Abstract

IZCARA PALACIOS, Simón Pedro. Extreme Precariousness in the Agricultural Labor Market in the United States. colomb.int. [online]. 2017, n.89, pp.109-132. ISSN 0121-5612.  https://doi.org/10.7440/colombiaint89.2017.04.

This article aims to examine the impact of the double agenda of U.S. immigration policy on the agricultural labor market in that country. Through a series of qualitative interviews of Mexican enganchadores (recruiters) and migrant workers from Mexico and Central America, it analyzes how this immigration policy deploys a militarized spectacle of arrests, detentions and deportations, at the same time that it facilitates undocumented migration. The article concludes that the toughening of border control policy has promoted the creation of an irregular agricultural labor market characterized by high levels of labor exploitation and extreme precariousness, which has led to the resurgence of a practice that was common a century ago: the enganche or recruitment of farmworkers.

Keywords : Agriculture; illegal immigration; United States; farmworkers; immigration policy.

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