Abstract
How do governments in the Global South, with abundant supply of labor, reconcile the positive utility of promoting labor migration and the wider effects that emigration has on the families left behind? Taking the case of the Philippines, the world’s largest exporter of nurses (a female-dominated profession), this chapter shows how the public policy perspective sheds light on the ways in which policy-makers in the Philippines reconciled the need for economic growth and the preservation of core cultural values of the country. Situating our analysis within the context of “Asian values”, the policy-makers’ policy narratives are traced in the design process of the Philippine Nursing Act of 2002. It is further revealed how the debates revolved around securing the market for Philippines’ nurse-migration industry. In so doing, it is concluded that while the country belongs to the cultural heritage of Asia, which upholds strong family ties and the central role of women in the rearing of children, its governance structure and regulatory practices have reconfigured Asian values to promote and prioritize economic growth over the core values of the family.
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Annex: Codebook in Analyzing Legislative Documents
Annex: Codebook in Analyzing Legislative Documents
Major codes | Sub-codes | Definition |
|---|---|---|
Nurse as economic migrants | Motivations for nurses’ emigration—high unemployment, underemployment, low salary, neglected workers, better opportunities overseas | Pertains to nurses who work in foreign countries |
Domestic demand and supply of nurses in the Philippines—surplus, shortage of nurses in local hospitals, exporter of nurses | ||
International demand and supply of nurses—surplus, shortage of nurses in foreign countries, nurses employed in foreign countries, foreign recruitment of Filipino nurses | ||
Overseas Filipino workers (OFWs)—modern heroes, lifeblood of the economy | ||
Gender dimension of nurses | Both male and female—parents, mother and father, men and women | Pertains to the gender of professional nurses |
Female—mother, aunt, housewife |
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Cabanda, E., Chou, MH. (2019). Designing the Export of Nurses: Whither “Asian Values” in the Emigration Policies of the Philippines?. In: Grimm, H.M. (eds) Public Policy Research in the Global South. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-06061-9_11
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