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Global Cities At Work

Global Cities At Work

New Migrant Divisions of Labour

by Jane Wills, Kavita Datta, Yara Evans, Joanna Herbert, Jon May and Cathy McIlwaine

A fascinating look at migrant labour in London, based on interviews with more than 800 foreign-born workers
This book is about the people who always get taken for granted. The people who clean our offices and trains, care for our elders and change the sheets on the bed. Global Cities at Work draws on testimony collected from more than 800 foreign-born workers employed in low-paid jobs in London during the early years of the twenty-first century.

This book breaks new ground in linking London's new migrant division of labour to the twin processes of subcontracting and increased international migration that have been central to contemporary processes of globalisation.

It also raises the level of debate about migrant labour, encouraging us to look behind the headlines. The authors ask us to take a politically informed view of our urban labour markets and to prioritise the issue of poverty in underemployed communities.


This book is available to download through the Open Access programme.

Jane Wills works at the Department of Geography and The City Centre, Queen Mary, University of London. She is the author of Global Cities At Work (Pluto, 2009).

Kavita Datta works at the Department of Geography and The City Centre, Queen Mary, University of London. She is the author of Global Cities At Work (Pluto, 2009).

Yara Evans works at the Department of Geography and The City Centre, Queen Mary, University of London. Her academic background is in Human Geography and she is the author of Global Cities At Work (Pluto, 2009).

Joanna Herbert teaches at the Department of Geography and The City Centre, Queen Mary, University of London. She is the author of Global Cities At Work (Pluto, 2009).

John May is at the Department of Geography and The City Centre, Queen Mary, University of London. He is the author of Global Cities At Work (Pluto, 2009).

Cathy McIlwaine is a lecturer at Queen Mary and Westfield. She has carried out research in the Caribbean and Costa Rica and the Philippines in the areas of gender, ethnicity and urban labour markets. She has also worked as a consultant on structural adjustment and urban poverty at the World Bank. She is the author of Global Cities At Work (Pluto, 2009).

'The voices of migrant workers come alive in these pages' - Jamie Peck, Professor of Geography, University of British Columbia 'A rare but critical window into the scale, nature and contradictions of contemporary immigration into the UK' - Danny Sriskandarajah, former Head of Migration at the Institute for Public Policy Research 'A very timely book. The description of migration-based divisions in the labour market should be of concern to all policy makers and politicians currently involved in planning a way out of deep recession' - Don Flynn, Director of the Migrants Rights Network
List of tables
List of figures
List of plates
List of acronyms
Acknowledgements
1. Deregulation, migration and the new world of work
2. Global city labour markets and London's new migrant division of labour
3. London's low paid foreign-born workers
4. Living and remaking London's ethnic and gender divisions
5. Tactics of survival amongst migrant workers in London
6. Relational lives: Migrants, London and the rest of the world
7. Remaking the city: Immigration and post-secular politics in London today
8 Just geographies of (im)migration
Appendices
References
Index
Published by Pluto Press in Dec 2009
Paperback ISBN: 9780745327983

256 pages

150mm x 230mm