Contenu du sommaire : Emploi, genre et migration

This article analyses several aspects of the integration of Moroccan immigrant women into the labour market in Spain. This integration is determined by the migrant's project which in turn depends upon the migrant's family situation in her origine country. The central idea is that the context of Moroccan employment does not allow working women to gain greater autonomy or to improve their general condition through work. However, in spite of their social position of inferiority in Spain both as foreigners and as women, working does allow Moroccan immigrant women greater access to, and control over resources, and provides them more autonomy in managing their lives. As a result, and keeping in mind that Spain's immigration policy gives priority to female immigrants, the possibility of immigrating can alter the situation of Moroccan women from the outset, becoming an additional factor of change.

Although it has often been argued that the conditions which have generated the migration of Filipinos as overseas contract workers are embedded in the unequal economic and political relationships between the Philippines and labour importing countries, we contend that international levels of inequality alone cannot explain the dominance of particular streams of Filipino migrants. Beyond examining the historical patterns of female employment in the Philippines and the structural conditions of labour demand in one receiving country (Singapore), this paper also investigates the experiences of the migrants as individuals. By focusing on foreign domestic helpers in Singapore, it demonstrates that the decision to become an overseas contract worker is ultimately located at the nexus between public accounts of the broader structural conditions underlying human motivations and actions, and private micro-level life-narratives as interpreted from a personal perspective. It is only by recognising the need to focus on both these levels that we can corne to a fuller understanding of labour migration.

Based on findings concerning a study of Italian and Spanish immigrant women in Switzerland nearing retirement age, the authors deal with the question of the condition of immigrant women. The authors discuss the models of incorporation of immigrant women into the labour market, the way in which this extra-family activity is estimated and perceived in terms of health and its impact on roles within the family, the characteristics of social networks constructed throughout the years of immigration, and finally, the immigrants' projects concerning their future residence once they have reached retirement age.

The article analyses the reasons and the forms of the insertion of immigrants in various sectors of Italian informal economy, in the context of the transformations of western economy that foster the reproduction and the growth of irregular labour relations. Starting from a pilot research carried out in the Milanese area, three forms of irregular work by immigrants can be identified: irregular employment, irregular self-employment and coerced work. The article also investigates the functionality of these phenomena for Italian economy and society, in terms of lower labour costs, higher competition, supply of domestic help for double career families. Finally it illustrates how the immigrants networks constantly feed the flux of irregular workers, thus becoming a typical case of socially embedded economic relations.

The black-market economy plays an important role in Algerian society. It is the response to a planned economy that is progressively pulling the country toward destitution. Informal activities, which have imported foreign goods more or less illegally since the 1970's, are rapidly increasing. Informal importation requires foreign currency. Importers are faced with the obstacle of the non-convertibility of Algerian currency and the inaccessibility of exchanging it by legal means, just as the demand for foreign currency is rising to fill the need for all sorts of products that have become more scarce and more expensive in Algeria. Logically, Algerian emigration is becoming the main source of foreign currency. The parallel market for foreign currency has expanded as migrants, then later as Algerian economic speculators, have taken charge of it. By way of a reticular process which structures these parallel currency markets, these actors organise the gathering and distribution of foreign currency from migration. After analysing the economic and sociological bases of this phenomenon, the author describes the organisation of these exchange transactions, based on a study, beginning in Saint-Etienne and extending to Algeria.

The objective of this article is to present the different forms of economic and professional ties that children of Algerian immigrants maintain with their country of origin. These ties vary according to the time frame considered, gender and professional status in France. In the past, economic and professional ties with Algeria were maintained in four distinct ways : through studies undertaken in Algeria, fulfilment of military service, employment and by spending several years in Algeria. Moreover, if several types of relations with the country of origin have been observed, professional or economic projects oriented towards Algeria or the Maghreb are even more numerous. When compared to previous relations with the country of origin, these more recent projects reveal a profound change : these activities are seen as temporary and they do not imply a return to Algeria. They involve solely independent economic or professional activities initiated by individuals who, in some cases, are already entrepreneurs in France. These activities are either considered to be supplementary or complementary to an existent professional activity in France. They also show the role played by family members in Algeria, as well as the years spent in France, which have altered the original migration project and, in turn, influence the migrant's new professional project. Finally, the economic and/or professional ties maintained with Algeria reveal three strongly interconnected elements : that the children of Algerian immigrants claim the right to place in both French and Algerian society, the emergence of an economic elite and «new» Algerian policy concerning this «second generation».

The main purpose of this article is to examine the heuristic value of the sociological concept of « trajectory » in order to better apprehend the processes of construction and evolution of ethnic groups. This concept, developed by Anselm Strauss to study the management of chronic illness by patients and those around them to manage its progress, treat it and shape it. Here, this concept is applied to the management of « ethnic difference » as signified through social interaction. Through the observation of two groups of migrants in the Paris metropolitan region, coming from Quercy and from the overseas departments, and categorized as « Auvergnats » and « Antillais », our conceptual approach reveals beyond certain particularities, more general common processes of ethnieization. It allows us to question the dialectic between migrants and natives and propose a more holistic conception of the process than that offered by conventional approaches.