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Work and Freedom All over the world, in factories and in their garages and living rooms hundreds of thousands of workers piece together clothing for the global fashion market. For little more than $2 an hour they fashion clothes that will bear the labels of Just Jeans and Sussan, Mooks, Cue and Nike. In some parts of the world, hundreds of thousands of people flee famine, war and terror. They place their last hopes for a life without fear in the leaky boats that bear them to new shores. They endure detention and isolation, only to be released with ‘temporary protection’. Others, who manage to avoid capture, are forced to live without visas as ‘illegals’. With few rights, and fewer options, many of them are forced to work in jobs with low pay and long hours. This is the paradox of neoliberalism. Money and trade are free to move across nation state borders, and yet people are not. Borders are porous for money and those with money, yet impenetrable for those without. Every day trillions of dollars move from one place to another across the seemingly invisible borders between nations. The mobility of capital and free trade creates an environment of the global competition, allowing companies to move from country to country seeking the lowest labour costs and highest profit margins. Outwork is the frightening face of this competition. By shedding the costs of maintaining factories, and forcing workers to compete with one another for work, clothing producers drive down the costs of garment production simultaneously maximising their profit margins. And despite this free movement of capital, the movement of people is tightly policed. Border surveillance is increasingly militarised; naval ships patrol the oceans around Australia, firing weapons over the boughs of ships forcing them to retreat into international waters. The existence of borders results in a class of people labelled ‘illegal’. People who have moved seeking a better life are stigmatised as ‘illegals’ on arrival, without rights, non persons. Most are forced into work with low pay and long hours, but their ‘illegal’ status and the threat of further detention or deportation leave them unable to challenge their conditions. By assigning people criminal status, borders facilitate the extraction of cheap labour. For those who do have legal residency status, the borders are of a different nature. Race and class discrimination leave many workers trapped in vulnerable and currently unregulated working conditions, without the choice to move into different work or secure further training. The struggle for freedom of movement – for unrestricted and decriminalised movement – is part of the struggle against dehumanising and oppressive work. Workers, refugees, those fleeing persecution, and those who survive punishment for crossing an imaginary line are part of the same struggle for real freedom. No One Is Illegal |