The Construction of Labor Immigration - A post-structural policy analysis in a Swedish context

Abstract: The purpose of the thesis is to investigate the meaning and knowledge production on labor immigration in a Swedish governmental context. This examination is done through a post-structural policy analysis focusing on understanding the discoursive construction of labor immigration and the labor immigrant is the thesis done with Carol Bacchi’s method of analysis named ”What’s the problem represented to be?”. The object for analysis is the official government report “Labor immigration to Sweden: population trends, labor market change, international outlook”, also known as SOU 2005:50. The term governmentality is used to understand the advanced exercise of power taking place. Labor immigration is represented to be a solution for Sweden’s changing demography and a fragile, double edged issue that needs to be controlled. The Swedish perspective is given and left un-debated. The problem representation has wide effects such as the understanding of the labor immigrant as a commodity