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The present study examines federal government programs to admit women to Canada as foreign domestic workers, their exclusion from labour standards legislation, the conditions of work and wage-rates which result from this exclusion, and attempts to organize foreign domestic workers. The thesis maintains that foreign domestic workers represent a modern form of unfree wage labour since they are required to remain in domestic work as a condition of entry to Canada. The study also examines the intersection of gender, class and ethnicity in the foreign domestic labour process. It is argued that the employment of foreign domestic workers in the homes of privileged families gives rise to differential experiences of oppression by women of different classes and ethnic origins. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)