Abstract (Summary)

This research note is divided into two sections. The first contains a brief overview of
Indonesian female overseas labor migration, which provides the context in which press
reports are written on female migrant workers' experiences abroad. In the second, data from a
survey of 4,682 press clippings is examined with reference to themes favored by activists and
academics writing about female overseas migrant labor in Indonesia. It concludes indicates
that the significant conformity between press coverage and activist discourse suggests that all
the nuances of women's experiences working abroad may not be fully recognized in public
accounts of Indonesian women workers' experiences overseas.

The lack of close study of these migrants is surprising, given that the ever-increasing flow of
migrants through Sumatra and Kalimantan (and Malaysia's policy of returning undocumented
migrants to the nearest Indonesian port) has drawn activists' attention to, and press coverage
of, problems associated with international labor migration in areas of Indonesia close to the
Malaysian borders in recent years. Malaysia's borders with Indonesia remain extremely
porous despite repeated attempts to tighten controls over undocumented labor migration.
Seventy-eight percent of all undocumented immigrants arrested in Malaysia between 1992
and 1995 (some 146,800 people) were from Indonesia (UNESCO-MOST, n.d.). During that
same period a further 402,508 Indonesians found to be working illegally in Malaysia were
allowed to register as legal foreign workers (UNESCO-MOST, n.d.). In 1996-97, over
300,000 more undocumented Indonesian workers were regularized ([Hugo], 2001).

The results of the survey suggested that female overseas migrant workers were generally
described using one of three related tropes, which closely reflect the themes of activist and
academic discourse about women working abroad (Ford, forthcoming). The first of these
tropes, `TKW(3) as victim of globalization,' has its roots in the structuralist critique of the
government's promotion of overseas labor migration as a source of national revenue. NGOs
and other critics maintain that, like female factory workers, female overseas migrant workers
have become fodder for the government's development programs and the expansion of
international capital (Tirtosudarmo, 1999). Some activists have argued that attempts to limit
overseas job opportunities in the informal sector actually disadvantage women by closing
poor rural women's access to work (Krisnawaty, 1997: 294). However, public discussion is
primarily framed in terms of how the TKW are sacrificed by the government and labor export
agencies for profit, despite the serious risks of overseas domestic work to their physical and
moral well-being.(4)

Full Text
(3557 words)
Copyright Ewha Womans University Press Dec 31, 2002

Keywords

Indonesia; labor migration; media; NGOs (non-governmental organizations)

Introduction

Female overseas labor migration has been a subject of controversy for decades in Indonesia.
The well-documented difficulties faced by Indonesian women working overseas include
agents' unregulated charging of registration fees; long periods in barracks awaiting
placement; employers refusing to pay wages; sexual harassment and abuse, sometimes
resulting in pregnancy or death; and even the sale of domestic workers in receiving countries
(Ananta, 2000: 38; Krisnawaty, 1997: 293; Robinson, 2000: 252). As domestic service is
particularly difficult to regulate, women employed in other people's homes face many more
risks in recipient countries than those working in the public sphere.

Despite its risks, the possible rewards of overseas work remain attractive and the lack of well-
paying jobs for `low skilled' workers in Indonesia has meant there is no shortage of women
willing to take their chances abroad. Many women perceive overseas domestic service as a
means of establishing themselves financially so that they can feed, house and educate their
children. In 1999 alone, female migrant workers remitted some 3 trillion Rupiah
(approximately US$300 million) to Indonesia (Yunianto, n.d.: 5). Those who have been
successful abroad can afford to build houses that are the envy of their neighbors and establish
small businesses. The obvious material benefits of their work encourages other women in
their districts to consider following in their footsteps. However, while women who become
overseas labor migrants clearly place great emphasis on the potential financial gains of
overseas employment, their motivation for working overseas are not always exclusively
financial. They work overseas for a complex web of reasons, which can include family
pressures or a desire to see the world (Interviews, June 2001).

Unsurprisingly, stories of women who work in cafes or in factories -- or of overseas domestic

workers who have positive experiences overseas and save enough to achieve a standard of
living unimaginable had they been employed in similar positions in Indonesiaare seldom
related in newspaper coverage of women working abroad. Instead, the female overseas
migrant is almost always portrayed as an abused domestic worker. In highlighting the human
cost of poor regulation and policing of labor migration policy, activists and journalists paint a
picture of women who are essentially passive; victims of globalization; and at risk of
commodification and sexualization. As a consequence, women's motivations for seeking
work overseas -- and their attempts to improve their conditions of work -- are seldom
recognized as agency, and the poor conditions of women employed as domestic workers in
Indonesian households pass relatively unnoticed.

This research note is divided into two sections. The first contains a brief overview of
Indonesian female overseas labor migration, which provides the context in which press
reports are written on female migrant workers' experiences abroad. In the second, data from a
survey of 4,682 press clippings is examined with reference to themes favored by activists and
academics writing about female overseas migrant labor in Indonesia. It concludes indicates
that the significant conformity between press coverage and activist discourse suggests that all
the nuances of women's experiences working abroad may not be fully recognized in public
accounts of Indonesian women workers' experiences overseas.
Indonesia's Overseas Female Migrant Workers

Although there are traditional paths of labor migration from Indonesia to Peninsular Malaysia
and Saudi Arabia, it is only relatively recentlyly that Indonesia became an important source
of migrant workers to the Middle East, East Asia and the wealthier countries within Southeast
Asia. A rapid rise in female overseas labor migration has taken place in a context where
officially sanctioned overseas labor migration as a whole increased dramatically. In the five
years between 1969 and 1974, just 5,624 workers were placed abroad under the government's
labor migration program. A quarter of a century later, 1,461,236 Indonesians were sent
overseas under government-approved labor migration schemes between 1994 and 1999
(Hugo, 2001: 2).

As the overall occupational distribution of Indonesian migrant workers suggests (Table 1),
Indonesian women working overseas are generally employed in domestic work in recipient
countries (ILO, 1998; Hugo, 2001). While a significant number of female Indonesian labor
migrants are employed in occupations other than domestic work in Malaysia (and to a lesser
extent, Singapore), the majority of women working in East Asia are employed in domestic
service positions. However, the predominance of domestic work is much higher in Saudi
Arabia and the Gulf States. In 1997, it was reported that in Saudi Arabia, for example, some
92 percent of Indonesian female labor migrants were employed as domestic workers
(Indonesian Embassy cited in Hugo, 2001).

In recent years, the number of overseas female labor migrants has far outstripped that of
males. In 1999, 302,791 women were officially placed in overseas positions compared to
124,828 men. In the year 2000, the ratio dropped only slightly, with 297,270 women and
137,949 men sent abroad. In the first six months of 2002, the ratio of women to men
increased dramatically with 91,224 women and only 14,198 men placed overseas
(Department of Manpower and Transmigration, 2001). Saudi Arabia receives the largest
percentage of Indonesian female overseas migrants leaving through official channels,
whilstwhilst Malaysia is their most popular Asian destination (Table 2).(1)

Many of the women who cross into Malaysia are not processed through the channels
sanctioned by the government. These women are part of Indonesia's unofficial labor
migration, which is estimated to exceed official migration levels. Hugo has identified three
broad groups of undocumented labor migrants leaving Indonesia. The first, who comprise the
majority of undocumented Indonesian workers in West Malaysia, enter without passing
through any official border checkpoint. The second, including many of those working in East
Malaysia, enter legally, but overstay their visas. The third, including women, who enter Saudi
Arabia on pilgrimage visas, obtain work in violation of their visa conditions (Hugo, 2001: 6-
8).(2)

The lack of close study of these migrants is surprising, given that the ever-increasing flow of
migrants through Sumatra and Kalimantan (and Malaysia's policy of returning undocumented
migrants to the nearest Indonesian port) has drawn activists' attention to, and press coverage
of, problems associated with international labor migration in areas of Indonesia close to the
Malaysian borders in recent years. Malaysia's borders with Indonesia remain extremely
porous despite repeated attempts to tighten controls over undocumented labor migration.
Seventy-eight percent of all undocumented immigrants arrested in Malaysia between 1992
and 1995 (some 146,800 people) were from Indonesia (UNESCO-MOST, n.d.). During that
same period a further 402,508 Indonesians found to be working illegally in Malaysia were
allowed to register as legal foreign workers (UNESCO-MOST, n.d.). In 1996-97, over
300,000 more undocumented Indonesian workers were regularized (Hugo, 2001).

Malaysia has taken a less benign stance on undocumented Indonesian migrant workers since
the financial crisis hit Asia in 1997-98, when one of Malaysia's primary strategies for dealing
with increasing unemployment was to expel Indonesians working illegally. Anti-Indonesian
sentiment continued after the Asian economic crisis: in 2001 the Malaysian government
responded to a riot by Indonesian workers by threatening to end Indonesian labor migration
to Malaysia. In mid-2002, the Malaysian government deported some 3,200 Indonesians
working illegally in Malaysia in the lead-up to the implementation of the new Malaysian
Immigration Act on 1 August 2002 (Satunet, 22 July 2002). So, while conditions in receiving
countries and the experiences of women in the barracks of registered labor export companies
in Jakarta are the subject of many books and articles, the experiences of migrants leaving by
these alternative routes -- particularly those recruited by illegal agents -- are relatively little-
researched.

Newspaper Representations, 1996-1999

A significant proportion of Indonesia's public discussion about whether or not women should
be working overseas as domestic labor takes place in the daily press. In fact, images of
women employed in domestic work overseas -- along with factory workers in Indonesia --
dominate newspaper representation of women's work (Ford, forthcoming). The period for
which the survey was conducted (January 1996-December 1999) includes the Asian
economic crisis, the fall of Suharto in May 1998, and the first eighteen months of the post-
Suharto period.

The clippings examined here were collected from volumes of Problema -- a press-clipping
service conducted by Yayasan Buruh Membangun and funded by the Friedrich Ebert
Stiftung, a German labor NGO (non-governmental organization). Problema was published
monthly in a 60-page A-4 booklet for distribution to worker activists, NGOs and other
interested parties throughout the 1990s. The use of a systematic clipping service meant that a
longer timeframe could be examined than would have been possible if the newspapers had
been accessed directly. The 4,682 clippings about work examined (the equivalent of almost
100 clippings per month for the 48 months surveyed) included articles on a wide range of
work-related topics. The increasing significance of overseas labor migration is reflected in
the service's adoption of `overseas migrant labor' as a separate heading, part way through the
survey period. Not every labor-related article published in the papers surveyed was included
in Problema because of space limitations and some papers were relied on more heavily than
others. Nevertheless, the data examined provides valuable insights into images of working
women in the Indonesian media.

As in any content analysis, the manner in which the articles were categorized is an important
methodological issue. Clearly, many articles could equally easily be classified as being about
women or not being about women, depending on the criteria employed. For the purposes of
this exercise, conservative definitions were used. Only those articles that were mostly or
completely about women were included in the tally. Reports in which the gender of the
overseas migrant worker was either unclear or male were first eliminated. The articles about
female overseas migrant workers were then divided into four categories: articles about female
overseas migrant workers employed in other occupations; articles providing factual
information (usually about remittances); articles that portrayed female overseas domestic
workers as victims; and articles which provided positive coverage of female overseas
domestic workers.

Of the articles included in Problema between January 1996 and December 1999, 403 referred
explicitly to women, 495 referred to overseas migrant labor, and 193 articles were about
women working overseas (Figure 1). Towards the end of the survey period, the previously
male-specific term `TKI' (Tenaga Kerja Indonesia: overseas labor migrant, lit. Indonesian
labor power) became more gender-neutral. Articles using TKI in this sense were counted only
if they referred explicitly to women or carried a photograph depicting women.

As expected, the overwhelming majority of articles about overseas female migrant labor
included in Problema during the survey period were about domestic workers. In addition to
news items related to specific cases, such as suicides of Indonesian domestic workers in
Singapore, the repatriation of undocumented workers from Malaysia or the abuse of women
working in Saudi Arabia, the newspapers surveyed included articles written by government
departments and NGOs, who use newspapers to publicize their positions on the migrant labor
issue. The small number of articles in Problema that referred to government statements about
overseas female labor migration frame women's work abroad in terms of remittances.
Although NGO-authored articles varied, most of those examined were calling for either a halt
to, or closer regulation of, overseas labor migration.

Only three articles offered alternative visions of the work of women employed overseas. Of
these, two (one negative, one positive) referred to women working in Malaysian factories,
whilstwhilst the third was a general article bemoaning the skills profile of Indonesian
overseas migrant workers. Of the remaining 190 articles about overseas female migrant labor,
168 (87 percent) showed women as domestic workers who were victims of their employers,
their host country, or the companies who sent them abroad (see Table 3).

In contrast, just 22 articles (11.4 percent) reported neutrally or positively on women's

experiences overseas or demonstrated overseas domestic workers' agency by reporting their
protests and attempts to seek compensation for their negative experiences (see Table 4).

The results of the survey suggested that female overseas migrant workers were generally
described using one of three related tropes, which closely reflect the themes of activist and
academic discourse about women working abroad (Ford, forthcoming). The first of these
tropes, `TKW(3) as victim of globalization,' has its roots in the structuralist critique of the
government's promotion of overseas labor migration as a source of national revenue. NGOs
and other critics maintain that, like female factory workers, female overseas migrant workers
have become fodder for the government's development programs and the expansion of
international capital (Tirtosudarmo, 1999). Some activists have argued that attempts to limit
overseas job opportunities in the informal sector actually disadvantage women by closing
poor rural women's access to work (Krisnawaty, 1997: 294). However, public discussion is
primarily framed in terms of how the TKW are sacrificed by the government and labor export
agencies for profit, despite the serious risks of overseas domestic work to their physical and
moral well-being.(4)

A second common theme emerging from the survey is the image of `TKW as good woman.'
In articles using this trope, overseas migrant workers are portrayed as victims of the process
of labor migrationr -- of unscrupulous agents, heartless employers or con men encountered at
airports and bus terminals on their return to Indonesia. Like all `good women' they are
powerless to change their circumstances. They endure them nobly and without protest,
relying on others to bring their plight into public view.

Finally, these `good women' are portrayed simultaneously as strangely asexual and at risk of
sexual abuse. They are `TKW as sexual victim(s),' about whom sensationalist articles, often
accompanied by graphic representations, regularly appear in the press. However, whilst cases
of sexual exploitation and forced prostitution were reported in the national press, women
working overseas as sex workers were not widely acknowledged at a national level -- let
alone by the government -- in the period examined. In one of the very few press accounts I
found (Pos Kota, February 15, 1997), the then Minister for Manpower, Abdul Latief, strongly
denied accusations made in an earlier report in the popular Jakarta tabloid Pos Kota that
Indonesians were working as prostitutes abroad (Pos Kota, February 8, 1997). The absence of
reports on prostitution in national newspapers is puzzling given that significant numbers of
Indonesian women earn their living as sex workers overseas, particularly in the neighboring
countries of Southeast Asia (Interview, July 15, 2001).(5) When questioned on this silence,
the head of KOPBUMI (the Consortium for the Defence of Indonesian Migrant Workers)
suggested that many NGO activists, like the government and the public, are not prepared to
accept or acknowledge the `other side' of female labor migration (Interview, July 15, 2001).

Conclusion

Press reports do not capture all the nuances of public discourse about overseas female
migrant labor. They nevertheless reflect both activists' and the government's beliefs about
overseas labor migration and are an important force in shaping the agenda of the public. The
clippings surveyed indicate that little changed in Indonesia's public discourses about overseas
migrant labor during the years immediately before and after the fall of Suharto in May 1998.
It is beyond the scope of this research note to compare press coverage and activist discourse
with the experiences of women working abroad. However, the dearth of articles about women
employed overseas in occupations other than domestic service, of successful migrant labor
experiences, or of collective initiatives to mediate the conditions of their employment (Ford,
2001), suggests that public representations of female overseas migrant labor do not fully
reflect the variety of conditions in which women working abroad find themselves.

References

Newspapers covered in Problema

Barata

Business News

Berita Sumatra

Jakarta Post

Kompas

Merdeka
Harian Terbit

Media Indonesia

Pos Kota

Pikiran Rakyat

Rakyat Merdeka

Republika

Serambi Indonesia

Suara Merdeka

Suara Pembaruan

Surya

Waspada

Newspapers Accessed Separately

Pos Kota

Kompas

Kompas Online

Satunet (online newspaper)

Other References

Ananta, Aris (2000), "Economic Integration and Free LabourLabor Area: An Indonesia
Perspective," Labour Migration in Indonesia: Policies and Practice, eds. Abdul Sukamdi,
Hafts Sukamdi and Patrick Brownlee, Yogyakarta: Population Studies Center Gadjah Mada
University.

Department of Manpower and Transmigration (2001), "Data Penempatan TKI" ("Overseas

Labor Migrant Placement Data"), on
http://www.nakertrans.go.id/berita_penting/2001/agustus/ BP010820b.htm.

Ford, Michele (2001) "Responses to Changing Labour Relations: The Case of Women's
NGOs in Indonesia," Globalisation and Women's Labour in Msia, eds. Dong-Sook Gills and
Nicola Piper, London and New York: Routledge.

_____ (forthcoming), "Beyond the Femina Fantasy: The Working-Class Woman in

Indonesian Discourses of Women's Work," Review of Indonesian and Malayan Affairs.
Hugo, Graeme (2001), "Women's International Labour Migration," Paper presented at the
Indonesia Update 2001: Gcnder, Equity and Development in Indonesia's Reform Period,
Australian National University, Canberra, September 21-22.

ILO (1998), "Emigration Pressures and Structural Change: Case Study of Indonesia," on
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/protection/migrant/papers/emindo ch3.htm.

Jones, S. (2000), Making Money off Migrants: The Indonesian Exodus to Malaysia, Hong
Kong and Wollongong: Asia 2000/ CAPSTRANS.

Krisnawaty, Taft (1997), "Catatan Pengalaman Advokasi Hak Asasi Perempuan Pckcrja
Migran Internasional" ("Notcs on My Experience Advocating the Human Rights of
International Migrant Working Women"), Agenda LSM Menyongsong Tahun 2000: Sebuah
Refleksi Pengalaman Dua Dasawarsa ISM (NGO's Agenda Approaching the Year 2000: A
Reflection on Two Decades of NGO Experience), ed. Rustam Ibrahim, Jakarta: Center for the
Study of Democracy.

Robinson, Kathy (2000), "Gender, Islam, and Nationality: Indonesian Domestic Servants in
the Middle East," Home and Hegemony: Domestic Service and Identity Politics in South and
Southeast Asia, eds. K. Adams and S. Dickey, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

Tirtosudarmo, Riwanto (1999), "Buruh Migran Indonesia: Sang Korban dalam Proses
Globalisasi" ("Indonesian Migrant Workers: The Victims of the GlobalisationGlobalization
Process"), Paper presented at the KOPBUMI Workshop, Jakarta 17 December.

_____ (2001), "The Politics of Regulating Overseas Migrant Labor in Indonesia," Paper
presented at the Workshop on Labor Migration and Socio-Economic Change in Southeast and
East Asia, CLARA/Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, Lund, Sweden, 14-16 May.

UNESCO-MOST (n.d.), Issues Paper from Malaysia, http://www.

unesco.org/most.apmrnwp9.htm.

Wong, Diane. and Teuku Afrisal (forthcoming), "Migran Gelap: Indonesian Migrants into
Malaysia's Shadow Economy," Asian and Pacific Migration Journal.

Yunianto, A. (n.d.), "Problematika Buruh Migran Indonesia," ("The Problematic of

Indonesian LabourLabor Migrants"), Jakarta: Unpublished paper.

Notes

(1). See Jones (2000) a detailed account of Indonesian labor migration to Malaysia.

(2). A recent study of 100 `irregular' Indonesian labor migrants in Peninsular Malaysia
confirms the range of patterns identified by Hugo. Fifty-four percent of Wong and Afrisal's
sample entered Malaysia with no documentation whatsoever via East Sumatra and the Riau
archipelago. Forty-one percent (a quarter of whom came from Aceh) arrived on tourist visas.
The remaining 5 percent arrived as legally-recruited foreign workers, but had outstayed their
visas (Wong and Afrisal, forthcoming). Unfortunately, for the purposes of the present
discussion, Wong and Afrisal's sample included only 13 women, none of whom were
domestic workers.
(3). The Indonesian acronym for female overseas contract worker.

(4). The more than sixty NGOs involved in KOPBUMI (the Consortium for the
DefenceDefense of Indonesian Migrant Workers) are deeply divided over whether or not
overseas female labourlabor migration should be banned on the grounds that it is a form of
trafficking of women (Interview, July 15, 2001).

(5). This may be changing. In early 2002, a spate of articles appeared about the involvement
of lndonesian overseas migrant workers in prostitution. In interviews with the staff of
KOPBUMI in July 2001, it was indicated that a survey of regional newspapers in Riau and on
the East Malaysian boarder in Kalimantan may have demonstrated a more realistic attitude to
prostitution than the national press in earlier years.

Table 1. Occupational Distribution of Migrant Workers from Indonesia by Sector of

Employment, 1984-1999

Sector 1984-1994 (%) 198-1994 (%) 1994-1999 (%)

Domestic Service 70.2 59.7 40.4

Plantations 11.8 22.1 10.9

Transportation 14.2 14.2 7.1

Construction 1.5 0.1 7.0

Energy and Water 0.3 0.9

Hotel/Catering 0.3 0.1

Commerce/Finance 1.8 20.9

Mining/Oil 0.5(a)

Manufacturing 2.1 13.6

Other 0.1

Total 100.1(b) 99.7(b) 100.0

Number of Migrants 292,262 652,272 1,461,236(c)

(a). Percentage miscalculation in original table

(b). Rounding

(c). Figures in this period were inflated by Malaysia's policy of registering undocumented
foreign workers, significant numbers of whom worked in the service sector.

Source: Department of Manpower Data cited in Hugo (2001)

Table 2. Gender Distribution of Documented Indonesian Migrant Workers by Destination,
1994-1997

Country Female Male Total

Number % Number % Number %

Saudi Arabia 246,221 48.86 20,970 6.76 267,191 32.81

Malaysia/Brunei 174,319 34.58 218,193 70.30 392,512 48.20

Singapore & Hong Kong 61,187 12.14 19,035 6.13 80,222 9.85

Other Middle East 15,283 3.03 795 0.26 16,078 1.97

Korea/Taiwan/Japan 6,895 1.37 38,361 12.36 45,256 5.56

Other 75 0.01 13,018 4.19 13,156 1.62

Total 503,980 100.0 310,372 100.0 814,352 100.0

Source: Department of Manpower Data cited in Tirtosudarmo (2001)

Table 3. Summary of Articles about Overseas Female Labor Migrants

Articles about domestic workers as victims 168 87.0%

Articles about domestic workers as not-victims 22 11.4%

Other articles about female overseas labor 3 1.6%

Total No. of articles about female overseas labor 193 100.0%

Table 4. Non-Victim Articles about Female Overseas Domestic Workers

Quantity Subject Tone of

Coverage

6 Overseas domestic work is not all bad. positive

Women go to Saudi Arabia as domestic positive

1 workers for religious reasons.

1 TKW in Hong Kong have mobile phones, positive

1 Abused TKW to sue. positive

(agent)
Protests by women who are, have or will positive

5 work overseas, 2 of which were about the

Serikat Buruh Migran Indonesia. (agents)

8 Factual, mostly emphasizing the importance of neutral

remittances.

Table (Occupational Distribution of Migrant Workers from Indonesia by Sector of

Employment, 1984-1999)

Indexing (document details)

International, Labor force, Labor relations, Migrant workers, Women,
Subjects:
Workers, Workforce
Locations: Indonesia
Author(s): Ford, Michele
Document types: Feature
Document Table
features:
Asian Journal of Women's Studies. Seoul: Dec 31, 2002. Vol. 8, Iss. 4;
Publication title:
pg. 101
Source type: Periodical
ISSN: 12259276
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