A Look at Asian American Studies - Emery McKee - Ryan Caragher - Emma Rohrer - Gabe Velazquez

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In Rodriguez’s text, the Philippines is painted as a hub for global enterprise, a supplier of global labor, and neoliberalism. What does all of this mean? To start, a global enterprise is an entity that functions throughout the world. In the case of the Philippines, what we see is the leaders of the country have begun to advertise and sell their country as a land full of hard-working laborers to other nations, such as the United States. This then goes into the country being a supplier of global labor. As president Arroyo set the precedent for, the Philippines could sell strong labor to any part of the world. This would allow the country itself to be of service to other countries, while limiting the spending on labor that would occur in the Philippines if citizens were to only be employed back home. Furthermore, this moves us into the neoliberal strategy that has been implemented in the country by the nation’s leadership. Neoliberalism is the concept that policies should incentivise free market trade, shift the country away from welfare plans, and deregulate capital markets. By outsourcing your own citizens to other countries for work, these neoliberal goals can be accomplished, and today, the Philippines continues to engage in this methodology. As a result of these complex processes, Filipinos have had their perception of nationalism altered. It is now patriotic to leave your country to provide for your family and ultimately, this mentality still prevails to this day.

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