Labor migration systems are inherently exploitative – and the kafala system of states in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) is no exception.
The exploitative relationship between migrant workers and their employers in the Middle East has long been defined by the kafala system, the legal framework that structures transnational labor migration within the region and legally ties migrant workers to their employers. Although the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), the body of political and economic alliance within the Gulf, only initiated this system in the early 1950s in response to public demands for heightened infrastructure, the Gulf countries have continued to outsource foreign labor for various other occupations to the point of economic dependency on remittance incomes of migrant labor. This system creates a systemic framework of legal vulnerabilities, leaving transnational labor migrants in the GCC susceptible to exploitation and abuse. At the nexus of human trafficking concerns, the kafala system perpetuates the vicious cycle of migrant exploitation and vulnerability within a complex web of socio-economic and legal challenges.
According to recent UN estimates, there are over twenty-three million registered transnational labor migrants within the GCC, including private and domestic sector workers, of which thirty-nine percent are women. The GCC hosts ten percent of these labor migrants in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, each holding the third and sixth-largest global population of international migrants. The day-to-day abuses these migrant workers face under this system are primarily associated with forced labor and poor working conditions, often including threats of passport and visa confiscation, predatory recruitment fees, and sexual, verbal, and physical assault.
The greatest exploitation within the kafala system is found in the GCC nation-states’ private and domestic sectors. Within these private, labor-intensive sectors, labor migrants often “incur excessive debt from high recruitment fees; unequal, late, or non-payment of wages or illegal deductions; minimal enforcement of labor law; denial of freedom of association and assembly; denial of freedom of freedom of movement; treacherous working conditions; and limited or no access to legal and judicial remedies.” Such trends underlie the “nationalization of labor markets” in the GCC, where GCC nation-states continue to rapidly employ nationals in the more attractive public sector jobs, forcing private oil corporations to become almost entirely populated by foreign workers without access to trade unions, bargaining power, or government-sanctioned rights within the workplace.
Similarly, labor migrants within the domestic sector, primarily women, are employed in households across Arab Gulf societies. The ability of the employing households to maintain strict control over these domestic workers by legal, contractual means constitutes the structural conditions for the abuse and exploitation these workers face daily under the kafala system. Throughout the GCC, migrant domestic workers have made overwhelming reports of excessive work hours, minimal to no leisure time, requirements for working in other households without payment, and critically low wages without any market regulation. This exploitative employment relationship between migrant domestic workers and their employers is deemed a “personal relationship” under the current GCC labor laws, effectively providing these workers with little to no legal recourse. These workers are excluded from legal recourse against their domestic employers, and the kafala system does not protect against “ex-gratia” payments that these workers must pay to their employment agencies after arriving in the GCC region. If a domestic worker tries to flee, the kafala system mandates a reclassification of the migrant as an illegal foreigner who must be immediately deported under the law.
An angle of this issue that is seldom addressed is the distinct legal vulnerabilities situated at the intersection of the terms “human trafficking” and “labor exploitation.” Although recent policy shifts in the GCC have emphasized the need to adhere to international labor standards on migrant domestic labor exploitation, and the GCC has made an honorable attempt to model the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) protocol on labor abuses, such protocol lacks a clear definition of exploitation. Instead, the current protocol conflates labor abuses with charges of “slavery” or “human trafficking,” pointing to three primary elements: “violence or the threat of violence, restriction of freedom of movement, and economic exploitation.” Internationally and in the GCC, this classification has led to growing frustrations around what constitutes human trafficking versus labor exploitation within migrant labor concerns and the extent to which human trafficking needs to be addressed over labor exploitation under the law. Differentiating between human trafficking and labor exploitation under the kafala system is crucial for accurately identifying victims and addressing the distinct forms of harm. While labor exploitation can involve individuals who willingly cooperate or are complicit, human trafficking entails coercion and force, with perpetrators often operating within clandestine networks. Properly distinguishing labor exploitation from human trafficking is vital as it allows for the accurate identification of both issues, enabling targeted interventions to address the underlying problem of human vulnerability in the private labor sector that drives the trafficking market.
There have been attempts to reform the kafala system, but the fact remains that these reforms have not gone far enough. Only recently has the Arab political arena become fully aware of the harms of the kafala system, it having been exposed with preparations for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. This exposure prompted limited reforms, such as the removal of exit permit requirements for migrant domestic laborers who are traditionally excluded from labor laws. Qatar also eliminated No-Objection Certificates (NOC) for job changes, which allow workers to change jobs without permission from their employer under certain conditions. Despite representing notable progress, the effectiveness of these reforms has been eroded by insufficient implementation measures and protective measures, thus leaving migrant workers in both private and domestic sectors exposed to the high risks of labor exploitation that these reforms were designed to prevent. Migrant workers continue to face significant difficulties navigating the system, unaware of their right to leave and at the risk of retaliation from employers who might file false allegations of absconsion, which remains punishable by law.
The urgency of addressing the exploitative kafala system in the Gulf region cannot be overstated. The Gulf Cooperation Council and all associated labor-importing and exporting nations must act urgently to reform this broken system. Under the kafala system, the cycle of human rights abuses and exploitation must be broken through comprehensive policy changes, including regulating private industries, enacting local laws, and prioritizing victim assistance while addressing the root causes of migrant exploitation.
Image source: Mark Dixon