Empowerment as a pre-requisite to managing and influencing health in the workplace: The sexual and reproductive health needs of factory women migrant workers in Malaysia

Abstract

Malaysia is a major importer of migrant labour within the ASEAN region, and migration has adverse implications for the sexual and reproductive health (SRH) of women migrant workers. Given the centrality of the workplace to the lives of such women, this article reports a qualitative analysis of interview data with women migrant workers ( N = 14) and wider stakeholders ( N = 10) and considers the extent to which they are able to effect change in workplace SRH policy and practice. Informed by Jo Rowlands’ typology of power and model of empowerment, the analysis considers the extent to which normative expectations of process and collective mobilisation upon which feminist empowerment models are predicated operate in such contexts, and discusses the implications of the findings for research to advance workplace democracy.