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Migrant workers’ engagement with labour market intermediaries in Europe: symbolic power guiding transnational exchange

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  • Barbara Samaluk

Abstract

This article explores the strategies of migrant workers from post-socialist Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) within the process of transnational exchange characterized by transnational labour market intermediaries that have substantially altered the former national bilateral employment relations. Utilizing a Bourdieuian conceptual framework it examines Slovenian and Polish workers’ migration strategies and struggles to acquire and convert capitals within the process of transnational exchange and upon arrival in the UK. The article uncovers the (self-)colonial cultural capital embodied in CEE workers’ habitus that drives their strategies to take up various working and training opportunities in the UK in order to acquire (trans)nationally recognized cultural capital. This labour of acquisition drives Polish and Slovenian workers to seek specific cross-cultural and ethnic-niche intermediary services that can manipulate the most reliable symbolic signs in order to make profits from migrant worker-consumers. In this regard the article also exposes inter- and intra-ethnic variations.

Suggested Citation

  • Barbara Samaluk, 2016. "Migrant workers’ engagement with labour market intermediaries in Europe: symbolic power guiding transnational exchange," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 30(3), pages 455-471, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:woemps:v:30:y:2016:i:3:p:455-471
    DOI: 10.1177/0950017015594968
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Philip Kelly & Tom Lusis, 2006. "Migration and the Transnational Habitus: Evidence from Canada and the Philippines," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 38(5), pages 831-847, May.
    2. Anne White & Louise Ryan, 2008. "Polish ‘Temporary’ Migration: The Formation and Significance of Social Networks," Europe-Asia Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 60(9), pages 1467-1502.
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