23 July 2007
Tony Smith, Contributor, Bathurst, Australia
Dreamseekers: Indonesian Women as Domestic Workers in Asia
Dewi Anggraeni
Equinox, Jakarta (2006)
pp. 250
In the 19th Century, Dutch colonists sent landlejavascript:void(0)ss East Indies peasants to Suriname and New Caledonia to labor in plantations.
In the late 1970s labor exported from Indonesia was predominantly female as women sought employment as domestic workers in countries across Asia including Saudi Arabia, Taiwan and the three countries studied by Dewi Anggraeni: Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia.
Dewi's research was supported by the International Labor Organization of the United Nations, and while empathy with the workers informs the research report, Dewi understood the importance of consulting all of the stakeholders around this pressing issue.
She calls her book "a labor of love"; few readers will disagree with this claim.
In examining the Indonesian women who have sought positions overseas, Dewi found a major motivating factor in the unavailability of work locally. It is not surprising, then, to find a poor attitude toward them among many overseas employers, who assume that the women lack skills, are poorly educated and are so desperate that they will work for little return.
Nor is it surprising that such perceptions lead to disappointment on both sides. However, in most cases the dangers to the women are far greater than the inconvenience to employers.
Many overseas domestic workers have suffered abuse of some kind. Unfortunately, the media cover only the extreme cases where, for example, workers have been duped into prostitution or severely assaulted.
Non-government organizations have taken up the cause and attempted to ensure that the workers are treated respectfully, and the situation has generally improved.
Too often, however, the Indonesian Embassy or a refuge such as Bethune House, has had to pick up the pieces after a woman's dream has been shattered.
Dewi discovered a "jigsaw" of information, personal stories "ringing with humanity" and vested interests trying to protect the status quo.
In a balanced approach, Dewi interviewed workers, employers, sponsors, employment agencies and representatives of governments and organizations such as the Women's Aid Organization.
Some of the interviews revealed heart-rending stories. "Sari", for example, was physically assaulted, verbally abused, strictly controlled and had her rightful salary withheld. Her employer cut her hair, claiming that she was unhygienic.
Others suffered sexual abuse. In many cases when the women complained to the recruitment agency confidentially, the employers were told and the abuses worsened.
Cycle of low esteem
Dewi notes that the women fared differently in each of their destination countries. Language was a greater difficulty and disadvantage in Hong Kong.
In Malaysia, they had some cultural affinity with other Muslims and Malays, but they also suffered from an attitude that Indonesia was an impoverished land.
Wisely, she avoids the construction of a league table of mistreatment and gives credit where it is due for attempts to improve the women's situations.
Standardization of contracts for example, has gone some way to formalizing and codifying the women's rights.
Dewi constructs some useful typologies of workers, employers and the agencies involved in the administration of overseas workers. She finds that the women vary in their motivations, skills and attitudes while employers differ in expectations, understanding and fairness.
The private sector recruitment and training agencies also vary widely, because they are poorly regulated, resourced and supported by government.
The Indonesian government has been "unjustifiably slow" in reacting to the problem, and unfortunately, it seems to be common knowledge that "irresponsible and unscrupulous elements" within government profit from the status quo.
An aid worker described "an inherent attitude" that women who seek work of this kind are "stupid, unskilled ... untrainable".
Yet, "when they are treated like normal adults they will behave accordingly". In all workplaces, managers and employers make decisions that facilitate the effectiveness of their workers. The problem is the difficulty of breaking into the cycle of low esteem.
Overseas readers will be interested to know whether this is a uniquely Indonesian problem. Dewi notes that despite social evolution since Independence and particularly growth of education, "collective, feudalistic mores" remain.
In the household, the order of importance runs from husband, to wife, then children and lastly domestic servants. Among the staff there is also a hierarchy from nanny to driver, gardener and cook through to maid and cleaner.
Maids are expected to be invisible and it is their role that forms the stereotype for overseas workers. There is sexism involved also.
As Solidaritas Perempuan (Women's Solidarity) argues, laws designed to protect other Indonesians employed overseas have not applied to domestic workers.
Dewi concludes with an examination of "the stakeholders as protagonists in hypothetical scenes of conflict". She uses a medical analogy, suggesting that the piecemeal approach to the problem has thus far treated isolated symptoms.
She recommends "an overhaul, remedial surgery". Dreamseekers provides a rational basis on which Indonesian decision-makers might base their decisions about the future welfare of these vulnerable women.
While Dewi avoids speculation and is thoroughly objective, Dreamseekers is a case study in a more general issue. It reminds us all of the problems that await workers of all kinds in the globalized economy.
While the rhetoric of globalization is of equality, equity and opportunity, the reality threatens to render us all outworkers in our own lands.
Dreamseekers is therefore a very timely document.
The reviewer is a political scientist who has taught at several Australian universities, most recently the University of Sydney.
