Rethinking Unequal Exchange: The Global Integration of Nursing Labour Markets

Rethinking Unequal Exchange traces the structural forces that have created the conditions for the increasing use, production, and circulation of temporary migrant nurses worldwide.

Salimah Valiani explores the political economy of health care of three globally important countries in the importing and exporting of temporary migrant nurses: the Philippines, the world’s largest supplier of temporary migrant nurses; the United States, the world’s largest demander of internationally trained nurses; and Canada, which is both a supplier and a demander of internationally trained nurses. Using a world historical approach, Valiani demonstrates that though nursing and other caring labour is essential to human, social, and economic development, the exploitation of care workers is escalating. Valiani cogently shows how the global integration of nursing labour markets is deepening unequal exchange between the global North and the global South.