Title | Author(s) | Publishing Date | Summary | Keywords | Dossier |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Achieving Long Term Goals on Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (SGBV) Protection in Lebanon | Menaal Munshey | November, 2021 |
This article uses qualitative data from semi-structured interviews with 11 NGO representatives and five Syrian refugee survivors of domestic violence to argue that the current funding structure hinders survivors from accessing vital services such as shelters and legal aid. For Syrian refugees in Lebanon, this problem is exacerbated due to a lack of legal assistance for legal residency and official registration. Without this paperwork, Syrian refugee survivors are unlikely and unwilling to access support and justice mechanisms. The present gaps in funding and services impact survivors’ protection, safety, and access to justice, and hinders the likelihood of attaining sustainable solutions. |
Lebanon, refugees, Gender Based Violence, Gender Discrimination | Gender Equity Network |
From “Liberal” to “Liberating” Empowerment: The Community Protection Approach as Best Practice to Address NGO-ization | Nicolas Gianni, Francesco Michele, Chiara Lozza | November, 2021 |
This article attempts to conceptualize the observations collected throughout an action-research process carried out between 2017 and 2019 to develop the Community Protection Approach (CPA). The CPA is both an approach and a methodology to streamline actions within ongoing humanitarian and development projects in support of the affected population (www.cpainitiative.org, 2019). This research draws widely on field evidence of the implementation of the CPA between 2013 and 2019, and analyzes the exchange and feedback processes between affected communities and implementers in a variety of locations. |
Women’s empowerment, Civil Society, liberalization, hegemony, community protection | Gender Equity Network |
Paying “Lip Service” to Gender Equality: The Hollow Implementation of Gender Mainstreaming in Jordan | Rosalind Ragetlie, Dina Najjar, Bipasha Baruah | November, 2021 |
Based on a sample of 23 international, state-led, royal, and non-royal affiliated Civil Society Organisations (CSO)s in Jordan, this article suggests that gender equality is used as rhetoric more than as implementable policy or practice. It also argues that the blurred line between domestic CSOs, the monarchy, and the defensive democratisation pursued by the state also undermine the potential for CSOs to engage with the social and political roots of gender inequality |
Jordan, Gender Equality, Civil Society, Gender mainstreaming | Gender Equity Network |
A Historical Mapping of Lebanese Organized Labor: Tracing trends, actors, and dynamics | Rossana Tufaro | November, 2021 |
The paper provides a contextualized and easily accessible history of Lebanese organized labor from the mandate period up to this day. The paper is divided into six main sections, each corresponding to a distinct phase of the historical development of Lebanese organized labor. In each section, the paper identifies the main actors, demands, events, urgencies and constraints shaping the articulation and the trajectories of (de/) mobilization of workers’ collective agency and organization, so as to provide a cumulative and genealogical overview of the changes, continuities and peculiarities characterizing each phase. The paper builds for the most part on the piecemeal and dis-organic body of scholarship currently constituting the bulk of scholarly knowledge on Lebanese labor, in an attempt to provide a synthesis and an index thereof. In so doing, the paper aims at offering a directory and a ready-to-hand compendium for researchers, analyst and practitioners interested in Lebanese labor, and possibly contribute to (re)ignite interest in this still widely under-researched topic. |
Lebanon, Labor Rights & Livelihoods, labour movement, socio-economic demands, Policy Intervention, Activism | Socio-Economic Rights Base, Conflict Analysis Project |
Crafting the good citizen, streaming the good king: Notes on press freedom, hegemony and social contention in King Abdallah II’s Jordan | Rossana Tufaro | July, 2021 |
During the mandate of King Abdallah II, press freedom in Jordan has undergone a significant contraction. This has progressively endowed the Hashemite monarchy and its organic incumbents with an unprecedented directive control over the circulation and the framing of events in the country – hence over the capacity to strategically filter from above the diffusion of politically sensitive news, silence voices of political challengers, and orient domestic and international opinion. This paper aims to provide a preliminary assessment of the role played by the enforcement and the strategic application of restrictions on media freedom in consolidating King Abdallah II’s rule, by scrutinizing how the cumulative strategic application of press restrictions succeeded or failed to validate King Abdallah II's international reputation of a moderate and progressive leader, and legitimize the neoliberal upgrading of the authoritarian bargain with his domestic constituencies. |
Right to Information, Press Freedom, Civic Space, Jordan, Social Movements | Socio-Economic Rights Base, Conflict Analysis Project |
Beyond Humanitarian Relief: Social Networks and the Role of Shared Identity in Refugee Belonging and Support in Turkey | Michael Kaplan | August, 2020 |
A considerable body of research explores the ways in which refugees exert agency and establish belonging in exile. This scholarship challenges popular tropes that reduce the varied experiences of displacement to generalized themes of crisis, uprootedness, and suffering. Through exploring refugee involvement in Islamic communities in Turkey, this paper considers the role played by informal social networks and actors in both helping Syrian refugees to secure their basic needs, as well as in fostering subjectivities of belonging. Drawing on secondary research as well as on participant observation and interviews conducted with Syrians living in Turkey, it argues that attention to social networks built upon shared modes of identification, such as being devoutly religious, can offer generative insight into processes of emplacement among refugees. These networks not only make visible some of the problematic aspects of humanitarianism associated with non-governmental organizations, but also present alternative models built upon mutual support and care. At the same time, while recognizing the benefits of informal social networks, this paper also considers the potential for new boundaries and exclusions to emerge where others recede. |
refugees, Humanitarianism, Turkey, Belonging, Syrians, social networks, Anthropology | Migration, Mobility and Circulation, Conflict Analysis Project |
The October 2019 Protests in Lebanon: Between Contention and Reproduction | Marie-Noëlle AbiYaghi, Léa Yammine | July, 2020 |
The Lebanese power sharing consociational system has structurally engendered recurring protest cycles: student mobilisations, labour and union mobilising, left-wing collectives, as well as a more routinised associative sector. In a long temporality, and looking at these movements in a longitudinal approach, changes they appear to be seeking appear to be marginal or quite limited, which may lead to the observation that contentious movements play the role of mere relief outlet within the system they are challenging, hence, contributing to the permanence of the social and political structures they are challenging. |
Social Movements, Civil Society, October Protests, Civic Space, Lebanon | Conflict Analysis Project, Civil Society Observatory |
Negotiating “Home:” Syrian and Palestinian Syrian Artists in Borderlands | Ruba Totah | October, 2020 |
Since 2012, the escalation of the Syrian conflict has forced the displacement of millions of Syrians into neighboring countries, as well as Europe. Tens of artists moved out of Syria due to scarce employment opportunities and restrictions associated with working under oppressive regimes. Some of the interlocutors in this research emphasised their attempts to stay in Arab countries and reconstruct their “home” by resuming artistic careers, but ultimately decided to move to Europe, while others favoured leaving directly. This paper examines how, in the case of 16 artists’ narrated life stories, various cultural institutions’ support, life trajectories, and relational dynamics come together to influence home-making opportunities in Arab transit countries. It addresses the challenges, potentials, and implications of home-making attempts of displaced performing artists. |
Borderlands, trajectory, Mobility, identification, disentanglement, Refugee Crisis, cultural policies, relational dynamics, Arab performing arts. | Migration, Mobility and Circulation |
Faith-Based Actors in Şanlıurfa, Turkey: Reducing Tensions Between Host Populations and Syrian Refugee Communities | Zeynep Şahin Mencütek | October, 2020 |
Preventing possible tensions between refugees and the host population has become a policy priority for countries hosting large numbers of refugees. In addition to local, national and international humanitarian actors, faith-based actors from both host and refugee communities attempt to prevent any tension, as it may disrupt public order, migrant integration and social cohesion. However, little is known about the mechanisms and strategies used by refugee-led faith-based actors to take a role in reducing tensions between host-community and refugees. This article examines refugee-organised faith-based actors’ capabilities, limits and interactions with host city actors in conflict prevention, by drawing from the case of Şanlıurfa, a Turkish border province which hosts half a million Syrian refugees. Based on ethnographic field research, including interviews and participant observation, as well as the analysis of local media outlets, the paper focuses on the engagements of faith-based actors of Syrian refugee community with the local actors of Şanlıurfa. Findings illustrate that faith-based actors are able to prevent escalation of social tensions in early stages when they coordinate and cooperate with local political and humanitarian actors. However, their effectiveness in preventing tensions in later stages remains limited and does not fully eliminate the risk of violence, as such tensions are often underpinned by socio-economic factors. Finally, the case shows that faith-based actors’ engagement in refugee-host community relations lead to small but significant contributions that come with risks and challenges. |
refugees, faith-based actors, Turkey, Syrians, conflict prevention | Migration, Mobility and Circulation |
The Intersection of Labour and Refugee Policies in the Middle East and Turkey: Exploring the Dynamics of "Permanent Temporariness" | Souad Osseiran | September, 2020 |
The majority of Syrian refugees who have migrated to neighbouring countries in the Middle East and Turkey are faced with being “permanently temporary,” whether this temporariness defines their legal status, or state actor policies targeting refugees. The permanent temporariness of Syrian refugees in the region, while reinforced by various (non-)state actors, and produced differently based on the history and asylum framework of nation states in the region, aims primarily at incorporating Syrian refugees into local economies as surplus labour. This paper seeks to examine the incorporation of refugees as labour in relation to the development of migration governance in the region. Refugees as labour is used to conceptualize how refugees, as a type of mobile population, are approached as a desirable source of labour power due to their precarious position and permanently temporary presence. As such, the paper critically evaluates the ways in which refugees as labour are normalised. Lastly, it seeks to enquire how this impacts refugeehood as a political-legal concept. |
refugees, Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Labour, Migration Policies, Asylum Politics | Migration, Mobility and Circulation |