ways in which gender and ethnicity influence niche formation by exploring the role of social networks. It starts by making the link between niche formation and social networks, before analysing the ways in which migrants’ labour market insertion in Argentina is gendered. Migrants’ life stories and a survey of a community of ex-miners show that a higher proportion of women than men work in the Argentine garment sector. The data also show that migrant women and men do not have equal access to social networks. However, this unequal access does not, in itself, fully explain women’s greater clustering in garment work. Rather, the article suggests that labour market segregation and the articulation of gender, class and ethnicity, as well as migration status, provide women with few alternatives.
Keywords: Labour Migration; Social Networks; Gender; Bolivia; Argentina
Introduction Niches have generally been defined as the ‘overrepresentation of ethnic or racial minorities in particular jobs’ (Model 1993: 164). However, as Schrover et al. show in their introduction to this JEMS special issue, recent research has advanced niche theories with regards to a number of issues. Firstly, contrary to what was previously thought, niches are not limited to retail or self-employment but can also be found in other sectors of the economy, such as the civil service (Waldinger 1994). Secondly, niche formation and migrants’ participation in a niche economy are not dependent upon spatial clustering in a migrant neighbourhood (Boyd 2001; Portes and Jensen 1989 and 1992). Thirdly, niches have generally focused on ethnicity and migrant status, disregarding gender issues, with some exceptions, notably the work by Anthias (1983) on Greek-Cypriots in Britain. It is now increasingly recognised that gender
Tanja Bastia is Post-Doctoral Researcher at the School of City and Regional Planning at Cardiff University. Correspondence to: Dr T. Bastia, School of City and Regional Planning, Cardiff University, Glamorgan Building, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff, CF10 3WA, UK. E-mail: [email protected]
ISSN 1369-183X print/ISSN 1469-9451 online/07/0400655-15 # 2007 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/13691830701265628 656 T. Bastia plays an important role within niche economies in terms of the kinds of jobs undertaken and their relative benefits (Gilbertson 1995; Wright and Ellis 2000). This article analyses the importance of the garment sector for a specific group of migrants: Bolivians working and living in Argentina. The analysis starts from the migrants’ life stories and the way these relate to their migration strategies and opportunities in the host employment market. It explores the articulation of gender with race, ethnicity and class in migrants’ labour market insertion strategies, paying particular attention to migrants’ use of social networks and the way this relates to niche formation. The general literature on the migration of Bolivians to Argentina suggests that there are gender differences in their labour market insertion. The garment sector provides an interesting case study since it gives us the possibility to explore the role of social networks in niche formation and gender differences in a particular sector where both women and men are employed. While the data included in this paper provide some clues as to the gendering of social networks, this is insufficient to fully explain the differences found in the garment sector. It is argued that both social networks as well as existing labour market segregation along gender lines in Argentina are responsible for the fact that this particular niche is more important as a source of employment for migrant women than it is for migrant men.
Niches, Social Networks and Gender Niches are understood to be the result of the role played by social networks in migration (Light et al. 1999). There is in fact a proven close relationship between niches and social networks (Rath 2002; see also MacDonald and MacDonald 1964 for chain migration). Bailey and Waldinger (1991), for example, show the way social networks play a crucial role in supplying employers in the New York garment industry with workers they deem reliable while on the other hand providing workers with training opportunities generally with co-ethnic employers. Despite a long-standing recognition of the role played by social networks in the development of niches, there has been, to date, very little research on the way gender relations influence social networks and, as a consequence, shape niches. Some have warned that ‘much of the literature assumes that these networks are male dominated and that women follow men’ (Phizacklea 1999: 39). However, an emerging body of literature is now starting to look at the way these networks are gendered (see e.g. Hagan 1998; Hondagneu-Sotelo 1994). Wright and Ellis (2000), for example, have conducted a comparative analysis of several ethnic groups in the Los Angeles labour market. They found that women are less concentrated in niches than men are. With only one exception, ‘recently arrived men are more likely than recently arrived immigrant women to cluster with co-ethnics of the same sex’ (2000: 594). They also suggest that ‘women do not always tap the same migration information systems as men and often possess inferior financial resources for moving’ (2000: 585). They therefore propose that gendered social networks are at the base of gendered labour market participation within the niche economy. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 657 Niches are formed and maintained through the social networks migrants engage in. It is therefore fair to assume that, besides other causes, such as unequal gender relations within the household, occupational stereotyping and different educational attainments, unequal access to social networks also plays an important role in developing a gendered outcome in terms of the migrants’ labour market participa- tion, which includes participation in migrant and ethnic niches.
Data and Methods This research is part of a larger project on the Bolivian migration to Argentina. I conducted fieldwork and data collection at both points of origin and destination: in Cochabamba, Bolivia during May and June 2002 and in Buenos Aires, Argentina during January and March 2003 (see Mahler 1999 for another Latin American example of research conducted at both ends of the migration process). I was helped throughout this process by a research assistant who is an ex-migrant and a member of this community of migrant ex-miners. The quantitative data was collected by my research assistant by applying a structured questionnaire through face-to-face interviews in the neighbourhood of ex-miners located at the outskirts of Cochabamba to gather primary data on migration patterns. She randomly selected a third of all households, gaining 157 positive responses. This represents just over a quarter of all households in this neighbourhood, and in total gathered information on 605 people over the age of twelve.1 The qualitative data was obtained by collecting migrants’ life stories through unstructured interviews, which I conducted in Spanish; sometimes my research assistant was also present. In total, I collected, transcribed and analysed 38 life stories. This included Bolivian returnees interviewed in Cochabamba as well as Bolivian migrants living in Buenos Aires. Given the high response rate (89 per cent) of the face-to-face neighbourhood survey, the quantitative data can be taken to be representative of this particular neighbourhood. However, the conclusions cannot be generalised to other Bolivian communities or regional areas. This group of ex-miners shows different historical trajectories in terms of their inclusion in the national migration across the Argentine border as well as specific socio-economic and occupational characteristics. They are here presented as a case study of migrant ex-miners turned garment workers, given their relevance to migration and niche theories.
Gendered Migrant Labour Markets Migration trends in what some have termed the Argentinean migration system (Massey et al. 1998) as well as the Argentine national labour market have changed considerably over the course of the last decades of the twentieth century, with migration across the Bolivian Argentine border showing signs of steady increase. According to census data, Bolivians were the fastest growing migrant group from a neighbouring country between 1980 and 1991 and were only preceded by Peruvians 658 T. Bastia during 1991 2001 (INDEC 1991 and 2001). The 1980 census registered 118,141 Bolivians; the 1991 census counted 143,569 Bolivians; by 2001 they had increased to 233,464 (INDEC 1997 and 2001). Bolivian migration is essentially economic in nature. Both women and men travel to Argentina for work in order to improve their standard of living. Moreover, Bolivian migration to Argentina is mostly temporary or circulatory (Bala´n 1995; Dandler and Medeiros 1988) and ties with their place of origin and family members who remained in Bolivia are seldom severed, as is the case with other migratory groups within the Americas (see e.g. Ellis et al. 1996 for Puerto Rican women). The attraction of Argentina as a destination for Bolivian migrants changed radically since the crisis in 2001 and the consequent floating of the Argentine peso. Anecdotal evidence suggests both numerous returns to Bolivia as well as increasing numbers of Bolivian migrants travelling to Spain. The Bolivia Argentina migration flow is very dynamic, responding to changing circumstances and opportunities. It has recently shown changes in line with global trends in international migration (Castles and Miller 1993), such as a move from peripheral areas towards the capital city, increasing feminisation of migration, and an increased tendency towards illegal forms of migration. In the past Bolivians concentrated in the northern Argentinean provinces of Salta, Jujuy, La Rioja and Mendoza and were mainly engaged in agriculture. Today, their preferred destination is Buenos Aires, where they partly maintain their close relationships with agricultural production, albeit under changing circumstances and arrangements, but have also integrated into the urban economy (Benencia and Gazzotti 1995; INDEC 1997). The structural changes that brought about a geographical displacement of these migration flows have contributed to a feminisation of this particular migration. The new globalised economy, and its shift to the tertiary sector, creates a higher demand for what is generally acknowledged to be ‘female labour’. An ageing population and high levels of female labour market participation often result in increasing demand for domestic workers. In the case of Argentina, female migrants account for 65 per cent of the total increase in migration from neighbouring countries over the period from 1970 to 1990 (INDEC 1997). It is not surprising to find that labour market insertion of Bolivians in Argentina is gender-selective (Benencia and Gazzotti 1995). Women migrants from this commu- nity are primarily involved in garment manufacturing, domestic work, and trading in clothes and vegetables (Benencia and Karasik 1995; Grimson 2000; Mugarza 1985; Recchini de Lattes 1988; Zunino 1997). Men on the other hand used to work in agriculture, construction and garment manufacturing (Benencia and Karasik 1995; Grimson 2000) but, since the 2001 economic and political crisis, have decreased their participation in building because of diminishing opportunities in the construction industry. A number of migrants from the community of ex-miners were able to become upwardly mobile and are now working in relatively more stable and better paid jobs such as bus drivers and nurses. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 659 Migration status clearly affects migrants’ choices and opportunities and it is indicative that Bolivian migration is increasingly undertaken illegally (Sassone 1989), usually by migrants overstaying their tourist visas to engage in paid work. The primary data collected for this research confirms that it has been increasingly difficult for more recently arrived migrants to regularise their work and stay in Argentina (cf. also Oteiza and Novick 2000). This has important implications in terms of accessing jobs as well as working conditions, as will be explained below.
From Mining to Garment Workshops Most of the migrants interviewed belonged to a community of ex-miners who have relocated from the mining town to the outskirts of Cochabamba, the third largest city in Bolivia, during the 1990s. Many ex-miners and members of their families pursued livelihood diversification strategies at least since the 1980s, as a consequence of the severe economic crisis in Bolivia, which included plummeting mineral prices and the restructuring of the state-owned mining company, Comibol. Buenos Aires was just one of the destination areas, but one of increasing importance for this community during the 1990s. The significance of international migration as a livelihood strategy for this particular community is illustrated by the fact that, at the time of the survey in 2002, almost a third of all households (30 per cent) had somebody living abroad. Of these, almost a quarter had four or five absent family members. Migration as a livelihood diversification strategy at the community and household level was identified by Massey et al. (1998) as part of their ‘new economics of migration’, but where their overview falls short is its lack of attention to questions of gender and power relations, an issue well researched within feminist sociology and its critique of the new household economics (Kabeer 1994, especially Chapter 5). This article provides additional arguments on the importance of incorporating gender in migration research and disaggregating units of analysis, including the household. My own survey data shows that Buenos Aires is the main destination for this group of migrants. This is explained by the fact that they started migrating relatively late (late 1980s and early 1990s), when the Argentine capital had already taken precedence as a favoured destination for those Bolivian migrants who had in previous decades concentrated in the Argentine northern regions. Men led this migration. However, women’s independent migration increased throughout the 1990s, peaking in 1998. Women from this community also display high rates of female labour market participation while in Argentina. Survey data shows that both men and women migrate for work and that both have similar labour market participation rates: 85.4 per cent of all female returnees and 87 per cent of all male returnees stated that they worked while abroad. This is to some extent surprising, given earlier studies that showed Bolivian women migrants having much lower participation rates. For example, according to the 1991 census only 45 per cent of migrant women from the neighbouring countries were economically active (INADI 2001). Another study conducted by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) showed that 660 T. Bastia 56.7 per cent of Bolivian women were working at the time of the survey (Zunino 1997). Finally, regarding the wider migration trends discussed above, the migrants’ stories also describe increasing difficulties members of this community face in their attempts to regularise their stay abroad, which in turn influences the specific characteristics of migrants’ labour market insertion. Labour market participation among this group of migrants is clearly gendered, with women being found in only a fraction of the occupations men participate in. Men returnees had worked in 14 occupations; women returnees in only six. The latter were predominantly employed in the garment sector, followed by domestic work. This reproduces patterns found in the wider gender-based segregation of the Argentine labour market. However, what is interesting to note for the purposes of this paper is the high concentration of Bolivian migrants in garment work. The quantitative data shows that the garment sector was the most significant employer for this group of ex-miners (Table 1). Again, there are gender differences given that, for women, garment work was much more significant as an occupation than for men. Over half of all women (52.9 per cent) had in fact worked in the garment sector as their main occupation, while this was the case for a third of all men. It is clear that the garment sector here cannot be considered as a migrants’ niche in its classical sense.2 However, the gender composition of a sector, whether this is taken from the sectoral or from the migrants’ point of view, can be explored further to shed light on the intricate relationship between gender, ethnicity and class and the role these identities play in migrants’ labour market insertion. As will be seen in the next section, the data collected suggests that the ‘niche’ was more important as an employer to women than it was to male migrant workers. It could be argued that there is a bias in this survey data, given the fact that it is representative of returnees and therefore excludes those migrants who stayed in Buenos Aires. However, qualitative data collected among migrants living in Buenos Aires shows a similar picture and spread of occupations, except for the presence of upwardly mobile migrants employed in different, more stable occupations. Among
Table 1. Bolivian returnees: occupation in Argentina by sex, per cent
Bolivian returnees’ occupations Women (n 34) Men (n 45) Total (n 79)
Textile/garment worker 52.9 33.3 41.8 Domestic worker 26.5 0.0 11.4 Builder 0.0 13.3 7.6 Trader 8.8 4.4 6.3 Agricultural worker 5.9 6.7 6.3 Waiter 0.0 6.7 3.8 Construction textile/garment worker 0.0 6.7 3.8 Driver 0.0 6.7 3.8 Factory worker 2.9 2.2 2.5 Other 2.9 19.9 12.9
Note: ‘Other’ includes a plumber, a baker, a blacksmith, a security worker, a mechanic and a builder/trader. Source: Author’s survey of returnees in Cochabamba, Bolivia, 2002. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 661 women, this includes nurses who were able to secure stable employment after pursuing further training and education. It is well-known that the working conditions in the garment sector are far from desirable (Ceccagno, this issue; Rath 2002). Migrants describe workshops as overcrowded, with limited lighting or ventilation. The fact that these workshops are not registered with the national fiscal authorities makes the working conditions worse. Workshop owners, in their attempts to hide their activities, limit the size of the windows and lighting and often restrict workers’ movements. Many workers live at the workplace, sometimes taking turns to sleep on a bed shared with co-workers. An additional impediment is the lack of a regular work permit which makes migrants fearful of deportation and allows employers to use this to limit their freedom of movement. Some workers do not leave the workshops for the first few months. In some cases they had no outside contact for over a year. Given the tight work schedule and lack of alternatives, workers were dependent on their employers for food, which they often described as being inadequate. In terms of working hours, these range from 12 to 17 hours per working day (8am to up to 1am) with a half-hour break for lunch. The working week usually starts on Monday and finishes on Saturday midday, when most workers have to leave the workshop and arrange for their own food and lodging. Wages vary greatly, depending on the experience, working mode (hourly, daily, weekly or monthly pay or piece- rate), gender and nationality of employer. Before the devaluation at the beginning of 2002, workers’ aids (trainees) were sometimes paid 150 pesos (then equivalent to US dollars) during the first few months of employment. They could then expect this to rise to a maximum of 500 pesos per month for women and up to 1,000 pesos for men. The interviews indicate that men working in the garment sector were able to secure higher wages and they were also more likely to be working piece-rate, following a short period of apprenticeship. Employers’ nationality was found to be important but, contrary to expectations, Bolivian migrants preferred Korean employers. While all migrants interviewed in Bolivia (returnees) had worked for Bolivian employers, those interviewed in Buenos Aires worked for either Bolivian or Korean employers, with the exception of one who was employed by a Peruvian. Migrants generally recognised that Korean employers demanded a longer working day and expected their employees to work harder, but they felt that this was compensated for because they paid higher wages. They were also deemed to be more reliable in terms of actually paying their employees. Bolivian employers paid lower wages and were generally thought of as unreliable*sometimes they closed their workshops owing their employees several months’ wages. Bolivian employers were, however, sought at the beginning of a migrant’s occupational trajectory as training providers. The qualitative data gathered through life-story interviews shows a pattern of migrants working for Bolivian employers in order to gain the skills necessary to find better-paid positions with other migrant* but not necessarily ‘co-ethnic’*employers. Typically, a migrant works for a Bolivian employer for three months for little or no pay and then tries to find a Korean 662 T. Bastia employer in order to have access to higher wages. This finding is consistent with that of Light et al. (1999) who found that only a third of surveyed migrant workers were working for co-ethnic employees; co-ethnic was taken to be the sharing of the same nationality, although the authors recognise that shared nationality or citizenship does not necessarily mean shared ethnicity. Bolivians working in the Buenos Aires garment workshops might be able to set up a workshop of their own with time, employing members from their social network. Upward mobility within the garment sector is therefore pursued by establishing employment relations with members of the migrant community, but not necessarily with those of common nationality or ethnicity (Light et al. 1999). The fact that women have only a limited range of available occupations also influences their chances for upward social mobility. In the migrants’ occupational trajectories observed for this research, men were able to ascend, in terms of wages and stability, in a range of occupations. On the other hand, women were mainly employed in three occupations and were able to become upwardly mobile only by pursuing further training in other typically female occupations, such as nursing. A number of women were also successful traders or were able to set up their workshops, but this was seen as a temporary income-generating opportunity rather than a long-term investment leading to income stability and upward social mobility. Men, on the other hand, were able to achieve better wages and more stability following a clear occupational ladder, moving from garment worker to driver and sometimes to establishing successful businesses.
Gendered Social Networks Having described the labour market situation of Bolivian women and men in general and from this community in particular, the task at hand now is to try to explain the reasons for this inequality. Gender ideology is the basis on which further symbolic and material inequalities are constructed in society and in the household. It also leads women to have a disadvantaged position in the labour market (see e.g. Scott 1994). So far, the article has analysed the way these factors influence the gendered labour market insertion of Bolivians in Argentina. However, it is clear that the participation of this migrant group in the labour market is of a specific nature since the majority is employed in a single occupation. With regards to niches, Wright and Ellis (2000) suggest that women and men have unequal access to social networks and, as a consequence, to labour market opportunities. The rest of this article will therefore explore how social networks shape the labour market insertion of Bolivian migrants in Argentina, and specifically those who belong to the migrant group outlined above. The survey data gives some indication about the way social networks are gendered. The quantitative data collected through the neighbourhood survey regarding women’s and men’s use of social networks during the initial stages of the migration process, that is, during travel to Argentina and provision of initial accommodation, suggests that women and men make different use of social networks. Table 2 shows Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 663 Table 2. Social networks: travel companion by sex, per cent
Travel companion Women (n 42) Men (n 54) Total (n 96)
Alone 38.1 33.3 35.4 Husband/wife 23.8 16.7 19.8 Other family 16.7 13.0 14.6 Friends 4.8 18.5 12.5 Parents 7.1 7.4 7.3 Siblings 4.8 7.4 6.3 Other 4.8 3.7 4.2
Source: As Table 1. that women are more likely than men to travel alone and with their spouses or other family members. Men, on the other hand are more likely than women to be travelling with friends: 18.5 per cent of all males travelled with friends, compared to only 4.8 per cent of females. Table 3 presents a similar pattern. Migrant men are more likely than migrant women to stay with friends, while women are more likely than men to stay in a hostel. In both tables, women are more likely than men to travel alone and stay in a hostel, therefore showing lower access to social networks in general and specifically lower access to friendship-based social networks. Men, on the other hand, have wider access to social networks based on friendship. This can be explained by a number of reasons. As the previous account showed, men’s migration from this particular community started earlier than women’s. Their better-developed social networks could therefore be a consequence of the fact that they have been present in Argentina for longer. The relationships they established in their place of origin could also play a part in this process. Mining is a male occupation. Despite the fact that some women do participate in mining activities, the tasks are heavily gendered and the spatial organisation of the sexual division of labour provides men with more opportunities for establishing stronger relations and bonding with co-workers. Men usually work in groups underground; women work mainly alone above ground-level, creating fewer chances for bonding and organising. In fact, miners’ organisations are generally dominated by men. In cases when women do organise, they usually do so on the basis of their husbands’ identity as miners and their identity as housewives (see Barrios de
Table 3. Social networks: accommodation upon arrival in Buenos Aires by sex, per cent
Accommodation Women (n 39) Men (n 51) Total (n 90)
Extended family 35.9 31.4 33.3 Hostel 28.2 17.6 22.2 Friends 12.8 19.6 16.7 Close family 15.4 17.6 16.7 Garment workshop 7.7 11.8 10.0 Own house 0.0 2.0 1.1
Source: As Table 1. 664 T. Bastia Chungara 1978). The life-story accounts collected for this research suggest that men used their identity as ex-miners to pursue their migration objectives, for example, by calling for help and support from people with whom they had little linkage beyond a shared identity as members of the mining community. For women, this was more difficult to achieve. Given the fact that all of those interviewed found jobs through the person they first stayed with, it is possible to take the variable ‘stayed with’ as a proxy for ‘found job through’. This would also suggest that women have lower access to social networks. It could therefore be argued that women are at a disadvantage when it comes to making use of these networks for finding a job because they are not as well integrated within the community’s social networks as men are. This finding is not entirely surprising. Hondagneu-Sotelo (1994), in her book Gendered Transitions, shows that social networks are gendered. Wright and Ellis (2000) arrive at a similar conclusion when they argue that social networks are gendered in such a way as to give women lower access to the information and the financial resources that facilitate their migration. In relation to Peruvian labour market segregation, Scott (1994) argues that kinship networks act as mechanisms of discrimination against women and perpetuate gender segregation, in a context where over two-thirds of the labour force examined was made up of internal migrants. She describes the way recruitment is more casual in the least desirable jobs, such as construction, factories, sweatshops and domestic service, while the ‘personalisation of recruitment was associated with better, scarcer jobs’ (Scott 1994:170). There is, however, a contradiction. If niches are primarily established through social networks, as the theories and empirical data reviewed at the beginning of this article showed, then women, who have lower access to these networks, would be less, not more likely to find themselves in a niche occupation like the garment sector. It is therefore necessary to look in more detail into social networks as well as beyond them, to wider labour market characteristics, to build a better understanding of niching. Women’s clustering in the garment sector can be explained by looking at the alternatives open to them. Chief among these are domestic work and, to a lesser extent, trade. Domestic work involves long hours, relatively low salaries and personalised working relations which often include a good degree of harassment, including sexual harassment, and the imposition of hierarchical working relations between employer and employee (Chaney and Garcia Castro 1989; Moya, this issue). Migrant women often choose to work in this sector because the ‘live-in’ arrangements give them the opportunity to maximise their savings by offering accommodation and meals as part of the agreement and no commuting costs. For first-time migrants, this is a bonus given the fact that they are able to keep most of their salary as savings or for sending home (Pappas-DeLuca 1999). For women from Bolivia, however, there is an additional problem related to their would-be status as domestic workers. Domestic work in Bolivia is carried out by young, unmarried women, often girls in their early teens or younger, of rural origin. It is a highly feminised and also racialised Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 665 occupation. Women from the mining community generally have relatively high levels of education, certainly higher than women in rural areas, and despite their indigenous origins and bilingual language use, they see themselves as being part of the urban mestizo nation-building project. They are aware of the fact that mining sustained Bolivia’s economy for centuries and are proud of the contributions made by their particular community to the country’s development. Despite the fact that their origins two or three generations ago often stretch back into rural communities, they construct differences between themselves and people of rural origins, on the grounds of modernity, education achievements, access to material culture and ‘general culture’ (Gill 1997; Harris and Albo´ 1984). Working as domestics would, therefore, involve a scaling down of their status*as it relates not to the place of residence in Argentina but to their place of origin (see also Bala´n 1995)*and is therefore considered less desirable than the hard work in the garment industry. Trading, which generally involves following mobile markets (‘ferias’) to different locations throughout Buenos Aires’ marginal areas, including shanty towns, entails a different set of issues. Trading is to a great extent undertaken illegally. Despite the fact that some markets have legal permission to trade, within the market itself there is usually a mixture of legal and illegal posts. As was already mentioned, migrants find it increasingly difficult to obtain legal residency documents. Lacking residency and working permits precludes them from trading legally and they therefore need to resort to bribing the market organisers as well as the police officers who supervise markets. This in itself involves some level of risk, as the authorities have the right to enforce ‘legality’ through raids and they can also confiscate traders’ wares, should the necessary permits be lacking. The geographical location where these markets take place and the lack of security means that the street vendors are at a high risk of being robbed by criminals. Trading therefore involves many risks and the life stories give evidence of the perpetual cycles of capital accumulation, followed by armed robberies. This insecurity effectively prevent migrants from planning, saving and achieving their migration goals. Taking these factors into account, it is clear that garment sector work presents many advantages for female migrant workers from this community over other occupations. It often includes accommodation and meals for recently-arrived migrants and no daily bus fares. It presents much lower risks of exposure to the public and the authorities and therefore of being caught as an illegal migrant. It also does not involve the lowering of one’s status as compared to domestic work.
Conclusion Gender, ethnicity, class and migration status intertwine to produce specific outcomes in the host labour market. In this article women’s higher participation in the garment sector was shown to be the result of complex socio-economic as well as policy processes. It is clear that social networks do play an important role in the development of niches, and participation in migrants’ social networks is clearly 666 T. Bastia gendered. This is explained by the particular characteristics of this migration flow and the way it has been changing throughout the twentieth century. Social networks are also influenced by the social relations migrants develop among themselves prior to migrating, and these were also found to be gendered. The social network analysis showed that women have lower access to social networks in general but at the same time they are over-represented in garment work. The data presented suggest that women are overwhelmingly concentrated in the garment sector because they lack alternative opportunities. Their lower access to friendship-based social networks is therefore at least partly to blame for women’s lack of alternatives and choices when it comes to finding a job. Social networks are also very dynamic and the qualitative data indicates that networks built with people outside of their primary community of reference are particularly important for upward social mobility, as was suggested by Granovetter (1973) in his essay on the strength of weak social network ties. Following the same rationale, it is therefore likely that men’s higher access to friendship-based social networks allows them to diversify their job opportunities and increase their chances for upward social mobility. However, the analysis of migrants’ insertion into the Argentine labour market has suggested that there are other processes that need to be taken into account and that gendered social networks do not fully explain women’s higher participation rates within the garment sector. Women’s lower access to friendship-based social networks could to some degree explain their lack of opportunities for diversifying occupations. However this in itself cannot be understood without taking into account gendered labour market segmentation and restrictive migration policies that give migrants decreasing opportunities for acquiring legal residency and working documents. This explanation is in line with arguments put forward by Kloosterman et al. (1999) in the Dutch context, as well as Green (2002) for the Paris garment sector. Women migrants from this community of ex-miners have few occupational choices: domestic work, trade or the garment sector. Most of them can only pursue upward social mobility by undertaking further training. The analysis of women’s options has shown that their higher participation rates in the garment sector are explained by the interrelation between the relative advantages this occupation offers them and the wider socio-economic context migrants need to negotiate. For newly- arrived female migrants, garment work offers the same advantages as live-in domestic work in terms of accommodation, meals and no commuting costs; but at the same time it lacks the stigma attached to domestic work. Therefore, it can be concluded that niching and women’s greater participation within the garment sector can be explained by the conjunction of gendered labour market segregation, restrictive migration policies and gendered social networks. These conclusions are particular to this social group and are historically specific. One only needs to look at the historical trends outlined at the beginning to understand the reasons for the current prevalence of male social networks. It is very likely that, even within the same group of migrants, different social networks will Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 667 emerge as a result of a very different migration context. Migrants’ statements and observations suggest that a growing number of Bolivian migrants who have returned from Argentina are investing their assets in a new migration to Spain. These new migrants are mainly women (see also Gratton, this issue, for Ecuador). It is fair to expect that the social networks that develop over time as a result of this new migration to Spain will be qualitatively different from those that Bolivian migrants made use of in Argentina.
Acknowledgements I would like to thank my doctoral supervisors, Dr Jeremy Holland and Dr Helen Hintjens, for their support, and Marlou Schrover, Ivan Light and Joanne van der Leun, as well as the anonymous JEMS referee, for their useful comments. This article is based on research undertaken for a doctoral degree and was financed by the University of Wales Swansea and its Centre of Development Studies as part of a project of the UK Department for International Development (DFID). I am grateful to both institutions for their financial support. However, the research on which this article is based would not have been possible without the many people who opened up their lives and homes to me in Cochabamba and Buenos Aires; they will remain anonymous to protect their confidentiality of the information they provided. Special acknowledgement goes to my hermana mayor who welcomed me into her family and her community, carried out the survey and provided logistical help throughout the fieldwork, including access to other migrants.
Notes [1] Qualitative data and participant observation showed that, among returnees, 12 years old was the youngest age at which a person migrated for work. It was therefore unlikely that anyone younger than 12 would have migrated for work either as part of the family or independently. [2] Many references mention the participation of Bolivians in the garment sector (Benencia and Karasik 1995; Courtis 2000; Mugarza 1985; Recchini de Lattes 1988), but do not provide detailed information regarding their relative importance. Koreans have entered the garment sector since the 1980s (Courtis 2000).
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