Abstract
Paid domestic work and its specificities have raised many challenges in the understanding of the world of work, be it the specificity of employment relations and conditions, labour regulations and organizations of workers. The employer-employee relationship that characterizes most domestic work relationships is one of wage labour and symbolic contract, with various levels of personal relationships existing side by side. However, the language of employment contract dominates the current policy discussions on regulating working conditions and employment relations of domestic workers. The chapter through analysing the existing employment conditions and practices of workers who are part of a workers’ collective explores the possibility and implications of formal contracts for domestic workers. The chapter argues that though formal contracts have been the focus of the collective, in the current context many workers are hesitant in moving away from personal relations with employers to that of formal relations. Even when workers are members of collectives which promote formal contracts, labour rights and worker identity remain as challenges, owing to their social and economic specificities.
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Notes
- 1.
See ILO, 2012, for a detailed discussion on discrepancies between various sources on the estimates of domestic workers.
- 2.
The sub-categories are housemaid/servant, cook and governess/babysitter.
- 3.
The sub-category under personal services is ‘General household maintenance activities like broom the floor, dusting, cleaning of utensils etc’.
- 4.
Factories Act 1948 specifies working hours as 48 hours in a week and not more than 9 hours in a day. The Minimum Wages Act, 1948, also specifies working hours under the rules 20–25—the number of work hours in a day should not exceed 9 hours for an adult.
- 5.
This is especially true in the context of live-in workers as unlike the live-out workers they are with the employers throughout the day which makes them most vulnerable.
- 6.
The adoption of the ILO’s Domestic Workers Convention, 2011 (No. 189), and the Domestic Workers Recommendation, 2011 (No. 201), is a significant intervention in the valuation and recognition of domestic work and protection of domestic workers’ rights at the international level.
- 7.
After the global economic crisis, worker cooperatives are in general growing in popularity.
- 8.
Domestic work has seen many cooperative initiatives across the world to address the specific issues and conditions of this sector. In many contexts, since domestic workers are immigrant workers, there are further layers to their vulnerability, including fear of deportation and separation from their families. Further, for immigrants, cooperatives are found to help workers form social networks; gain social leadership, financial and business skills; and work in healthier environments.
- 9.
Registered under the Indian Trust Act, 1882.
References
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Neetha N. (2019). The Language of Employment Contract: Paid Domestic Work Practices and Relations. In: Shyam Sundar, K.R. (eds) Globalization, Labour Market Institutions, Processes and Policies in India. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-7111-0_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-7111-0_13
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