UCLA

Balancing between local capital’s requirement for labor, a shrinking local workforce, and exclusionary notions of national belonging, Taiwan’s migration regime bears similarity to a growing number of analogous migration regimes globally. Often described as ‘guest-worker’ programs, these policies exclude migrants from incorporating socially and culturally, by distinguishing between migrants based on skill. This dissertation explores the reproduction and mediation of guest-worker programs within everyday life through an analysis of migrant soccer leagues in Taiwan. The project focuses on guest-workers from Southeast Asia, but also highlights the experiences of student-workers and highly skilled migrants from Europe, the Americas, Southeast Asia, and East Asia in migrant soccer communities. The empirical evidence collected through semi-structured interviews and ethnographic observation and participation within migrant soccer communities, demonstrates overlapping processes through which Taiwan’s guest-worker program is perpetuated and challenged as migrants confront and overcome barriers to attending soccer games during their limited free time. This dissertation engages with the critical border studies literature to parse the various motivations that animate the exclusion guest-workers experience in Taiwan and analyzes the social capital guest-worker communities rely on to negotiate access to field space and organize soccer games. Finally, the dissertation explores the sense of place that is produced by migrant soccer communities as an analysis of the effects that the guest-worker program has on globalization and multicultural encounters.