This article illustrates the migration of foreign workers into the Republic of Korea as a process situated "between the periphery and the semi-periphery" at the global level. For the research, the author reviewed several data sets regarding the number of foreign workers, their working conditions and policy responses by the Korean Government. In addition, the author conducted interviews with two ethnic Korean Chinese migrant workers.
The author concludes that migration of foreign Asian workers into the Republic of Korea may be regarded as a typical case of how labour forces in the global market move regionally from the periphery toward the semi-periphery. The rapid wage increases and labour shortages since the late 1980s in the Republic of Korea forced the Government to permit foreign workers as a necessary solution. However, when the many foreign workers remained in the country irregularly, the Government initiated a trainee system, designed to maintain control over unauthorized labour by imposing strict employment requirements on foreign workers. In reality, the author argues, those so-called trainees functioned as low-wage workers in the labour system and had few rights. The trainee system underwent several amendments after an increasing number of demands and call for reforms were made from foreign workers, trade unions and civil organizations. Ultimately, the Government maintained the Industrial Trainee System but also revised its migration and labour laws to guarantee more rights to regular and irregular foreign workers. The author concludes that the Government now faces a dilemma: On one hand, small firms are affected by a labour shortage that can only be resolved with an influx of foreign labour force, but on the other hand, the Government wants to shield the very same labour market from foreign competition.
The study highlighted the social and economic constraints that foreign migrant workers experience in the Republic of Korea. The article does not directly contribute knowledge on migrant smuggling. It provides some information on irregular foreign workers in the Republic of Korea who fall into irregularity by deserting their original workplace for another job or by entering the country through travel visas with the motive to overstay and gain employment. According to the article, Chinese constitute the dominant majority of unauthorized workers in the country, followed by Bangladeshis, Filipinos and Vietnamese. In addition, the article provides data sets regarding the number and nationality of foreign irregular workers in the Republic of Korea in 2002.
