Informal labour contracting in Italian countryside: Burkinabe caporali in Puglia and Basilicata, and Panjabi brokers in the Po Valley

Journal title SOCIOLOGIA DEL LAVORO
Author/s Vanessa Azzeruoli, Domenico Perrotta
Publishing Year 2015 Issue 2015/139 Language Italian
Pages 11 P. 83-93 File size 84 KB
DOI 10.3280/SL2015-139007
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This article deals with the figure of the informal labour contractor in the Italian agricultural labour market. By comparing two cases - the Burkinabe caporali in the production of processing tomatoes in Puglia and Basilicata and the Indian Panjabi brokers in the dairy sector in the Po valley - we analyse the relationships among migrants’ social networks, intermediaries and local productive sectors. On the one hand, we describe how these brokers manipulate their social networks in order to gain economic and social capital. On the other hand, we show how Italian migration policies cause a hierarchization of the migrant networks: more than other migrants, the intermediaries are able to accumulate economic and social capital and to achieve a social and geographical mobility. The article is based upon two studies conducted with ethnographic methodologies.

Keywords: Farm labour contracting, migrant network, dairy sector, processing tomato, recruitment

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Vanessa Azzeruoli, Domenico Perrotta, L’intermediazione informale di manodopera nelle campagne italiane: caporali burkinabé in Puglia e Basilicata e mediatori panjabi in Pianura Padana in "SOCIOLOGIA DEL LAVORO " 139/2015, pp 83-93, DOI: 10.3280/SL2015-139007