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Paper short abstract:

Increasing FDI in electronics has intensified labour demand in Malaysia and Vietnam. This works analyses the evolving structure of manufacturing workforce through the lens of adverse incorporation of women and migrants, arguing that the two countries stand at two different points of the same trend.

Paper long abstract:

In the past fifty years, southeast Asian countries have increased their participation into global production networks, as capital from central economies started moving toward peripheral ones. Electronics manufacturing has been among the leading sectors this process, with foreign direct investments moving as a function of low labour costs in the hosting country. Since outsourced tasks have been predominantly labour-intensive, demand for so-called cheap labour ramped up in these countries, requiring readjustments in the occupational structure to satisfy capital’s need for manufacturing workers. As Malaysia and Vietnam are among the main recipients of electronics FDI, this paper analyses the evolution of the structure of their workforce, using the concept of adverse incorporation proposed by Phillips (2013). It argues that adverse incorporation followed a wave pattern, with women being first absorbed in the industry as the most vulnerable group and migrant being then attracted into manufacturing only after female workforce exhausted. The works identifies Malaysia and Vietnam as standing at two different points of the same trend: while women labour conditions and livelihoods in Malaysia are improving thanks to the more recent and persistent adverse incorporation of migrants, women workers in Vietnamese manufacturing are still experiencing the same working conditions, as current labour demand and national policies such as the Ho Khau System hinder the absorption of additional and more vulnerable workforce.

References:

Phillips, N. (2013). Unfree labour and adverse incorporation in the global economy: Comparative perspectives on Brazil and India. Economy and society, 42(2), 171-196.