1. Modes de vie transnationaux: Mobilité accrue et ménages à double carrière Irene Hardill The Nottingham Trent University E-mail: Irene.Hardill@ntu.ac.ukIrene.Hardill@ntu.ac.uk

2. Introduction In this paper I link transnationalism with writings on the new economy I focus on the production and reproduction of daily life amongst heterosexual dual career transnational households I use case studies of dual career transnational households living in Canada, USA and UK I look at transnationalism ‘from below’ – from the level of the household Linking home and workplace in study of production and reproduction of daily life, economic and non economic factors

3. Juggling work and home in the new economy: work Careers, transnationalism, changing household forms and cultural capital Career – for managers and professions – job progress, a career ‘ladder’, upward social mobility Women have tended to have ‘discontinuous’ careers, ‘trailing spouse’ Anglo-American capitalism – changed employment relations, deregulation, non-standard employment contracts, performance targets, insecurity Transnational households – the new reality is space-time compression aspect of the new economy Transmigrant, ‘lived experience transcends boundaries of nation states’ embracing sending and receiving country

4. Juggling work and home in the new economy: home Family arrangements changing: more fluid Greater lifestyle choice but the most common household form remains heterosexual couple Living together as a couple is about ‘sacrifice’, ‘common interests’, couples with two jobs, A problem arises when one partner gets a job abroad – can result in complex living arrangements: - Commuter couple – both partners jobs in different countries - Astronaut families: children and one partner one country, other partner in different country

5. Empirical surveys of dual career households Empirical research conducted with dual career couples living and working in the UK, Canada, USA Qualitative study In-depth interviews with households who have jobs in management and/or the professions (1) Explore reasons for transnational living, both the spheres of production and reproduction (2) Examine the ways in which transnational living and working impacts on the production and reproduction of the lives of the household – the couple and the children (if any).

6. I use 7 of the total 32 households from the study Bill and Betty (UK) engineer, Saudi Arabia Jenny (40) and Peter (36) (UK) he works for oil company, lived in Saudi Arabia then Netherlands Jane (a food technologist) and Mark (a sales representative) (UK), turned down job abroad. Hela (born eastern Europe) and Teddie (born US) are in their late 40s. She moved to USA for a PhD Tania (33) and Olav, lived Eastern Europe, academics. She was a Fulbright scholar. Ranji and Monder, 40 years, migrated from India to Canada, “for the children”. Solomon and Sandy, 50s, he works for oil company, she remains in the UK with the children, he went back to west Africa.

7. Transnational working and living Transnational working – variable experience, diverse settings The decision to make a move can be the result of economic factors (career of one partner) But also noneconomic factors (family contacts, education benefits, dislike previous residence) Couples adopt complex living arrangements

8. One partner is offered work abroad … number of options: Turning down job - often results in negative career consequences for the partner; Finding partner a job in the new country; Finding partner a position in the same region of the world, thus becoming a commuting couple; Partner remains at home in his/her current position, thus becoming a commuting couple; Partner takes a sabbatical, a career break that allows him/her to accompany his/her partner.

9. The ‘expatriate’ bubble: Middle East Bill and Betty – 2 two years ‘dual location’, and then Betty joined Bill in the Middle East where their son was born. Betty could not obtain a work permit, and not allowed to drive a car Jenny and Peter described compounds in the Middle East, “you call it a camp, but in fact its just like a housing estate … a lot of domestic help”. Jenny moving from country to country means that, “you are having to change values all the time … [when] you’re a real expatriate … you all stick together like glue and lots of English is spoken’

10. The commuter couple Peter, Jenny and the children all relocated to the Netherlands, but Jenny became very unhappy. She lives in the UK, with the children and Peter in the Netherlands, “he works in The Netherlands, comes back on a Friday and goes back on a Monday... we have four or five airports within striking distance”. Jenny, “since we have been married we have been all over the place... it gets to the stage where nowhere feels like home and you feel very much subject to what the company wants to do all the time”.

11. The refusal of transnational work Jane and Mark, he worked for a multi-national, “I had been doing the job for about a year … they wanted to restructure … which meant the area I was looking after was going to be handled from Amsterdam, The Netherlands”. They asked me to relocate to The Netherlands immediately but said “no” when Mark asked about paid flights home at a weekend: “I wouldn’t have seen Jane for three months. He left the company.

12. The acquisition of cultural capital through transnational education International higher education market is estimated to be worth £1.5 billion to the UK economy 1996-7, the USA 458,000 overseas students (68 per cent of the global market), the UK 198,000 (17 per cent), Australia 63,000 (10 per cent) and Canada 34,000 (5 per cent) (Tysome, 1999:8) One couple moved from India to Canada for the education (and future upward social mobility) of their children. Their careers suffered downward occupational mobility as a ‘trade off’ to give their children access to the education system of their host country. Their children will build their careers in the host country, as she said, “ there is no turning back”.

13. The acquisition of cultural capital through transnational education 2 Hela migrated from eastern Europe to the US. Her education began in eastern Europe, where she gained her first two degrees, “It had to be an English speaking country. My French was good but my English was a bit better”. Tania (33) is an academic married to Olav, a fellow eastern European academic. She went to the USA as a Fulbright scholar – short period of research in the USA. “For me it wasn’t difficult. I have knowledge of English. Acquisition of qualifications are important but so is knowledge of English, or French in the Francophone world.

14. Astronaut families and parachute children Study in Canada by Johanna Walters - migration to Vancouver from Hong Kong and Taiwan, Key factors - Canadian passport, accumulation of other forms of capital, critical importance was ‘education’. Solomon and Sandy, - he was posted back home to West Africa and they made the decision to keep their children in the British education system, “to give them the best”, They thus live as a commuter couple. Solomon travels to the UK for Christmas, while Sandy and the children spend the long summer vacation in West Africa.

15. Conclusion In this paper I have used household biographies for a privileged group of households, dual career households Transnational living is the result of career-related decisions on the part of one partner, the pursuit of economic gain, Non-economic factors, augmenting their own or their children’s cultural and social capital can also result in households having a transnational dimension. Complex living arrangements include household members living in both the sending and receiving country. Some households made the difficult decision of declining an assignment abroad

16. Conclusion 2 Some authors explore the impact of globalisation on class (Antonopoulou 2000). Breen and Rottman (1998) a “new international middle class” is challenging existing notions of class. The national state usually the geographical unit for class analysis. Emergence of a privileged and mobile transnational capitalist class, skilled professionals and entrepreneurs with capital, who can purchase immigration and citizen status. New class whose status symbols, interests and lifestyles are broadly similar (Mitchell 1993). Business immigration programmes are symbolic - its cosmopolitan belief that anything can be purchased, including citizenship (Harrison 1996:18).