Complicating the entrepreneurial self: professional Chinese immigrant women negotiating occupations in Canada

Shan, Hongxia

doi:10.1080/14767724.2014.934069

Cited by 19 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…Gooptu (), accordingly, summarizes that “the ideal neoliberal ‘enterprising self’ is goal‐oriented, self‐directed, committed to acquiring skills and competencies required for self‐advancement; one who is optimistic, creative, takes initiative, embraces opportunities and seeks autonomy and self‐fulfillment” (p. 45). Rather than depending on the state or civil society organizations to meet their needs, ideal entrepreneurial subjects embody “enterprising attitudes and a culture of self‐reliance” (Shan :179). The role of learning is central to the conception of the entrepreneurial subject; learning is constructed as a timeless, always positive trait that leads to individual and social enhancement.…”

Section: Labor Law Enforcement As An Entrepreneurial Projectmentioning

confidence: 99%

Complaints‐Based Entrepreneurialism: Worker Experiences of the Employment Standards Complaints Process in Ontario, Canada

Mirchandani

Hande

Condratto

2019

Canadian Review of Sociology

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In Ontario, workers who face unfair working conditions have the option of filing an official complaint with the Ministry of Labour. Complaints making is characterized as a widely available, easily accessible, and free‐of‐cost avenue for workers who may have experienced a violation of the law. However, interviews with Ontario workers who have filed complaints tell a different story. This paper is based on a community‐university project on the enforcement of the Employment Standards Act in Ontario. We draw on 36 interviews with workers employed in precarious jobs in Sudbury, Toronto, and Windsor, who filed complaints to the Ministry. Workers characterize the complaints process as rife with bureaucratic complexity, risk, and unsuccessful payouts. Their experiences shed light on the efficacy of complaint‐based approaches that are often promoted as a form of “bottom‐up” enforcement of employment standards (ES). We demonstrate that the current ES complaints system requires workers to enact neoliberal entrepreneurialism (rather than agentic or collective entrepreneurialism) creating a highly stressful, enormously time‐consuming, and demoralizing experience. We document the increasingly individualized and contradictory avenues through which workers must act as entrepreneurs to navigate and self‐advocate when their rights have been violated. We argue that the current complaint processes limit the potentially empowering impact of this strategy.

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Section: Labor Law Enforcement As An Entrepreneurial Projectmentioning

confidence: 99%

Complaints‐Based Entrepreneurialism: Worker Experiences of the Employment Standards Complaints Process in Ontario, Canada

Mirchandani

Hande

Condratto

2019

Canadian Review of Sociology

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“…Earlier studies of immigrant women have mainly focused on women’s experiences in low-end occupational sectors, such as sewing, care, entertainment and services (Hochschild, 2000; Ng, 2001; Sassen, 2004). More recently, the literature has witnessed an emerging body of research on skilled migrant women (Gupta et al., 2014; Leung, 2014; Pio and Essers, 2014; Roos, 2013; Shan, 2009a, 2009b) and a consideration of women as members of skilled dual-earner and entrepreneurial families (Ghosh, 2014; Salaff and Greve, 2003; Shinozaki, 2014). Related studies have pinpointed that as migrant women move across diverse geopolitical and economic regimes, they may become more capable of “integrating diverse desires, motivations and obligations by (re)configuring concepts, practices and relationships across time and space” (Calás et al., 2013: 725).…”

Section: Women and Migration Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Immigrants often find themselves struggling on the peripheries of the host labor markets, especially if they have moved from a developing to a developed country (Guo, 2013;Maitra and Maitra, 2015;Shan, 2009aShan, , 2013Spring et al, 2015). Women, especially those trained in traditionally male-dominated professions, may find it even more challenging to reestablish themselves in the host countries in a career in their fields of training (Goyette and Xie, 1999;Tong, 2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…Although, to some extent, the policy turn to skill has equalized people’s opportunities to be mobile on a global scale, it has also been implicated in the perpetuation of existing social stratification and the production of new forms of social exclusion (Kofman, 2007, 2014b; Shan and Fejes, 2015). Immigrants often find themselves struggling on the peripheries of the host labor markets, especially if they have moved from a developing to a developed country (Guo, 2013; Maitra and Maitra, 2015; Shan, 2009a, 2013; Spring et al., 2015). Women, especially those trained in traditionally male-dominated professions, may find it even more challenging to reestablish themselves in the host countries in a career in their fields of training (Goyette and Xie, 1999; Tong, 2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The making of transnational social space: Chinese women managing careers and lives between China and Canada

Shan

Pullman

Qing-hua

2016

Asian and Pacific Migration Journal

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China-Canada people flows are increasingly characterized by two-way movement, engendering possibilities and problems, particularly for women juggling careers and lives. Within this context, a qualitative study was conducted to trace the migratory and career trajectories of 15 Chinese migrant women between China and Canada. The study finds that to maximize their career and life spaces, the women endeavored to build and mobilize various forms of capital. Not only did they engage in migratory movement, but some of them also acquired Canadian credentials, moved into entrepreneurship and took up transient jobs. The utility and futility of women's efforts point to ''games'' of differentiation emanating across fields, particularly along the lines of gender, race and class that were invoked to produce transnational spaces where existing power relations were simultaneously challenged and reaffirmed. Conceptually, this paper is informed by the concept of transnational social field and gender, race and class analysis.

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“…In particular, I focus on South Asian immigrants to take up questions of how racialised immigrants fit into the enterprise culture. This is an area that has remained understudied (for exception see Maitra, 2015;Maitra & Maitra, 2015;Shan, 2015) despite the fact that immigrants of colour in Canada are consistently pushed towards retraining and re-skilling because of their higher rates of un/under employment in Canada (George & Chaze, 2014;Guo, 2013;Shan, 2009). I make two arguments in this context.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Crafting ‘enterprising’ workers through career training programs among Canada’s South Asian professional immigrants

Maitra

2017

Studies in the Education of Adults

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In the current post-Fordist, neoliberal Canadian state, the concept of the 'enterprising self' has come to define worker-subjectivity and ability to access the labour market. The discourse of entrepreneurialism promotes individual initiatives and resources as the most useful qualities necessary to be successful in the neoliberal labour market. This paper, based on two qualitative research projects examines the mechanism through which enterprising conduct is instilled within immigrants in Canada. In particular, the focus is on South Asian immigrants to take up questions of how racialised immigrants fit into the enterprise culture. This is an area that has remained understudied despite the fact that immigrants of colour in Canada are consistently pushed towards retraining and re-skilling because of their higher rates of un/under employment in Canada. Informed by the theories of governmentality, the paper highlights two findings; first, it demonstrates how work-related training programs offered by the settlement agencies in Canada advocate the importance of being 'enterprising' by harping on discourses of self-sufficiency and personal endeavour to become productive workers; second, the programs implicitly correct or redress immigrants of colour to conform to the hegemonic Eurocentric codes underlying normative citizenship. In foregrounding the experiences of South Asian immigrants, this paper thus explores how the process of neoliberal subject making, particularly in the first world countries, has a racial and cultural undertone. Racism continues to circulate powerfully in the neoliberal era, reordering existing modes of inclusion and exclusion which, having been relegated to the realm of private choice becomes difficult to pinpoint.

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Complicating the entrepreneurial self: professional Chinese immigrant women negotiating occupations in Canada

Cited by 19 publications

References 32 publications

Complaints‐Based Entrepreneurialism: Worker Experiences of the Employment Standards Complaints Process in Ontario, Canada

Complaints‐Based Entrepreneurialism: Worker Experiences of the Employment Standards Complaints Process in Ontario, Canada

The making of transnational social space: Chinese women managing careers and lives between China and Canada

Crafting ‘enterprising’ workers through career training programs among Canada’s South Asian professional immigrants

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