Transnational Ties, Flexible Workers: Exploring the Strategies Adopted by Indian Immigrant IT Workers to Access the Labour Market in Canada

Recent studies affirm how educated South Asian immigrants in Canada experience high levels of unemployment due to the various racialized and gendered barriers existing in the Canadian labour market. This paper, utilizing interviews with 10 Indian immigrants in Canada and 3 global IT (Information Technology) recruiting agencies based in India, demonstrates how these immigrants are learning to strategize through transnational ties with body-shopping agencies in India to maximize chances of accessing the labour market after immigration. I argue that by indirectly placing the responsibility for learning strategies of networking and labour market incorporation on the immigrants, the Canadian state and its allied institutions are shirking away from their responsibility of providing economic security and opportunity to immigrants specifically of colour. Furthermore, I contend that the state fails to actively address the various systemic barriers and inequalities that continue to impact the entry of the skilled immigrant workers into the Canadian labour market. As a consequence of such failure on the part of the state to ensure proper labour market integration for racialized immigrants, the Indian skilled workers often remain un/under employed in Canada. Many are thus turning to global recruiting agencies in India for acquiring employment. However, such agencies often utilize the relatively vulnerable position of these workers to maximise their control over the productive capacities of these workers. They are being managed and governed to fulfill the labour needs of the globalized firms that require a committed, flexible and skilled workforce, eager to learn new abilities continuously as the market dictates