Posted by Belarmino Dabalos Saguing
Rome, Italy 22 October 2014
From the aticle The Philippines' Culture of Migration
by Maruja M.B. Asis JANUARY 1, 2006
Historical
Background
After more than three centuries of Spanish colonial rule, the
revolution waged by Filipinos in 1896 almost led to the end of Spanish rule.
After a year of fighting, the revolutionaries and the Spanish authorities
signed a truce in December 1897, and General Emilio Aguinaldo went into exile
in Hong Kong.
The Spanish-American War broke out in February 1898, sparked
by the United States' support for Cuba's fight against Spain. This spilled over
into the Philippines. An American fleet led by Admiral George Dewey arrived in
Manila, defeating Spanish forces in the Battle of Manila Bay on May 1, 1898.
Upon the urging of Admiral Dewey to resume the fight against
Spain, General Aguinaldo returned to Manila on May 18, 1898. General
Aguinaldo's forces liberated several towns south of Manila and declared
independence from Spain on June 12, 1898. More American forces arrived, and the
Spaniards surrendered Manila to the Americans that August.
On December 10, 1898, the Treaty of Paris was signed between
the United States and Spain, formally ending the Spanish-American War. Under
the treaty, the United States paid Spain to take control of the Philippines.
Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Mariana Islands were ceded to the United
States as well.
Filipinos resisted American rule, and the ensuing Philippine-American
War, which began in 1899, dragged on even after it "officially" ended
with the capture of General Aguinaldo in 1901, followed by the establishment of
a civil government throughout the Philippines in 1902. The Philippines became
independent in July 1946, after the Japanese invasion and occupation of World
War II.
For much of the 20th century, "international
migration" for Filipinos meant going to the United States and its Pacific
territories. The first batch of Filipino workers arrived in the U.S. territory
of Hawaii on December 20, 1906 to work on sugarcane and pineapple plantations.
More workers, mostly single men, followed; others left Hawaii
to work in agriculture in California, Washington, and Oregon, or the salmon
canneries of Alaska. On the mainland, low-wage service work in the cities —
waiters, busboys, or domestic work — provided alternative jobs between
agricultural seasons or when other jobs are not available. Some 4,000 Filipinos
were employed in the merchant marine, but this employment possibility ceased
with the 1937 passage of a law requiring the crew of U.S. flag vessels to be at
least 90 percent American citizens.
According to one estimate, approximately 120,000 Filipino
workers came to Hawaii between 1906 and 1934. Another estimate puts the number
of Filipinos arriving in the United States between 1907 and the 1930 at
150,000, the majority of whom were in Hawaii. A small number of scholars, known
as pensionados, also immigrated to the United States before the 1920s. They
were either sponsored by the U.S. government or by missionary-related programs.
Some were sent by rich families to study and a few were self-supporting
students. Those who returned assumed important positions in Filipino society
while others remained in the United States.
Because the Philippines was a U.S. colony, the movement of
Filipinos to the United States was considered internal migration and Filipino
migrants were "nationals" (but not citizens). It was not until the
passage of the 1934 Tydings-McDuffie Law (also known as the Philippines
Independence Act of 1934), which provided for the granting of Philippine
independence in 10 years' time, that the Philippines became subject to
immigration quotas. The 1934 law limited the Philippines to 50 visas per year,
and migration dropped off dramatically.
But even so, there was an exception clause: in case of a
labor shortage, the governor of Hawaii was authorized to hire Filipino workers.
As nationals, Filipinos were entitled to American passports and could enter and
leave the country freely. World War II intervened and further migration to the
United States stalled. Between 1946 and the mid 1960s, about 10,000 to 12,000
Filipinos came to Hawaii as workers, military personnel, and war brides.
It was not until the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act,
when nationality-based restrictions were struck down, that Filipino immigration
grew and diversified.
Other countries of settlement also dismantled their
pro-European immigration policies in the 1960s and 1970s, paving the way for
Filipinos to enter Canada, Australia, and New Zealand under family or
skills-based provisions. The Philippines eventually became one of the top 10
sending countries in these traditional immigration countries.
Filipinos also settled in countries that are not traditional
countries of immigration, such as Germany and Japan, through marriage or
work-related migration. This permanent migration, however, was overshadowed by
the larger and thornier temporary labor migration that started in the 1970s.
Becoming a
Labor Exporter
The Philippines' ascent as a major labor exporter in Asia and
worldwide is based on various factors. When large-scale labor migration from
the Philippines started in the 1970s, the "push" factors were very
strong but made worse by the oil crisis in 1973. Among others, economic growth
could not keep up with population growth. The country was hard pressed to
provide jobs and decent wages and had severe balance of payment
problems.
At the same time, the oil-rich Gulf countries needed workers
to realize their ambitious infrastructure projects. With supply and demand
factors converging, the Philippines was ripe for large-scale labor migration,
an opportunity the Marcos government recognized. The framework for what became
the government's overseas employment program was established with the passage
of the Labor Code of the Philippines in 1974.
The Philippines' foray into organized international labor
migration was supposed to be temporary, lasting only until the country
recovered from its economic problems. However, the continuing demand for
workers in the Gulf countries and the opening of new labor markets in other
regions, especially in East and Southeast Asia, fueled further migration.
On the supply side, the push factors have not abated. The
absence of sustained economic development, political instability, a growing
population, double-digit unemployment levels, and low wages continue to compel
people to look abroad.
The flow of overseas foreign workers (OFWs), numbering a few
thousand per year in the early 1970s, has grown to hundreds of thousands (see
Table 1). In 2004 alone, 933,588 OFWs left the country. Based on trends, it is
expected that the number of deployed OFWs will hit the one million mark in
2005.
The data on deployed workers include seafarers, who account
for some 20 percent of all OFWs leaving the country every year (see Table 2).
Filipinos dominate the industry: 25 percent of the world's seafarers are from
the Philippines.
As of December 2004, the stock of overseas Filipinos include
some 3.2 million permanent settlers (the majority of whom are in the United
States), about 3.6 million temporary labor migrants (called OFWs), with Saudi
Arabia hosting close to a million, and an estimated 1.3 million migrants in an
unauthorized situation. The latter tend to be mostly in the United States and
Malaysia.
Women are very visible in international migration from the
Philippines. They not only compose the majority of permanent settlers, i.e., as
part of family migration, but they are as prominent as men in labor migration.
In fact, since 1992, female migrants outnumbered men among the newly hired
land-based workers who are legally deployed every year.
The majority of female OFWs are in domestic work and
entertainment. Since these are unprotected sectors, female migration has raised
many concerns about the safety and well-being of women migrants. Female OFWs
can also be found in factory work, sales, and nursing.
Among the top 10 destinations of OFWs, Hong Kong, Kuwait,
Singapore, Italy, United Arab Emirates, Japan, and Taiwan are dominated by
women OFWs. In Hong Kong, for example, more than 90 percent of OFWs are women
(Table 2).
How Labor
Export Works
With its low rate of foreign investment and a steady
reduction in development assistance, the government, not just its people, has
come to rely on overseas employment as a strategy for survival. After years of
pushing the official line that it does not promote overseas employment, the
government set a target in 2001 of deploying a million workers overseas every
year, a goal it is likely to meet in 2005.
Since the 1970s, the government and the private sector each
have played a role in the labor export process. The Philippine Overseas
Employment Administration (POEA) grew out of the Overseas Employment
Development Board and the National Seamen Board in the then Ministry of Labor
and Employment. POEA became the government agency responsible for processing
workers' contracts and predeployment checks, as well as for licensing,
regulating, and monitoring private recruitment agencies.
When the overseas program started, the government
participated in recruiting and matching workers and employers. Due to demand
for workers and the large numbers involved, the government relinquished the
placement of workers to private recruitment agencies in 1976. There is a
placement branch within the POEA, but it only accounts for a small number of
all OFWs placed with foreign employers.
On the private-sector side, there are more than 1,000
government-licensed recruitment and manning agencies in the Philippines (and an
unknown number of unlicensed ones) that match workers with foreign employers.
In the Philippines, recruitment agencies refer to those that find jobs for aspiring
land-based migrant workers; manning agencies refer to those that engage in
recruiting and finding jobs for seafarers.
Recruitment agencies charge migrant workers "placement
fees" for the service that they provide. Manning agencies are not supposed
to charge placement fees as these fees are assumed by the principal or
employer, but there are cases of known violations.
Although there is a standard placement fee for most
destinations (except for special markets such as Taiwan) which is equivalent to
one month's salary plus 5,000 Philippine pesos (about US$94) for documentation,
this is routinely violated. The excessive fees are a burden to migrants and put
them in a vulnerable situation because they are already in debt before they
leave. When they are abroad, they go without any salary for a period of time,
and they are forced to bear harsh working and living conditions in order to
repay their loans.
Another government agency, the Overseas Workers Welfare
Administration (OWWA), provides support and assistance to migrants and their
families. All processes and requirements up until the point of departure are
handled by the POEA, while the OWWA assumes responsibility for the workers'
welfare while they are employed abroad. POEA and OWWA are under the Department
of Labor and Employment.
A separate agency, the Commission on Filipinos Overseas
(CFO), provides programs and services to permanent emigrants. CFO was
transferred from the Department of Foreign Affairs to the Office of the
President in 2004.
Among the countries of origin in Asia, the Philippines offers
a fairly comprehensive package of programs and services covering all phases of
migration, from predeparture to on-site services to return and reintegration.
Although the government could improve its implementation of these programs, the
programs demonstrate the government's efforts to balance the marketing of
workers with protection.
Some of these initiatives, such as the predeparture
orientation seminars for departing workers and the deployment of labor attachés
and welfare officers to countries with large OFW populations, are good
practices that other countries of origin have also implemented.
Protecting
Workers Abroad
The irregular operations of recruitment agencies in the
Philippines and their counterparts in the countries of destination are one of
the sources of vulnerabilities for migrant workers. Excessive placement fees,
contract substitution, nonpayment or delayed wages, and difficult working and
living conditions are common problems encountered by migrant workers, including
legal ones.
Migrant women face particular vulnerabilities. Aside from the
usual problems that plague migrants, their jobs in domestic work and
entertainment usually mean long working hours, surveillance and control by
employers, and abusive conditions, including violence and sexual harassment.
Given the "private" context in which they work, the problems
encountered by migrant women in these sectors go unnoticed.
In general, compared to other national groups, Filipino
workers are relatively better protected because they are more educated, more
likely to speak English, and they are better organized. NGOs for migrants in
the Philippines and their networks abroad not only provide services and support
to migrants, but, more importantly, they advocate for migrants' rights
The development of a legal and institutional framework to
promote migrant workers' protection is also an important factor. The Philippines
was the first among the countries of origin in Asia to craft a law that aims
"to establish a higher standard of protection and promotion of the welfare
of migrant workers, their families and overseas Filipinos in distress."
Although there had been discussions about a Magna Charta for migrant workers
for some time, it was not until 1995 that the Migrant Workers and Overseas
Filipinos Act (also known as Republic Act or RA8042) was finally passed.
The tipping point was the national furor in 1995 over the
execution of Flor Contemplación, a domestic worker in Singapore, who many
Filipinos believed was innocent despite her conviction for the deaths of her
Singaporean ward and another Filipino domestic worker. This was a factor in
fast-tracking the passage of RA8042.
Briefly, the law's provisions include:
- the deployment of workers in countries that ensure
protection, including the banning of deployment if necessary;
- providing support and assistance to overseas Filipinos, whether
legal or in an unauthorized situation;
- imposing stiff penalties for illegal recruiters;
- free legal assistance and witness protection program for
victims of illegal recruitment;
- the institution of advisory/information, repatriation, and
reintegration services;
- the stipulation that the "protection of Filipino migrant
workers and the promotion of their welfare, in particular, and the protection
of the dignity and fundamental rights and freedoms of the Filipino abroad, in
general, shall be the his/her priority concerns of the Secretary of Foreign
Affairs and the Philippine Foreign Service Posts;"
the establishment of the Migrant Workers and Other Overseas
Filipinos Resource Centers in countries where there are large numbers of
Filipinos;
and the creation of the Legal Assistant for Migrant Workers
Affairs (now the Office of the Undersecretary of Migrant Workers Affairs) and
the Legal Assistance Fund.
The haste with which RA8042 was passed has resulted in some
problematic provisions, leading to calls for amendments. For example, in the
Declaration of Policies, it is mentioned that "the State does not promote
overseas employment as a means to sustain economic growth and achieve national
development." Some sectors, such as the NGO community, believe the state
does promote labor migration.
One controversial provision is Section 29, which deals with
the deregulation of recruitment activities. If this were implemented, the
regulatory functions of the POEA would have been phased out in 2001, that is,
within five years of the law becoming effective. NGOs are against the
deregulation plan because the playing field already is highly uneven. The
recruitment agencies, on the other hand, are pushing for deregulation.
Overall, RA8042 has not been a complete failure. Some provisions
have been implemented well (e.g., there are various information programs in
place); some need to be fine-tuned, notably programs dealing with returning
migrants and their reintegration in the local economy. There are also moves to
amend certain sections of the law.
The Office of the Undersecretary of Migrant Workers Affairs,
under the Department of Foreign Affairs, provides assistance to migrant workers
who encounter legal problems abroad, while the National Labor Relations Council
handles employment-related problems such as money claims.
In addition to government initiatives, the efforts of NGOs,
church-based organizations, and migrants' organizations, as well as
transnational and international efforts directed at promoting and protecting
migrants' rights, help provide an "antidote" to the dangers of
migration.
Among the countries of origin in Asia, the Philippines is
also a leader in introducing several migration-related laws. These include:
the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act of 2003, which establishes
policies and institutional mechanisms to provide support to trafficked persons;
the Overseas Absentee Voting Act of 2003, which gives
qualified overseas Filipinos the right to vote in national elections; and
the Citizenship Retention and Reacquisition Act of 2003,
which allows for dual citizenship.
In terms of commitments to international norms and standards
concerning migrants, the Philippines is one of 34 countries (as of October 27,
2005) that has ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of All Migrant Workers
and Their Families. It is also one of 95 countries (as of November 6, 2005)
that has ratified the UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking
in Persons, Especially Women and Children.
Remittances
Aside from easing unemployment, Filipinos who choose to work
abroad send home remittances that have become an important pillar of the
Philippine economy (see Table 3). In 2004, according to the Bangko Sentral ng
Pilipinas, remittances sent through formal channels amounted to US$8.5 billion.
In 2005, remittances are expected to reach US$10 billion.
For the families of migrant workers, remittances are
generally spent on fulfilling the basic needs of the family, better housing,
educational opportunities for children, and starting or investing in small
businesses. According to a 2005 World Bank report, the Philippines is the
fifth-largest recipient of remittance flows after India, China, Mexico, and
France.
The government encourages migrant workers to send remittances
through banks. A study by the Asian Development Bank found that 80 percent of
Filipino respondents regularly remit through banks or other regulated sectors.
Among other reasons, lower remittance costs help explain the greater use of
regulated channels than was the case in the past.
The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas is also working on enforcing
minimum standards for banks and other players in the remittance business to
protect OFWs and their families from fly-by-night operators, excessive fees,
unfair foreign currency conversion, and delivery problems.
Looking
Ahead
Within the Philippines, there has been much speculation about
the costs of migration: the problems borne by migrants, anxieties about the
destabilizing impacts of migration on families, apprehensions about
materialism, and so forth. Although it is acknowledged that migrants and their families
have benefited from labor migration, mostly because of remittances, the
economic impacts beyond the family level are less tangible.
And while it is acknowledged that remittances have buoyed the
country's economy, the development impacts have not been clearly felt. Some
question what the country has to show for more than three decades of overseas
employment.
In a strange twist, the Philippines has become so successful
as a labor exporter that it has failed to develop and strengthen development
processes. The target to send a million workers every year is a telling
indicator that migration will be an important part of the country's future
development plans and prospects.
Even without government involvement, labor migration from the
Philippines likely will persist thanks to social networks, social capital, and
social remittances that have flourished. Filipino society has become
migration-savvy, having developed the ability to respond and to adjust to the
changing demands of the global labor market.
Anticipation of future demand for nurses, for example, has
resulted in the proliferation of nursing schools and a remarkable increase in
student enrollment in nursing programs in recent years. Even doctors are
studying to be nurses to have better chances of working abroad. This is a
concrete example of how perceptions of the international labor market have also
woven their way into the educational and work aspirations of Filipinos.
Individuals make decisions based on perceptions of what would
be beneficial for them. But those decisions can have a cumulative effect on
communities and the country. In the nursing example, the proliferation of
nursing programs (which puts into question the quality of training), the
specter of an oversupply of nurses, and the potential mismatch between skills
needed and available human resources are some societal-wide concerns that must
be considered and must be weighed vis-à-vis individual aspirations.
While the Philippines cannot stop people from leaving, the
country will need to explore how migration can be an instrument for
development. In this regard, the Philippines can learn much from international
discussions and reflections on migration and development taking place in other
countries.
