Labour Market Segmentation within Ethnic Economies: The Ethnic Penalty for Invisible Kurdish Migrants in the United Kingdom

Abstract

Despite the extensive literature on the labour market outcomes of migration, little attention has been given to labour market inequalities within ethnic economies containing internal ethnicity. This article, using a field-study, multi-segmented labour market approach and the enclave hypothesis, contributes to the literature by demonstrating the key roles of different migration patterns and ethnic disparities in shaping labour market segmentation. It focuses on how and why Kurdish migrants are located in the lower segments of the labour market in their shared ethnic (migrant) economy in London. It argues that the Kurds’ underprivileged position associated with an ethnic penalty for them in the UK results from their relatively recent migration history, (un)documented asylum status and the ongoing persecution against them in Turkey. The article concludes that different migration histories, particular motivations for migration and ethnic disparities stratify migrants into distinct segments of the labour market in the country of destination.

“I’m Not a Refugee Girl, Call Me Bella”: Professional Refugee Women, Agency, Recognition, and Emancipation

“…As a consequence of such a binary framing, refugees are pitched, politically constructed, and some would argue stigmatized, as a homogeneous group who are on the one hand, welfare-dependent, a bleed on business and a burden to society, and on the contrary, are a vulnerable and marginalized group of workers channeled into precarious employment in low skilled sectors. Overall, the marginalization from the labor market is also seen to be inextricably linked to challenges surrounding integration into the broader society (Baranik et al, 2018; Dedeoglu, 2022; Hebbani & Khawaja, 2019; Kesici, 2022, challenging this perspective, see D’Angelo et al, 2020). This positioning negates the fact that refugees arrive in their destination country with an array of skills-sets and backgrounds, job readiness, different hopes, dreams, and concerns about their educational, workforce, and settlement futures (Betts & Collier, 2017; Betts et al, 2017a, 2017b).…”

The History of Migration from Turkey to Western Europe: A Multi-theoretical Analysis of the Routes to Germany and the United Kingdom

“…Thus, state violence, everyday racism and discrimination against ethnic and religious minorities, and other opponent groups in Turkey create an environment of human insecurity for those groups and trigger a movement from Turkey to these countries. In particular, the Kurdish question and related war and conflicts in Turkey force a strong and steady flow of people to Germany and the UK (Kesici, 2020(Kesici, , 2021Sirkeci & Cohen, 2016;Sirkeci et al, 2012), as one respondent illustrated:…”

“…The culture of migration as an aspect of the conflict model (Sirkeci & Cohen, 2016) could help to explain chain migration from Turkey. As a result of long-standing sources of conflict, such as the ethnic discrimination against the Kurds, religious discrimination against the Alevi community in Turkey (Kesici, 2021), and regional distinctions in socio-economic development levels in Turkey (Sirkeci et al, 2012), a culture of migration has developed, and this is one of the factors maintaining mobility of migrants from Turkey to Germany and the UK.…”

Ethnicity disparities in job control in the United Kingdom

“…The paper further contributes to debates on labour market stratification, and in particular to theoretical approaches that depart from the strict dual labour market framework (c.f. Doeringer & Piore, 1971) and instead allude to the idea that labour markets are multisegmented (Kesici, 2022;Grimshaw et al, 2017;Rubery, 2007).…”

“…Our approach is informed by the observed heterogeneity in how ethnic groups fare in terms of some extrinsic aspects of job quality outlined above, but also research on within‐ethnicity disparities in labour market experiences. Kesici (2022) for example, drawing on a sample of Kurds, Turks and Turkish Cypriots workers finds that the former ethnic group—in comparison to the latter two ethnic groups—is relegated to the lower layers of the labour market in a shared ethnic economy. In short, to the extent that the empirically observed disadvantage of ethnic groups compared with their White counterparts in extrinsic aspects of job quality found within the existing literature also holds for job control, it is also possible that within‐group disparities exist since different ethnicities are not homogeneously allocated to jobs, occupations, and industries.…”