ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book presents a political-economic analysis of migrant networks from Pakistan, offering an alternative to the modes and units of analysis adopted in extant literatures. It discusses that the re-assessment of the available historical accounts of Pakistani migration. The book draws inspiration from Bataille's refutation of any attempt to define human activity as dictated exclusively by rationalising interests. Interplay between the two is a useful metaphor for thinking about the function of human smuggling in global capitalism, in particular the manner in which it conveniently funnels, filters, disciplines and facilitates the ingestion of immigrant labour as it passes through the bowels of Europe's productive system. Lascar migration networks in 19th and early 20th centuries were commodified through the activities of intermediaries throughout the migration process. The channels have mediated the relationship between Europe's restrictive core and Afro-Eurasian labour since at least the colonial era.
