Women Migration in the Globe

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slow-growth sectors, not fast-growth sectors. Moreover, it is evident that immigrants flowed disproportionately into the slowest-growing parts of the economy.

2.2.2 Women Migration in the Globe

Although there has been a long tradition of female cross-border migration in the Asia Pacific region, women are increasingly dominating migration flows and they do so in a variety of forms. With these women migrating either as single, independent workers as a stage in their lives when marriages seen as appropriate, if not obligatory, or as wives (and mothers), the issue of marriage, or marital relationships, becomes closely intertwined with international migration (Piper and Roces, 2003).

It is ever indicated that gender-sensitive or female perspectives of migration recently have begun to contribute new insights by pointing to noneconomic incentives to migration. In these studies, the family, or households, emerges as important units of analysis, but migration’s impact on marriage or marital relationships as such has not been explored in their multiple dimensions and forms (Piper and Roces, 2003).

The interaction of marriage and migration was related to sex imbalance, which female migrants “follow” male pioneers. Researchers ever noted that in the specific contexts of Asian women’s experiences, works on the so-called “picture brides” fall into this category. Furthermore, scholars concerned with women’s migratory patterns seem to be more comfortable discussing women as either migrants for marriage or as overseas contracted workers (OCWs) (the woman as worker), especially women as unskilled laborers, domestic helpers and careers in particular. Historically inclined studies on the phenomenon of “marriage migration” also include those discussing

“war brides”. Other studies focus on how these brides are represented by the host countries. Yet in this discussion of marriage migration, little attention is paid to the women’s subsequent entrance into the labor market. Other studies discussing marriage

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and migration are those typical by sociologists and geographers on “mail-order brides” (Piper and Roces, 2003).

Piper （ 2003 ） manifested that scholars concerned with women’s migratory patterns typically discuss women as either migrants for marriage or as overseas contract workers (OCWs) (i.e. the woman as worker or as ‘bride’), especially in studies on women as domestic helpers and carers —– which, together with

“entertainment” related work, are the main jobs that such migrant women are employed in. Such depictions, however, totally ignore the fact that these women’s roles can, and often do, shift, such as when the ‘migrant for marriage’ engages in paid employment or when the “labor migrant” marries a “local” citizen.

Significant share of women in international migration has been noted since 1960s. According to estimated numbers categorized by regions, Asia stands as the second largest in the world. In 2005, the total number of Asian migrants was 55 million followed by North America of 45 million, only surpassed by Europe which had 64 million (United Nations, 2009).¹⁰ It also displayed that women constituted close to half (49.2%) of all international migrants in 2005.

Moreover, Piper (2005) claimed that global estimates by sex confirm that for more than 40 years since 1960, female migrants reached almost the same numbers as male migrants. Since then, the share of female emigrants among all international migrants of the world has been rising steadily.

Based on the data of United Nations (2009), female migrants constitute roughly 50 percent (all the number showed on the table is over 49 percent since 1990) of the international migrants in the past two decades (Table 2-2). Moreover, by 2005, there was another astonishing fact that the female migrants constituted more than 51 percents of all the migrants in the more developed regions and about 46 percent of all

10 Except for the less number of total migrants than Asia in 1990, Europe has long been the leading region of having the hugest proportion of international migrants in the globe.

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Table 2-2: Female Migrants as Percentage of All International Migrants

Year %

1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

49.1 49.3 49.4 49.2 49.0

Note: The number in the year 2010 is predicted based on the data and the global migration development trend in 2009.

Source: United Nations (2009), Trends in the International Migrant Stock: The 2008 Revision.

the migrants in the less developed countries were female migrants during the same period (United Nations, 2009).¹¹

Furthermore, nearly half of all international migrants are female and female migrants outnumber male migrants in developed regions like Europe and North America. Moreover, according to the data of Population Division of Department of Economic and Social Affairs of United Nations, women migrant population maintain steady development in most regions in the world, having close to and even over half of the global migrant population; there is no significant regional differentials showing in various areas (Table 2-3).

Furthermore, the female migrants proportion compared to male migrants in terms of different regions nearly equal in most regions around the world, even surpassed that of male migrants except in Africa and Asia in last decade as showed on Table 2-4 (Siddiqui, 2008; United Nations, 2009). Nonetheless, over the last decades, growth rate of female migrants compared to male is higher in Asia.

According to the International Migration Stock Report of the United Nations in

11 According to the estimate data of international migration stock of UN in 2009, the female migrants as percentage of international migrants maintain over 51 percent in more developed regions and over 45 percent in less developed regions but both slightly decrease in 2010.

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Table 2-3: Female Migrants as Percentage of all International Migrants

Unit: % Year

Region 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

Latin America and the Caribbean

Note: The number in the year 2010 is predicted based on the data and the global migration development trend in 2009.

Source: United Nations (2009), Trends in the International Migrant Stock: The 2008 Revision.

2008, the leading three regions owning great proportion of migrants in the world are Europe, Asia, and North America, which respectively have 64 million, 55 million, and 45 million in 2005; moreover, they may grow to 69 million, 61 million, and 50 million in 2010. That is Asia standing as the second largest.

Asia has been in the forefront of migration of people all alone. People of Asia moved across territory for better life and livelihood. Over the years Asia has been experiencing increased movements within the region. Another important trend in migration within Asia is the emergence of women as principal migrants (Siddiqui, 2008; United Nations, 2009).

Referring to the main stream of female migrants, we follow what Siddiqui (2008) indicated that the typical migrations of women are as dependent spouses of male migrants both within and outside Asia, independent women migrants for labor migration, independent migrants as students and professionals, and transnational marriage migrants. However, the global and regional inequalities are inherent to these marriages. For many women and their families, an international marriage can offer

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social, economic, and geographic mobility through international migration (Belanger and Tran, 2009).

Another conspicuous fact is that the women migration is no doubt maintain the steady development and even occupies almost a half of the total migration population in different regions whatever their respectively various economic, political and technological development degree around the world. It is a common phenomenon and attracts a lot of attention (Table 2-4). Therefore, women play equally important roles as men in human migration which obviously reflects that there is no gender- preference indication and tendency in migrant acceptance of many countries.

Consequently, female migration, being dominant in world stage may also have influence in various regions socially, politically, culturally and economically to different degree.

Table 2-4: The Proportion of Female Migrants among the Total Migrants

Unit: %

Note: The number in the year 2010 is predicted based on the data and the global migration development trend in 2009.

Source: United Nations (2009), Trends in the International Migrant Stock: The 2008 Revision.

2.3 International and Domestic Research on Marriage Migration