Bus stops, triple wins and two steps: nurse migration in and out of Asia

摘要

The migration pathways in which nurses engage are increasingly heterogeneous. In this article, I contrast three types of nurse migration pathway from three country pairs - Vietnam to Germany 'triple win' bi-lateral migration (direct migration); India to Canada two-step study-work (multistage) pathway; and 'bus stop' multinational migration from the Philippines to Singapore and onwards to other sites. Each pathway is not exclusive to the country pair selected; rather, this occupational and pathway specific analysis permits a comparison of the structures and processes involved - the different kinds of hierarchies that underpin mobility; the migration and border-control infrastructure that channels mobility; and the differential incorporation of multi-nationally mobile lives and their gendered/racialized implications. The migration trajectories analysed in this article reveal how multinational and multistage migrations are produced (through state and non-state intermediaries and policy structures), and how they are productive of new subjectivities and imaginaries (shaped by what is possible and desirable).