Author
Rachel Dölker
Title
Waiting in Irregularity: How young Moroccans in southern Spain navigate temporal bordering processes produced by the Spanish migration law
University of A Coruña, 2022
Abstract
El Ejido, in southern Spain, constitutes the densest surface for agroindustry, where manual work is done mainly by migrants. It is a microcosm that particularly encapsulates social problems, struggles, and (state) violence. The thesis exposes practices of temporal bordering, by analysing the role of migration laws, through the lens of waiting. The ‘arraigo social’ is a regulation mechanism, conditioned on a previous three years' irregular stay in the country. Through ethnographic observations and narrative interviews, this paper asks about the function of waiting and how it is experienced and encountered by the people living through this time. To this end, it maps its connections with exploitation of labour, negotiation of belonging and the exertion of state violence. I argue the function is to keep migrants in a situation of a ‘inclusive exclusion’, tantamount to ‘capitalist exploitation’. As through their irregularised stay and the need for an employment contract, they face employers with an extreme power imbalance.
Keywords
Waiting; Temporal Bordering; Agroindustry; Migrant Labour; Irregularity