“ At The Intersections Between Care Labor Migration and Transnational Family Care Circulation: The Case of Colombian and Ecuadorian Care-Workers in the Global City of Brussels.”

In Belgium, female migrant Care workers are key elements for the demographic challenges the country faces. The aging of the population and the insertion of native women in the labor market led to an increasing demand for their liable/affordable care-work. A relevant aspect that might help us to understand their careers toward their social and labor incorporation in Belgium are the informal circulations of care that take place within their transnational family networks; which shift over the life course and are subject to the political, economic, cultural and social contexts of both sending and receiving societies (Baldassar and Merla 2014). This paper focuses on the labor migration of Ecuadorian/Colombian care-workers in the global city of Brussels and aims to analyze the role of transnational family care circulations in these women’s social and labor incorporation in Belgium. In order to do so I will make use of a Care Circulation approach (Baldassar and Merla 2014), which allows me to: Firstly, understand the individual characteristics and changes in gender roles that either facilitates or constraints their mobilization of care. Secondly, link the individual level to the opportunities and constraints posed by the state institutions and migration regimes in this mobilization of care. Lastly, it allows me to take a look at the networks of co-nationals who over time sustain their incorporation in Belgium and their transnational caregiving practices. It is through the combination of these past three aspects that this research contributes to a better understanding of the feminization of care labor migration in Belgium; by analyzing transnational family care circulation and highlighting the role of family and the domestic sphere in supporting certain types of labor migration such as care-work. Ultimately, this paper highlights these women’s agency within their transnational families and migratory projects, and recognizes the heterogeneity in their strategies and profiles even within the so-called “care sector”.