Ang Nawalang Ilaw ng Tahanan:

Examining the Lived Experiences of Filipino Women in the Live-In Caregiver Program (Trans: The Missing Light of the Home)

Abstract

The Philippines belongs to Southeast Asia and is rich in natural resources. However, it remains a developing country, with globalization and neoliberal policies paralyzing its industries and damaging its environmental resources to prioritize foreign interests (Velasco 2002). With a lack of national industries, the Philippine government implemented a labor export policy favorable to developed countries such as Canada, whose demand for domestic work, childcare, and eldercare expanded. In the 1980s, Canada’s Foreign Domestic Movement (FDM) Program allowed migrant workers to gain permanent residency status (Velasco 2002; Cohen 2000). FDM was replaced by the Live-in Care Giver (LCP) Program by 1992, and during this period the Philippines became among the top sources of laborers to Canada (Bonifacio 2008). The seemingly mutually beneficial setup between the two countries inevitably treated these human beings as commodities, with the laborers also racialized, thereby devoid of rights typically afforded to other migrant workers of European descent. The migration process was also gendered since most caregivers were women, depicting care work as feminized. This paper entitled: Ang Nawalang Ilaw ng Tahanan: Examining the Lived Experiences of Filipino Women in the Live-In Caregiver Program (Trans: The Missing Light of the Home) attempts to shed light on the experiences of Filipino caregivers who worked under the Live-In Caregiver Program. Most importantly, it investigates the interlocking issues of race, ethnicity, and gender and how these became tools of oppression for these Filipino women.