The seasonal labour issue between two crises: immigrant condition, social exclusion and risk of contagious

Abstract

In the health crisis caused by COVID-19, agricultural employees have had a notable visibility. On the one hand, a visibility that exalted its central role in the supply of food during the months that lasted the confinement strategy decreed by the state of alarm of the Spanish government to face the health crisis caused by the spread of the virus. On the other hand, a negative visibility derived from its presence in multiple viral “outbreaks” and infections during the post-confinement period called “new normal”. Both processes of visibility, in their positivity and negativity, and to the extent that they remain in the superficiality of the media treatment, resist revealing the complex bundle of social interdependencies that define the social condition of the agricultural worker in the societies of southern Europe. This article addresses the social conditions that shape and make both forms of visibility of agricultural worker comprehensive in the health crisis.