Moving South for care: the political economy of older Swiss people’s search for a better life in Thailand

In this article, I ethnographically explore how the migration of older Swiss people toward retirement facilities in Thailand relates to the contemporary global division of care labor. While my intervention is attentive to both extractive and affective dynamics of caring relations at the micro-level, I argue that this pattern of mobility represents a new mode of neocolonial care labor extraction that emerges amid intensified neoliberalisation. Struggling to afford what they consider a ‘good life’ and adequate eldercare in Switzerland, many Swiss retirees I encountered in Thailand felt compelled to seek socio-economic mobility through spatial mobility toward the Global South. Their lives are not only shaped by desires to be cared for and (in some cases) to care for others, but also by colonial attitudes and ways of living, reflecting broader extractive dynamics. Swiss care dependants’ migration to Thailand allows Switzerland and Swiss people to extract value from the labor of Thai women as the Swiss state saves on public spending, Swiss capitalists generate profits, and Swiss care dependants receive excellent care and other services at a low cost.