Revisiting Institutions

Abstract

The global capitalist distribution of resources and power allowed racialized and gendered institutions to operate and govern based on the concept of the division of labor. Predicated on this, domestic work became a devalued feminized reproductive form of labor, mostly performed by migrant women and underprivileged individuals for relatively affluent households. The gendered and racialized institutions has made women migrant domestic workers prone to experiencing exploitation because their labor is marginalized as unproductive real job, hidden behind closed doors. Domestic labor became publicly irrelevant labor especially as it is performed in the private sphere. Accordingly, this research will apply the intersectional feminist institutionalism approach to understand how the intersection of gender with different social identities determines the way institutions function, either to include or marginalize women migrant domestic workers. To further emulate this, the research will use the case of women expatriate domestic workers in Bahrain. This research will attempt to answer how have Bahrain's formal and informal institutions interacted to facilitate or impede the inclusion of women migrant domestic workers in the public space. In yet another perspective, it will highlight some of the bottom-up responses that women migrant domestic workers deploy to resist marginalization in Bahrain and will provide an insight into how civil society organizations challenge practices of institutional marginalization.