Sociology Mind 2014. Vol.4, No.1, 15-23 Published Online January 2014 in SciRes (http://www.scirp.org/journal/sm) http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/sm.2014.41002 OPEN ACCESS Community Inhabitants’ Attitudes on the Partitioning of Urban Space Derived from South-Eastern Asian Migrant Workers’ Gathering in Urban Commercial Area—A Case Study on Tainan City, Kaohsiung City and Taichung City in Taiwan Kung-Hung Chen Graduate Institute of Taiwan Culture, National University of Tainan, Taiwan Email: hung@mail.nutn.edu.tw Received October 5th, 2013; revised November 24th, 2013; accepted December 11th, 2013 Copyright © 2014 Kung-Hung Chen. This is an open ac cess article distrib uted und er the Cre ative Co mmons At- tribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. In accordance of the Creative Commons Attribution License all Copyrights © 2014 are reserved f or SCIRP an d the owner of the intell ectu al pro pert y Kung-Hung Chen. All Copyright © 2014 are guarded by law and by SCIRP as a guardian. This study is to explore south-eastern Asian migrant workers’ impacts and their influential factors of ga- thering/consumption activities on divided cities in Tainan City, Kaohsiung City and Taichung City. We will take on an empirical study in the cities’ commercial area or shopping street in three cities. Three ma- jor research methods are applied, including questionnaire survey, participant observation and regression analysis. Data will be obtained from the questionnaire answers of local inhabitants and analysed via SPSS10.3 statistical methods. The main outcomes of this study are as follows: 1) In Tainan City, Kaoh- siung City and Taichung City, we have found that the partitioning of urban space has begun to become. Among this, the outcome of Taichung City is much stronger than that of the two other cities. 2) In the impacts of migrant workers’ gathering on commercial streets, community inhabitants also have more to- lerant attitude than shop keepers. The community inhabitants of Taichung City have more hostile than those of the two other citi es . 3) In comparison of South-eastern Asian migrant workers’ gathering in urban commercial area and its relations between the partitioning of urban space, from the viewpoint of local in- habitants, we have found different influential factors among Tainan City, Kaohsiung City and Taichung City. We can say that these factors will be valid predictable variables on divided cities resulted from mi- grant workers’ gathering/consumption activities in the paper. In the meantime, we can obtain these in- fluential factors among these three cities through two variables: 1) community inhabitants’ socio-eco- nomic attributes and 2) community inhabitants’ responses to migrant workers’ gathering/consumption ac- tivities in commercial area. Basically we can find these influential factors among the paper which are the same as the Netherlands and Singapore, and not the same as Guangzhou, China. Keywords: Gathering of South-Eastern Asian Migrant Workers; Partitioning of Urban Space; Tainan City; Kaohsiung City, Taichung City Introduction According to the statistic data of Bureau of Employment and Vocational Training, from at the end of September, 2011, it is indicated that the total amount of migrant workers in Taiwan and Fukien area is 417,844, including Tainan City with 30,237 people, Kaohsiung city with 30,394 people, and Taichung city with 56,374 people. (These three cities that are mentioned above are after merger upgraded to municipalities). Saskia Sas- sen (1988, 1991, 1996) clearly analyzed in many of her writings how migrant workers, in the era of globalization and economic dynamism, created new global cities and how this kind of large- scale flow of capital and human resources inevitably causes a great impact on residential countries urban spaces. As a series of researches about “Divided Cities” by Peter Marcuse (2002) proposed, it is more obvious to notice that, in the global market economy, the spatial structures which are the spaces for pro- duction, consumption and living are formed by people in dif- ferent economic classes. Thus, the effects on the migrant work- ers versus the spatial development of commercial communi- ties and the changes of the space axis are really interesting and have significant academic meanings for the researches of met- ropolitan spaces. In other foreign countries, the empirical re- searches, which relate to the ideas of “Divided Cities”, are more exuberant and complete, but less direct to the factors of the space division of cities. In Taiwan, most of the empirical re- searches are concerning the distribution of the gatherings and consumption activities of migrant workers in the cities, as well as the aspects of socialized spaces. Thus, to explore from community residents’ points of view, how migrant workers from Southeast Asia’s gathering cause an effect on urban space division is not only the characteristic of this paper, but also the research motivation of this paper.
K.-H. CHEN OPEN ACCESS In this paper, we use the concept called “divided cities”, pro- posed by Peter Marcuse to see how local community residents’ attitude changes and their responses to the inflow of different cultural groups impact on urban space division, and to investi- gate, analyze and interpret how migrant workers’ consumption activities cause an effect on urban community space. We use 3 of Taiwan’s biggest cities, Tainan city, Kaohsiung City and Taichung city as our objects of research, which is also the pur- pose of this study. Literature Revi ew In other countries, the empirical studies about the concept of “divided cities” are richer and more complete, but however, they rarely focus directly on urban space division’s influencing factors’ studies. Therefore, we introduce the cases as following: Netherlands In his paper called “Towards Partitioned Cities in the Neth- erlands” (2002), Ronald van Kempen targeted the changes of patterns of urban space’s segment in a well-developed welfare state—the Netherlands. He found that, in the Netherlands, so called “partitioned cities” have become a more and more ob- vious trend and they have been developing rapidly. Apart from the changing role of the government, the change of economic, population and socio-cultural factors must be taken into account as well (Marcuse & Kempen, 2002). In the Netherlands, me- tropolis of ethnic minorities’, segmentation and concentrated phenomena are very obvious. In recent years, a large number of migrants moved to the Netherlands, and they also entered its labor market to look for jobs, this phenomenon has been con- tinuing to expand, due to the supply and demand imbalance, it leads to the result of persistent structural unemployment. Mi- grants (Especially Turkish and Morocca n) also suffer from this development, many low-skilled migrants must rely on state support in order to survive, more and more phenomena of “par- titioned cities” are resulting from the welfare state’s recession, which leads to the results of social and spatial problems. In short, the factors that made the Netherland’s “partitioned cities” phenomenon so obvious are: the changing role of government, economic, demograph i c, so cio-cultural changes, employment rate and the level of income. Singapore Brenda Yeoh and Shirlena Huang (1998), in the study of housework female migrant workers’ taken in strategies and types in the Singapore’s public space, by viewing the social map of these migrant workers, it can be seen how it has been structured and compromised on public space and investigated how these migrant workers, viewed as margins of society in Singapore built their urban landscape. They found out, in capi- talist, so-called “partitioned cities” reflect more clearly and strengthen the gender division of labor as well as the characte- ristics of daily live experience. It not only presented the space by the traditional patriarchy, but also presented by the space of racial factors and other means of isolation, to expand it. This study indicated that these housework female migrant workers aren’t entirely passive recipients of dominant practice and ideas, in fact, they are capable of taking a variety of different ways and strategies to use and compete the public space. Their research based on public domain’s points of view is based on the following: 1) deprived of space and 2) competition of space, in order to analyze them. The former, use Filipino housework labor’s gathering and all kinds of consumption ac- tivities in the shopping mall—“Lucky Plaza”, as the research’s main focus. The shopping mall—“Lucky Plaza”, has become like “little Manila”. Over the weekend, there are around 2000 Filipino female migrant workers gathering in this area. Thus, the Filipino migrant workers have caused the colonization trend of this public space. Gradually, as for some Singaporeans, “Lu- cky Plaza” has been a “partitioned city”, changing from an “other type of space” to a “hesitant space”. The latter, by the limitations of “other type of space”, the female migrant workers can still make differences by managing their ways of living their daily life, including understanding how to define and use space well, we’ll use this concept as our entry point, in order to analyze the so-called “competitive space”. In short, the influen- cing factors that made Singapore’s “Lucky Plaza” become such an obvious “partitioned city”, included not only a laissez-faire government, but also the tolerance of the community residents, and most importantly, how these Filipino migrant workers used “competitive space” as means to colonize this pubic space. Guangzhou, China Huimin Du and Si-ming Li (2010), have been observing China’s economic reform and the process of urbanization. In recent years, millions of migrant workers came from the coun- tryside to the big cities in China, and they have become an im- portant part of the labor force of the cities, and eventually shaped the so-called “urban villages”. In this development trend, both of them focus on the “urban villages” laborers’ socioeco- nomic background, life satisfaction, living environments etc., to describe the situations in detail, and at the same time use “com- munity satisfaction” and “community contacts” to explore the emotions of these “urban villages” laborer’s emotions about the community. The research findings show that “urban villages” not only pro- vide a place to live, but the laborers of the “urban villages” also use various ways to integrate in the cities. Community senti- ment is mainly based on labor’s cognition on neighborhood environment quality and neighborhood relationships, in addi- tion, the effect of local participation and migrants social net- works also gradually unfolded. Participating in local affairs bring residents a higher level of community satisfaction, how- ever, participating in local affairs doesn’t have a statistically significant difference on degrees of community contact; like- wise, the migrant social network theory can also explain com- munity sentiment, it can fully support community satisfaction, rather than degrees of community contacts. In short, the reasons why Guangzhou, China’s “urban villages” phenomenon seems so similar to “partitioned cities” are mainly because of: good cognition on neighborhood relationships, public participation, migrant social network, etc. But the Netherlands and Singa- pore’s cases’ migrant socio-economic attributes and roles of government are comparably less important. In Taiwan, the empirical researches about the concept of “di- vided cities or partitioned cities” are relatively few. Most of the very few researches are about migrant workers gathering, their consumption activities’ distribution in the urban space and their socialized space field kind of researches. For example: The first paper in Taiwan that studied about migrant worker’s space issue was written by Sheu, Horng-Yih in 2000. It is called “The
K.-H. CHEN OPEN ACCESS use of Space and Its Effect in a Filipino Labor Gathering Area —Christopher Church Area on Chung-Shane North Road”. He saw the migrant workers from an urban point of view, and use “Filipinize” to interpret the Filipino migrant workers impact on Chung-Shan North Road, focusing the study on Filipino mi- grant workers space conflict with the city residents, and finally concluded that the public sector should intervene to control it as a policy recommendation. Wu Bi-nar’s thesis (2003), “Chung- Shan—The Formation of a Filipino Migrant Workers’ Com- munity Space in Taipe i”, basically compared with Sheu, Horng- Yih’s paper, has a better insight on Filipino migrant workers relationship with the space., By gathering around Christopher church area in a common space-time and the entering of sur- rounding shops, Chungshan is where displaced Filipino migrant workers can re-territorialize the space. This space has given rise to richer and more diversely activities, it not only satisfies the Filipino migrant worker’s transnational life needs in Taiwan, it also became Filipino labor community’s leisure, consumption and cultural center. In one of Pei-Chia Lan’s paper (2002) call- ed “A Transnational Topography for the Migration and Identi- fication of Filipino Migrant Domestic Workers”, we found out they perform multiple roles and shifting identities through the front/backstage segregation in social space (working days vs. rest day; home country vs. host country), isolating labor and consumption activities, and the differentiation of temporal ho- rizons (now vs. future) in order to build floating identification. In Chou Cheng-Hung’s thesis called “Migrant labors: a ca talyst for rebuilding urban space”, he found out that migrant workers always appear at a certain time, which alienates the urban space, the ethnic contact, cultural contact and the overlapping use of objects’ process generates a “critical space”, by walking the delicate balance between public, privacy, other people and our- selves. This paper is noteworthy because it has some similari- ties to our research of Qixian 3rd Road, Kaohsiung city’s ob- served phenomenon, thus, it has a higher reference value. Chih-Hung Wang (2006), used “Dis/placed Identification and Politics of Space: The Consumptive Ethnoscape around Tao- yuan Railroad Station” to explore what kinds of social tension and conflicts are derived from the formation of Southeast Asian consumptive ethnoscape around Tao-Yuan railroad station. And how do these tensions and conflicts appear as contention about uses and meanings of space? What the relation between the formation of consumptive ethnoscape and the negotiation is of dis/placed identities, as well as various stores and police control? Such topics are worth being referenced. Chen Kung-Hung’s (2011a-2011c, Chen, 2008) research is different from the pre- vious studies because he advocates: the original existence of the urban business district and its’ surrounding communities’ local community residents and shop owners, their original life style and shop’s mode of operation will change because immigration of different cultural groups, will bring influence and change on its culture and space, their way of presenting changes of lives, culture and space are called the “result” of “transnational space” or “divided space”. Under the concept of “transnational space” or “divided space”, the paper focuses on the attitudes of local community residents and shop owners toward the impacts of immigration of different cultural groups, of urban space parti- tioning and it also explains the degrees of “partitioning of urban space”. It emphasis the main research orientation on “urban bu- siness district’s migrant workers gathering caused partitioning of urban space phenomenon”, it’s an innovative area of re- search, which is worthy of attention. Based on the literature, theories and related researches above, we believe, there are some points in common: 1) Based on the theory of “migrant workers, in the era of globalization and economic dynamism, created a large-scale flow of capital and human resources, they inevitably cause a great impact on residential countries’ urban space”. This is the context that so-called “tra nsnational space” and “space partitio- ning” form, it belongs to global macro kind of driving force. 2) Based on daily life, leisure, shopping and religion needs, migrant workers naturally have to gather in the business dis- tricts and do consumption activities, and their consumption ac- tivities have become urban community space’s “outside invad- er”, “influencer”, this is the reason why the “transnational space” or “space partitioning” is formed. Furthermore, local commu- nity residents living in the business districts as well as sur- rounding communities’ l ocal residents have changed their ways of living and the ways of using the space due to the impacts of immigration of different cultural groups on culture and space. Based on the impact of urban community space, they have be- come migrant worker’s consumption activities’ “local insiders”, “influence”, at the same time, their ways of presenting their changes of life, culture and space are the results of “transna- tional space” or “space partitioning”. 3) In view of the above cases, they’re in fact a ll the same re- gardless of space, which can be the evidence of the “causes” and “results” that were mentioned above. These “causes” and “results” are the research motivations. This paper’s main pur- pose is also based on the concept of “transnational space” or “space partitioning”, to conduct investigations, analysis and in- terpret the feelings of migrant workers’ space usage, the atti- tude of the local community residents toward the impacts of immigration of different cultural groups of urban space parti- tioning, and the influencing factors of migrant workers’ con- sumption activities to the community space. Theoretical Framewo rk According to Figure 1, we can propose some hypotheses of the research as follows. Hypothesis 1: The attitude of the local community residents toward the im- pacts of immigration of different cultural groups of urban space partitioning is an important influencing factor of the level of urban partitioning. Hypothesis 2: Community inhabitants’ socio-economic attributes are im- portant influencing factors of the level of urban partitioning. Figure 1. Theoretical framework. Under the global economy, large-scale flow of migrant workers have made a great impact on resettlement countries-transnational space or space partitioning. The attitude of the local community residents toward the impacts of immigration of different cultural gro ups of urban space partitioningCommunity residents’ basi c socio-economic attributes Explor ing the i nfluenc i ng fact o rs o f migra nt workers ’ gathe r ing t o urban space partitioning from community residents’ viewpoints
K.-H. CHEN OPEN ACCESS Research Methods and Content Research Methods The required information comes from local community resi- dents of Tainan, Kaohsiung, and Taichung City. These mem- bers of the community live around the area where Southeast Asian migrant workers like to gather in the business districts. Designing a questionnaire of “urban business district’s migrant workers’ gathering in urban business districts and the its rela- tions between the partitioning of urban space” (community residents section) as one set, and we’ll go to the commercial area for sampling, in order to study the relations between mi- grant workers’ gathering and the partitioning of urban space. The questionnaire’s content mainly included: 1) The attitude reflection on migrant workers’ weekend gathering and its im- pact of urban space partitioning, and 2) the basic information of the respondents. About data analysis, we use version 10.3 of SPSS as the s tatistic al software to do the statistical analysis. Types of Stores in the Research Areas In Tainan City, the so-called “Indonesian Migrant Worker Street” refers to the shopping streets around Fu-Bei Street/Xi- Hua Street/Bei-Zhong Street. It currently has a total of 43 shops, including 2 Indonesian restaurants, ENCAR, Ming-Yue Viet- namese restaurant, 2 foreign exchange banks, Yi-li Telecom Service Co., Ya-Jiu food store, 3 Thai restaurants, TK store, Charlie Brown restaurant, EEC store; When adding the 12 stores that are owned by local Tainan shop owners, it has a total number of 26 shops. It contains more than half of the total shops which include a tea shop, a supermarket, a telecom com- pany, a cafeteria, complex restaurants, noodle restaurants, a ve- getarian restaurant, the Qiao-Yi kitchen and the Ma-Na restau- rant. They’ve become places where migrant workers (Indone- sian-based) often consume at. The stores mainly opened in 2001 in a total number of 26 stores, and 36 rental stores. In Kaohsiung City, the so-called “Southeast Asian Migrant Worker Street” is mainly around the Kaohsiung Railway Sta- tion and the Kaohsiung port area. It’s where migrant workers like to gather and shop in Kaohsiung City nowdays. The former includes: 1) Jianguo 3rd Road: a total of 117 stores, 2) Zhong- Hua 3rd Road: a total of 100 stores, 3) Qi-Xian 1st Road: a total of 26 shops, 4) Qi-Xian 2nd Road: a total of 88 shops, 5) Ba-De 2rd Road: a total of 82 shops, the latter includes Qi-Xian 3rd Road and Bi-Zhong Street, it has a total of 99 shops, but from the interviews of the bosses, there are around 30 shops that Filipino migrant workers rarely go to. And the rest of the 60 shops’ main c ustomers are Southeast Asian migrant workers, or the shops that Southeast Asian migrant workers often go to. Among them, Qi-Xian 3rd Road has a total of 46 shops, in- cluded 6 shops which owned by Taiwanese boss and hired South- east Asian as employees, they’re Qi-Xian restaurant , Sally mini supermarket, MARINERS eatery, PINOY BISTRO BAR (opened two), and CEBU CITY Korean restaurant; and there are 23 shops on Bi-Zhong Street, including 2 shops owned by Taiwanese bosses which hired Southeast Asian as employees, namely “We llcome” and “Annie’s boracay”. Most of the shops have opened in less than 10 years, and half of them rented the place to open up the stores. So, it can be seen that same as in Tainan City, because of migrant workers gathering and con- sumption in recent years, it’s common for non-local residents to come all the way to Kaohsiung City to open up stores. In Taichung City, it’s mainly around the business district opposite the Taichung Railway Station, includes where the migrant workers like to gather and shop most in Taichung City: Taichung First Square/Lu-Chuan Western Street and two shop- ping streets: Cheng-Kung Road, Chi-Kuang Street: 1) First Square/Lu-Chuan Western Street: They mainly distributed on 1st to 3nd floor, it has a total of around 120 shops, and there are around 1/4 shops owned by foreigners (Mainly from Southeast Asian countries), the types of shops are mainly restaurants, eatery, shopping malls, and telecom service companies, such as “BIG KING Shopping Mall”, “Indah Counter”, “Tai-Luo 77”, Thailand restaurants, “Vinh Ha Long snack bar”, Vietnamese Restaurants, et al.; 2) Cheng-Kung Road: it has a total of 27 shops, and there are around 6 shops owned by foreigners, such as BOSS STORE, the branch of BOSS STORE, Café Batavia, JASON STORE, 3) Chi-Kuang Street: it has a total of 53 shops, and there are around 2 shops owned by foreigners and Viet- namese snack bar . Statistical Respondents and Sample Size The survey respondents are mainly community residents. In Tainan City, the communities around Fu-Bei Street/Xi-Hua Street/Bei-Zhong Street have a total number of about 380 households, using household as a sampling unit, it has 100 ef- fective samples and thus the sampling ratio is 26.3%. In Kaoh- siung City, the “Southeast Asian Migrant Worker Stree” con- tains 6 migrant worker streets, which have a total number of about 1150 households. Using household as a sampling unit, it has 421 effective samples which results into a sampling ratio of 36.6%. In Taichung City, the “Migrant Worker Street” is around the business district, on the opposite of the Taichung Railway Station, including Taichung First Square/Lu-Chuan Western Street and two shopping streets: Cheng-Kung Road, Chi-Kuang Street, which has a total number of about 1200 households. Using household as a sampling unit, it has 400 effective samples which results into a sampling ratio of 33.3%. Discussion of Survey Results Discussions about the Regression Analysis of Influencing Factors of Migrant Workers’ Strong Movement towards Urban Spaces Are Partitioning 1) A. Tainan City Seeing from Table 1 and the overall regression model, the overall regression model has an explanatory power (F = 1.968, P < .05), it can effectively explain why migrant workers have 39.9% variance as positive impact on consumption activities. Among all these, residence time has reached statistically signi- ficance; it’s an effective forecasting variable, because β is neg- ative. It shows that the longer the residents live in the commun- ities, the less they think migrant workers have positive impact on consumption activities. Moreover, for respondents that work in agriculture, forestry, fishery, and animal husbandry field, it has also reached a statistically significance. It indicates that comparing people who are working in agriculture, forestry, fishery, and animal husbandry field with middle class people, people who work in those fields tend to think that migrant workers have better positive impacts on consumption activities. At the same time, the standardized regression equation is as following: Y = −.053 Gender (male ) + .201 Age + .221 Educat iona l Level
K.-H. CHEN OPEN ACCESS Table 1. Regression coefficient table. Predictor Standardized Regression Coefficient β t Significance (Constant) 4.154 .000 Gender (male) −.053 −.466 .643 Age .201 1.360 .178 Education al Level .221 1.761 .082 Residence Time −.246 −2.056 .043* Monthly Salary .167 1.516 .134 Family Structure −.073 −.659 .512 Marriage (unmarried) .058 .435 .665 Marriage (divorced) .107 .992 .324 Religion (Catholic) −.122 −1.140 .258 Religion (Christian) −.147 −1.339 .185 Religion (Taoism) .134 1.193 .237 Religion (Other) .058 .553 .582 Activity time (noon) .114 .792 .431 Activity time (evening) −.168 −1.225 .225 Activity time (other) −.235 −1.747 .085 Contact time with the migrant workers (weekends or holiday) −.039 −.267 .790 Contact time with the migrant workers (other) −.028 −.193 .847 Occupations (agriculture, forestry, f i shery, animal husbandry) .290 2.875 .005** Occupations (industries) −.056 −.468 .641 Occupations (low-level of white-collar office labors and low-level military personnel) .027 .255 .799 Occupations (high-leve l of white -collar labors, middle class) .028 .240 .811 Occupations (homemaker) −.031 −.253 .801 Occupation (none) .025 .202 .840 Occupation (other) .108 .857 .394 Social-identity from community residents to migrant workers .011 .107 .915 Note: The dependent variable Y is the total score of migrant workers positive impacts on commercial activities. + −.246 Residence Time + .167 monthly salary + −.073 Family Structure, .058 Marriage (Unmarried) + .107 Marriage (Di- vorced) + −.122 Religion (Catholic) + −.147 Religion (Chris- tian) + .134 Religion (Taoism) + .058 Religion (Other) + .114 Activity time (noon) + −.168 Activity time (evening), −.235 Activity time (other) + −.039 Contact time with the migrant workers (weekends or holiday) + −.028 Contact time with the migrant workers (other) + .290 Occupations (agriculture, fo- restry, fishery, animal husbandry) + −.056 Occupations (indus- tries) + .027 Occupations (low-level of white-collar office la- bors and low-level military personnel) +.028 Occupations (high- level of white-collar labors, middle class) + −.031 Occupations (homemaker) +.025 Occupations (none) + .108 Occupations (other) + .011 Social-identity from community residents to mi- grant workers. 2) Kaohsiung City Examining Table 2 and the overall regression model, you can see that the overall regression model has an explanatory power (F = 1.812, P < .01), it can effectively explain why mi- grant workers have 12.2% variance on positive impact on con- sumption activities. Amongst all these, Religion (Islam)’s β = −.109, (t = −2.241, p < .05) has reached statistically signific- ance, it’s an effective forecasting variable, because β is nega- tive, it shows that non-Muslim residents think migrant workers’ gathering makes urban space partitioning more serious. More- over, marriage (Divorced)’s β = −.117, (t = −2.363, p < .05) has also reached a statistically significance. It indicates that non- divorced residents tend to think migrant workers’ gathering makes urban space partitioning more serious. And as for the reason why “Married residents have lower degree of satisfac- tion to community spatial links” we can find explanations from resident’s marriage status and their current family structure. According to the surveyed residents, the proportion of married people is much higher than unmarried and divorced people, because married couples with kids, married couples with kids plus the parents, four generations of families… all these above in total make the proportion higher than others, considering the cultural and spatial impacts due to immigration of different cultural groups, people have to consider the negative impacts that family members will possibly encounter. Usually married people tend to tolerate the situation and even accept it. In other words, it creates a lower degree of satisfaction to community spatial links, and they tend to think it can make urban space partitioning more serious. In the end, residents attitude on mi- grant workers’ β = .121, (t = 2.444, p < .05) has reached a sta- tistically significance, so it's an effective forecasting variable. It indicates the more positive attitude of residents towards migrant workers gathering, the easier they think it leads to urban space partitioning. At the same time, the standardized regression equation is as follows: Y = −.070 Gender + −.149 Age + −.021 Educational Level + −.027 Monthly Salary + −.013 Family Structure, + .043 with or without Migrant Maids Marriage + −.069 Religion (Catholic) + −.041 Religion (Christian) + .002 Religion (Buddhism) + −.109 Religion (Islam) + −.038 Re ligion (Other) + −.026 Occupations (agriculture, forestry, fishery, animal husbandry) + −.027 Oc- cupations (industries) + .028 Occupations (low-level of white- collar office labors and low-level military personnel) + −.019 Occupations (high-level of white-collar labors, middle class, high-end military personnel) + −.005 Occupations (Bourgeois, freelancers) + .011 Occupations (big capitalists) + −.021 Occu- pations (homemaker) + .048 Occupations (none) + −.012 Mar- riage (Unmarried) + −.117 Marriage (Divorced) + −.060 Activ- ity time (morning) + .077 Activity time (noon) + −.006 Activity time (afternoon) + −.047 Activity time (midnight) + −.100 Contact time (morning) + .002 Contact time (Noon) + .015 Contact time (Afternoon) + −.009 Activity time (midnight) + .121 Community residents’ attitude on migrant workers. 3) Taichung City
K.-H. CHEN OPEN ACCESS Table 2. Regression coefficient table. Predictor Standardized regression coefficient β t Significance (Constant) 11.098 .000 Gender −.070 −1.268 .206 Age −.149 −1.967 .050 Education al Level −.021 −.390 .697 Monthly Salary −.027 −.460 .646 Family Structure −.013 −.219 .827 With or Without Migrant Maids .043 .848 .397 Religion (Catholic) −.069 −1.351 .178 Religion (Christian) −.041 −.781 .435 Religion (Buddhism) .002 .037 .970 Religion (Islam) −.109 −2.241 .026* Religion (Other) −.038 −.707 .480 Occupations (agriculture, forestry, fishery, a ni mal husbandry) −.026 −.495 .621 Occupations (industries) −.027 −.430 .667 Occupations (low-level of white-collar office labors and low-level military personnel) .028 .494 .621 Occupations (high-level of white-collar labors, middle class, high-end military personnel) −.019 −.308 .759 Occupations (Bourgeois, freelancers) −.005 −.072 .943 Occupations (big capitalists) .011 .222 .824 Occupations (homemaker) −.021 −.339 .734 Occupations (none) .048 .807 .420 Marriage (unmarried) −.012 −.147 .883 Marriage (divorced) −.117 −2.363 .019* Activity Time (Morning) −.060 −1.028 .305 Activity Time (noon) .077 1.333 .183 Activity Time (Afternoon) −.006 −.095 .925 Activity Time (Midnight) −.047 −.831 .407 Contact Time (Morning) −.100 −1.795 .073 Contact Time (Noon) .002 .037 .970 Contact Time (Afternoon) −.015 .236 .814 Contact Time (Midnight) −.009 −.156 .876 Community r esidents’ attitude on migrant workers .121 2.444 .015* Note: The dependent variable Y is the total score of urban space partitioning. (Please name Y on your own). Seeing from Table 3 and the overall regression model, the overall regression model has an explanatory power (F = 6.437, P < .001), it can effectively explain why migrant workers have 37.3% variance as migrant workers’ impact on urban space partitioning. Among all these, industrial labors’ β = −.162, (t = −3.147, p < .01) have reached a statistically significance, thus it’s an effective forecasting variable. β being negative indicates that non-industrial Labors think migrant workers’ consumption gathering makes a great impact on urban space partitioning. Bourgeois/freelancers’ β = −.181, (t = −2.939, p < .01) have reached a statistically significance, thus, it indicates that people who aren’t bourgeois/freelancers tend to think migrant workers’ consumption gathering makes urban space partitioning easier. Jobless people’s β = −.125, (t = −2.234, p < .05) has reached a statistically significance, thus, it indicated residents who have jobs think migrant workers’ consumption gathering makes ur- ban space partitioning easier. We can find the explanation of the results from community residents’ jobs: low-level of white- collar office labors, high-level of white-collar office labors, housekeepers and other jobs, these 4 types of jobs fields have a total of 48.2% in the communities. It’s the composition of the bottom, and they have more direct feelings on changes of daily life. So, they think migrant workers’ consumption gathering makes urban space partitioning easier. Additionally, the com- munity residents think the phenomenon has brought changes on its cultural basis, which has reached a statistically significance, thus, it’s an effective forecasting variable, β = .276, (t = 4.960, p < .001). Because β is positive, it indicates that the community residents think the phenomenon has brought changes on its cultural basis, at the same time, it also makes urban space parti- tioning easier. The community residents who think the pheno- menon has brought changes on its activity events is β = .344, (t = 5.168, p < .001). Since β is positive, it indicates that commu- nity residents think things that make changes on activity events, at the same time, also makes urban space partitioning easier. As a result we can see from community resident’s attitude reflec- tions, migrant workers’ cultural impacts and the impacts on activities, as for urban space partitioning, it’s an effective fore- casting variable, so the findings are noteworthy. At the same time, the standardized regression equation is as following: Y = .001 Gender + .121 Age + (−.067) Educational Level + (−.016) Religion (Catholic) + (−.079) Religion (Christian) + .023 Religion (Buddhism) + .023 Religion (Taoism) + (−.033) Religion (Islam) + (−.076) Occupations (agriculture, forestry, fishery, animal husbandry) + (−.162) Occupations (industries) + (−.020) Occupations (low-level of white-collar office labors and low-level military personnel) + (−.097) Occupations (high- level of white-collar labors, middle class, high-end military personnel) + (−.181) Occupations (Bourgeois, freelancers) + .076 Occupations (big capitalists) + (−.033) Occupations (homemaker) + (−.125) Occupations (none) + (−.091) Marriage (Unmarried) + (−.172) Marriage (Married) + .082 Monthly Salary + (−.088) Family Structure + (−.056) With or Without Migrant Maids + .010 Activity Time + .036 Contact Time + .037 X1 + .276 X2 (cultural changes) + .033 X3 + .11 X4 + .344 X5 (changes on activities). Tainan Ci t y , K a oh siung City and Taichung City’s Influencing Factor’s Comparison and E xplanati on As we can see from Table 4, in the resident’s point of view,
K.-H. CHEN OPEN ACCESS Table 3. Regression coefficient table. Predictor Standardized Regression Coefficient β t Significance Gender .001 .024 .981 Age .121 1.600 .111 Education al Level −.067 −1.182 .238 Religion (Catholic) −.016 −.347 .729 Religion (Christian) −.079 −1.517 .130 Religion (Buddhism) .023 .391 .696 Religion (Taoism) .023 .417 .677 Religion (Islam) −.033 −.712 .477 Occupations (agriculture, forestry, fishery, a ni mal husbandry) −.076 −1.613 .108 Occupations (industries) −.162 −3.147 .002** Occupations (low-level of white-collar office labors and low-level military personnel) −.020 −.357 .721 Occupations (high-level of white-collar labors, middle class, high-end military personnel ) −.097 −1.608 .109 Occupations (Bourgeois, freelancers) −.181 −2.939 .004** Occupations (big capitalists) .076 1.561 .120 Occupations (homemaker) −.033 −.564 .573 Occupations (none) −.125 −2.234 .026* Marriage (unmarried) −.091 −.648 .517 Marriage (married −.172 −1.298 .195 Personal Month ly Sal ar y .082 1.504 .134 Family Structure −.088 −1.747 .082 With or Without Migrant Maids −.056 −1.187 .236 Activity time .010 .208 .835 Contact time .036 .744 .457 X1’s changes on population .037 .752 .453 X2’s changes on culture .276 4.960 .000*** X3’s changes on spatial function .033 .583 .560 X4’s changes on socioecon omic status .011 .164 .870 X5’s changes on activities .344 5.168 .000*** *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001, Y: The dependent variable. the influencing factors between Southeast Asian migrant work- ers’ gathering in the business district and urban cities differ. Furthermore we can see that Tainan City, Kaohsiung City and Taichung City all have obvious differences on the impact va- riables. The reasons are as mentioned above in the first para- graph (Section 5. 1). The Results of the Study’s Dialogue with Existing Theoretical Research The survey’s responder’s are Filipino and Indonesian tran- sient migrant workers. It’s quite different from Peter Marcuse’s (2002) study which focuses on how the “Ghetto” area in the US formed “divided cities”; and Ronald van Kempen (2002) in the Netherlands, using “segregation index, SI” “to prove so-called partitioned cities” have become more obvious with time and have developed rapidly. Comparing it with our research method, it is completely different. Even though this survey didn’t use the “segregation index, SI” to prove the degree of urban space partitioning in Tainan City, Kaohsiung City and Taichung City, it still has similarities with Brenda Yeoh and Shirlena Huang’s (1998) studies about the subjects, which are strategies and types thereof of housework female migrant worker in public spaces in Singapore and it is found that the phenomena of “divided cities” −especially for the gathering and all kinds of consumption ac- tivities in shopping malls like “Lucky Plaza”. As for some Sin- gaporeans, “Lucky Plaza” has been a “divided city”, changing from an “other type of space” to a “hesitant space”. I, as the author of this paper, speculate that, when more and more mi- grant workers gather in the research areas in the future, and community residents have lower links of satisfaction on cultural and spatial influences, then the citizens of these three cities in Taiwan will also view those areas as “divided cities”. Thus, it proves Ronald van Kempen’s (2002) studies’ notion on “social polarization and urban space partitioning” is correct, including 1) The growing influence of ethnic groups, race and migration, 2) Exclusive of race and class. These two factors can fully de- scribe the “divided cities” phenomena in these three cities. Basically, the influencing factors of these three cities’ Southeast migrant workers’ gathering to urban space partition- ing, have some factors in common as in the Netherlands and Singapore, which include: The Netherland’s economics, popu- lation and changes in the socio-cultural factors; Singaporean government’s laissez-faire attitude as the role of the govern- ment, the tolerance of the community residents and shops, but however, it doesn’t have common factors as in Guangzhou, China. If we try to interpret the “de-territorialization” and “re- territorialization” points of views to describe the relation be- tween transnational migration and local spaces, according to the survey’s results, the same thing happened which was written in Wu Bi-nar’s (2003) thesis. In Chung Shan’s research results— displaced Filipino migrant workers used the entering of Chris- topher church and its surrounding shops to re-territorialize the space. And, as in Pei-Chia Lan’s paper (2002), we found out Filipina housework migrant workers perform multiple roles and shifting identities through the front/backstage segregation in social space (working days vs. rest day; home country vs. host country), isolating labor and consumption activities, and the differentiation of temporal horizons (now vs. future) in order to build floating identification. Based on the results of these two research papers, the research of this paper added two more viewpoints: under the concepts of “transnational space” or “space partitioning”, we focused on the attitudes of local com- munity residents toward the impact of immigration of different
K.-H. CHEN OPEN ACCESS Table 4. The attitudes of community residents in Tainan City, Kaohsiung City and Taichung City toward migrant workers’ gathering in the business districts to urban space partitioning and comparison am ong the influencing factors. Tainan Cit y Kaohsiung Ci ty Taichun g City Impact variables 1) Short residence time 2) First level of occupational background 1) Non-Muslim 2) Non-divorced 3) Attitudes of residents toward migrant wor kers 1) Non-industrial labors 2) Non-Bourgeois 3) Non-freelancers 4) Labors 5) Thinking changes of culture exist. 6) Thinking changes of activities e xi st . cultural groups, in order to describe the “degree of urban space partitioning” better, and at the same time, observing from the local residents points of view, we can explore the influencing factors between Southeast Asian migrant workers’ gathering to urban space partitioning. Psychological Explanations Represent ational Space and Third Space Theory We also can interpret these consumption patterns and the partitioning of urban space derived from migrant workers’ ga- thering in urban commercial areas from the viewpoint of “re- presentational space of migrant workers in other homeland (Taiwan)”. For migrant workers, Taiwan acts as a relative loca- tion, not only in a geographic space of map but also in a social space. Taiwan has been a subject as compared to “other” (mi- grant workers). In other words, dining room acts as a space “the family take a dinner together”—that is “representation of space” called by Lefebvre also is “second space” called by Soja. This space is not existent for migrant workers. Therefore, “represen- tational space” acts as a bridge linking social life with art and imaginary, has been a struggling space to strive for freedom and disarm. Soja think that “third space” by Lefebvre (1991) has strengthened “governance”, “obedience” and “resistance” and he call it “thirds pace” (1996). This is reason why migrant workers usually favored excursion, shopping out and dining out with their friends on weekend. Because they can compete for dignity and human rights via “third space”. Migrant Network The result of this research has to be a dialog with the con- sumption theory, has to extend to all consumption theories, then attempt to create a new consumption theory. From the expe- rience of this research we can discover, through Philippine, Thai, Indonesian, Vietnamese nationality labourers in Tainan county, Tainan city, Kao-hsiung county, Kao-hsiung city com- mercial district or shopping street’s consumption patterns creat- ed innovative consumption theory, has to excede Veblen or Simmel’s classificational determining consumption viewpoint, neither using Bourdieu stated habitual (habitus) or distinction causing consumption. Rather using Massey’s “migrant network” (1996) stand, or Erickson (1996) proposed “network variety”, “cultural variety”. To create a migrant network, consumption is a very important system, through different consumption events, the whole network becomes operated, in the whole migration process framework, “class” will influence “consumption” and “network”, in the meantime consumption and network also mu- tually influence each other, the relationship between the three is just like above. Just like this research discovers, the four countries labourers are looking forward to have cell-phone, because they are yearn- ing for “language intimacy”, a familiar language can have a kind of emotionally relieving effect, also can be a helping me- dia in the migrant network to individually get acquainted with Taiwan’s unfamiliar environment. In the aspect of “Consump- tion in a specific store”, except for the Vietnamese, the Philip- pine, the Thai and the Indonesian labourers all generally have their specific consumptional behaviour. The Philippine labour- ers prefer to consume in [shopping mall], [sport-dress store], [department store], the Thai labourers usually like to choose [Thailand store], [supermarket], [communication/cell phone store], and the Indonesian labourers also usually like to choose [Indonesian store]. There have been influenced by their mother nations’ socio-economic and cultural context, traditional con- sumer s’ habits, consumption ability and unique lifestyle and so on. For example, under Western/colonial education and consu- merism, the Philippine labourers are used to patronize mod- ern/western-style commercial facilities. Beca use the national ity of collective life and dinning-in-home, the Thai and the Indo- nesian labourers are used to patronize the stores which selling homeland commodity. If we explain the differences between the Philippine, the Thai and the Indonesian labourers and the Vietnamese, we can say that when compared to the Vietnamese, the former three have needs to establish their social network and have adequate migrant network. From the interviewee’s answer, we know the Vietnamese have not strong need to meet and chat with their friends. And they consider few Vietnamese store are less than Thai or Indonesian store on shopping streets in Taiwan. Featherstone (1991) had the same point of view, thinking in the modern world class-based consumption’s influ- ence gets less and less determining, there are more and more facts to confer consumption behaviour, including gender, race, religion, country, migrant network, human relationships, ethnic identity, etc. Limitations of This Research Although we are going to trace back the research to the ini- tial theoretical framework: “The era of globalization and eco- nomic dynamism, has created a large-scale flow of migrant workers, it has made a great impact on the urban space in the residential countries—transnational space and partitioning space”. By thinking of this theoretical framework, We found out, that the result of this research not only can provide expla- natory arguments in the theoretical framework of “global in- dustrial movements—migrant workers gathering and preference choice of space-cross-cultural diversity—the transformation of local consumption spaces—the segmentation of the functions of urban space—the restructuring process of local space”, but it can also be used as a foothold in order to develop more values
K.-H. CHEN OPEN ACCESS of academic research. Especially the induced outcomes of di- vided space in the three city’s spatial structure, not be consi- dered in this paper. This is the limitation of the paper. Conclusion The following points are the outcomes of this paper: 1) The activity spaces of local residents show that a signifi- cant segregation of migrant workers activity spaces, the so-call- ed “independent, divided space” has obviously taken shape. The result is a common phenomenon of Tainan City, Kaohsi- ung City and Taichung City. However, Taichung City’s propor- tion of this has a higher percentage than that in Tainan City and Kaohsiung City, which is a major discovery of this paper. 2) In Tainan City and Kaohsiung City, community residents have more tolerant attitudes towards the negative impacts of migrant workers gathering in the shopping streets. Comparing the community residents’ attitude in Taichung City with Tainan City and Kaohsiung City, their attitudes to migrant workers’ gathering are relatively unfriendly. They seem to have a more intense opinion in this issue, and thus they are l ess friendly and hospitable. 3) The influencing factors’ comparison of Southeast Asian migrant workers’ gathering in the business districts to urban space partitioning, in regard to community residents, Tainan City, Kaohsiung City and Taichung City all have significant differences. They’re all effective forecasting variables which are worthy of attention. Thus we can make the important con- clusions that: in community residents’ points of view, we can look for residents’ opinions from different socio-economic back- grounds, and their attitude toward migrant workers’ gathering in the business district to find the influencing factors of South- east Asian migrant workers’ gathering to urban space partition- ing. 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