Regional economic integration and the emergence of the East Asian international migration system

The paper examines the recent emergence and rapid development of one of the world's most active, regionally based, migrant-labour systems. Explanation is sought through two major theoretical perspectives: the neo-classical economics view of labour flows responding to international differences in labour market conditions, and the world systems view of migration as an integral part of the global restructuring of capital. The prime analytical focus is on the economic and migration linkages of the region's three leading labour-exporting countries-the Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia. While the basis for the rapid development of the East Asian labour-migration system has been the widening demographic and economic inequalities within the region, it is shown that the detailed geographical pattern of ensuing labour flows reflects particular macro-economic, cultural and institutional linkages that selectively channel particular types of labour to particular core economies. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.