Precarious Lives and Hope During a Pandemic Among Women Migrant Workers in Chiang Rai

Authors

  • Thikumphorn Singtomast -

Keywords:

Hope, Precarious Lives, Female Migrant Worker, Chiang Rai

Abstract

This article examines women migrant workers’ lives and experiences in Chiang Rai during the COVID-19 pandemic between 2020 and 2021, considering the conditions that shape women migrant workers’ precarious lives and their hope-generating process. According to the study, COVID-19 is not only a critical situation that leads women migrant workers to precariousness, but it becomes an actor who crosses over to work alongside other conditions such as socioeconomic structure, gender, and Thai bureaucracy to construct precarious lives. These conditions always interplay in women migrant workers’ daily lives but may be overlooked or not recognized until they come together to construct a state of being precarious and reveal the problem of its existence. However, women migrant workers have generated an infinite hope to cope with precariousness during a pandemic and create new opportunities to rearrange power relations in border areas, especially with the local disease control agencies. Furthermore, they also succeeded in changing migrant workers’ representation from being cheap labor to becoming an actor who plays an important role in epidemic control and prevention mechanisms in border towns.

 

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Published

29-12-2022

How to Cite

Singtomast, T. (2022). Precarious Lives and Hope During a Pandemic Among Women Migrant Workers in Chiang Rai . Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences Prince of Songkla University, 18(2), 118–151. Retrieved from https://so03.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/eJHUSO/article/view/261863

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Research Article