International Mobility, Global Capitalism, and Changing Structures of Accumulation

Capitalist maturity and South Korea's post‐development conundrum

“…For example, the US economy from a manufacturing powerhouse became predominantly a service‐driven economy. Services, both private and government, in the USA contributed 83% of total non‐farm employment in 2010 (D'Costa, ) and 80.4% of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2014. The massive industrial restructuring and the services transition were engendered by capitalist crisis internal to the USA but not independent of the rise of East Asia, particularly Japan and Korea, and triggered by low‐wage export‐oriented manufacturing investments by American firms in Southeast Asia.…”

“…It is clear that it would be difficult for Korea to hold on to its manufacturing sector in the same way as it had leveraged it during its high growth period. Japan has found it difficult to hold onto its manufacturing because of rising costs, institutional rigidities, and international competition (including from Korea; D'Costa, ). It has been compelled to offshore lower value segments of manufacturing production to Southeast Asia, China, and elsewhere, leading to “hollowing out” firms.…”

“…Although these developments have multiple causes in different countries and at different times, the contemporary macro dynamics based on the OECD experience can be captured by the following relationships. Although the international movement of people is driven by many factors (Castles & Miller, ; D'Costa, ; Goldin, Cameron, & Balarajan, ; Solimano, ), economic prosperity attracts migrants as both unskilled and skilled workers and professionals. The evidence for the OECD drawing in people from other countries is solid (OECD, ).…”

Beyond blue ocean? The roles of intermediaries in the cross‐border labour market between Japan and Vietnam

“…66Indian IT workers are touted as a main supplier of IT labour around the world, and Indian IT professionals tend to prefer a destination where English is used as the primary working language (D'Costa 2013). Although Japanese employers are also courting Indian IT experts (Murata 2020), their integration into the Japanese labour market and society has so far been unsuccessful (D'Costa 2015). …”