Osman Balkan provides an incisive and generous read of Patterns of Exploitation. I identify three main critiques he presents in his review and address them in turn. First, he queried the positive legal framework that I adopted in the book, inviting me to consider critical legal approaches that acknowledge the ways in which laws are socially constructed, rather than merely taking the laws themselves on face value. As I acknowledge in my accompanying article to this book “What is exploitation and abuse?” (see Boucher, Anne. 2021. “What is exploitation and workplace abuse? A classification schema to understand exploitative workplace behaviour towards migrant workers,” New Political Economy 27(4)), while critical perspectives on labor law (including Marxian perspectives) can be useful in understanding its embeddedness within capitalist systems, they are less useful in differentiating between varying types of exploitation and abuse, as their focus is mostly economic in nature.

In contrast, I provide an examination of 79 variables, including indices such as race and gender discrimination, which may not have an economic component, but which nonetheless have considerable impact upon individuals. My selection of a positivist framework permits comparison across exploitation type, country and migrant visa, and in some instances, across time—allowing for an empirically robust comparative instrument. I certainly agree that critical exposition of labor law is important, and perhaps this figures most in the area of law reform, as we have seen in recent years in Australia with worker protective changes to the Fair Work Act (2009) and the Migration Act (1958). Yet, I was unable to develop a comparative method that both allowed for deep empirical comparison and, at the same time, was critical of that comparison’s very basis.

Second, Balkan provides the provocation regarding undocumented migration on how we might usefully collected data on undocumented populations who at the same time are unwilling or fearful of having their identity revealed due to reprisal or even deportation by governments. Naturally, this issue adopts heightened salience at present in the United States. I agree that this is an essential challenge for governments and likely, therefore, is part of the reason that the court cases as a chosen empirical tool underestimate the level of exploitation in the selected countries, especially the United States. At the same time, it is also true that governments are developing new ways to protect these populations labor rights, such as not asking visa information when providing labor advice, creating information firewalls between immigration enforcement and labor rights agencies, and in some instances, providing “justice visas” that provide temporary migration status while an alleged labor infringement is being pursued in the courts.

Finally, Balkan suggested that it would have been beneficial if I had considered the perspective of migrants themselves through interviews. I do, but indirectly, through the perspectives of their legal counsel. Of the 53 interviews I undertook with attorneys, many shared with me the positions of their clients and the legal documentation that accompanied the trials. I see the merit of also speaking directly to migrants, which is incidentally the focus of my next book, but I must acknowledge that it presents a series of ethical, vulnerability, and sometimes legal challenges for the researcher. The focus on applicant and respondent legal counsel in Patterns of Exploitation was driven both by pragmatism and the distinctive focus on the legal process that underpinned the book. I thank Balkan for his provocations that inspire me for my future work in this field.