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Zimbabwean migrant women encounter numerous challenges from their homes to the borders of Zimbabwe and South Africa, as well as upon arrival in Johannesburg, and during their stay there. In addition to the decision to move to South Africa, particularly Johannesburg, these migrant women from Zimbabwe plan their journeys from their homes to the border and carry them out with many considerations that they made while planning the journey at home, a process that is not extensively covered in the literature. Based on in-depth interviews with some Zimbabwean women migrants, the article reveals that these women plan their journeys by incorporating religious and cultural practices and using road transport to move from their homes to places near the borders. Upon reaching the borders, some cross the Limpopo river on foot, while others enter South Africa via Botswana. Relatively few women follow the normal, formal border route to enter South Africa. Many either bribe border authorities, while others take the risky route of traveling on foot and crossing the dangerous Limpopo river. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While recognizing that women are part of the most vulnerable sections of migrant communities, the article affirms their social agency by locating their responses to difficulties they face as migrants within a framework of precarious resistance. Based on in-depth interviews with Zimbabwean migrant women working in Johannesburg, South Africa, the article discusses a duality of precarious work and precarious resistance. Women who would have been carers of families at their homes in Zimbabwe, and been supported financially by men who worked in the cities like Johannesburg, are now breadwinners who take risks by travelling to Johannesburg in search of work. The first aspect dealt with in this paper narrates problems faced by the women when travelling to Johannesburg. Being women doubles the risk in a way as the women have to deal with violence against women and generalized lack of basic services and goods like those necessary for female hygiene and washing facilities. Arriving in Johannesburg means the beginning of a new struggle of searching for work and finding work which tends to be precarious. As a response to this precariousness, the second aspect of this duality comes into play where the female workers amass strategies and tactics which are defined as precarious resistance, because they are individualized and isolated. However, networks play a major role in anchoring precarious resistance of the women migrants who work as precarious workers in Johannesburg. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a growing literature on the conditions of Zimbabwean women working as migrant workers in South Africa, specifically in cities like Johannesburg. Based on in-depth interviews and documentary analysis, this empirical research paper contributes to scholarship examining the conditions of migrant women workers from Zimbabwe employed as precarious workers in Johannesburg by zooming in on specific causes of migration to Johannesburg, the journey undertaken by the migrant women to Johannesburg, challenges of documentation, use of networks to survive in Johannesburg, employment of the women in precarious work, and challenges in the workplace. Rape and sexual violence are threats that face the women interviewed during migration to Johannesburg and even when in Johannesburg. The police who are supposed to uphold and protect the law are often found to be perpetrators involved in various forms of violence against women. In the workplace, the women earn starvation wages and work under poor working conditions. Human rights organizations and trade unions are unable to reach the many migrant women because of the sheer volume of violations against workers' rights and human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]