Jordan is the second biggest host of Syrian refugees per capita in the world, yet, initially, refugees were not given the legal right to work. Investment in Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET) was seen as a way to equip refugees and host communities to find employment, and with the 2016 Jordan Compact, a formal pathway for employment was created for Syrians refugees in Jordan. It appears that, despite some avenues for formal work and the significant investment in TVET programmes, many refugees still prefer to work in the informal sector. Through interviews with TVET providers in Jordan, this article assesses the role of TVET and explores the reasons for the preference for informal work among Syrian refugees in Jordan. The research shows that the most successful TVET programmes include digital skills training, as this enables refugees to work remotely, and informally, circumventing local laws that limit their participation in the local labour market. Yet, while digital skills appear to be the most promising in terms of actually helping refugees acquire work, there are still significant challenges.
{"title":"The Privilege to Work: Syrian Refugees in Jordan, Technical and Vocational Education Training, and the Remote Work Loophole","authors":"Jinan Bastaki, L. Charles","doi":"10.1093/rsq/hdac017","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdac017","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Jordan is the second biggest host of Syrian refugees per capita in the world, yet, initially, refugees were not given the legal right to work. Investment in Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET) was seen as a way to equip refugees and host communities to find employment, and with the 2016 Jordan Compact, a formal pathway for employment was created for Syrians refugees in Jordan. It appears that, despite some avenues for formal work and the significant investment in TVET programmes, many refugees still prefer to work in the informal sector. Through interviews with TVET providers in Jordan, this article assesses the role of TVET and explores the reasons for the preference for informal work among Syrian refugees in Jordan. The research shows that the most successful TVET programmes include digital skills training, as this enables refugees to work remotely, and informally, circumventing local laws that limit their participation in the local labour market. Yet, while digital skills appear to be the most promising in terms of actually helping refugees acquire work, there are still significant challenges.","PeriodicalId":39907,"journal":{"name":"Refugee Survey Quarterly","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2022-07-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48182540","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article examines asylum-seeker women’s appeals involving forced marriage at the Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) in the UK over the past 20 years. Internationally forced marriage has long been understood as a human rights issue. In the UK, the government has introduced a range of policy and legislative measures to tackle forced marriage of its nationals that have been framed within human rights discourse. The aim of this article is to examine the ways in which forced marriage has been framed by the Tribunal in women’s asylum claims. Informed by feminist contributions to gender and refugee law, the article reveals two problematic and interrelated trends. First, that gendered harm in the form of forced marriage continues to be contained in the “private” sphere. And secondly, that a noteworthy trend of trivialisation through conflation of forced and arranged marriage, and the use of euphemisms emerges. As a result, these gendered representations evidence a continuing failure of refugee law to take women’s rights violations seriously.
{"title":"“An Unhappy Interlude”: Trivialisation and Privatisation of Forced Marriage in Asylum-Seeker Women’s Cases in the UK","authors":"Nora Honkala","doi":"10.1093/rsq/hdac018","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdac018","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 This article examines asylum-seeker women’s appeals involving forced marriage at the Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) in the UK over the past 20 years. Internationally forced marriage has long been understood as a human rights issue. In the UK, the government has introduced a range of policy and legislative measures to tackle forced marriage of its nationals that have been framed within human rights discourse. The aim of this article is to examine the ways in which forced marriage has been framed by the Tribunal in women’s asylum claims. Informed by feminist contributions to gender and refugee law, the article reveals two problematic and interrelated trends. First, that gendered harm in the form of forced marriage continues to be contained in the “private” sphere. And secondly, that a noteworthy trend of trivialisation through conflation of forced and arranged marriage, and the use of euphemisms emerges. As a result, these gendered representations evidence a continuing failure of refugee law to take women’s rights violations seriously.","PeriodicalId":39907,"journal":{"name":"Refugee Survey Quarterly","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2022-07-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49182734","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This concluding chapter provides an overview of the chapters, as well as briefly highlighting the relevant normative frameworks applicable to the issues addressed in this special edition journal. The authors have addressed structural, institutional, and individual gaps and challenges in the refugee protection sphere and have raised concerns about the lack of adequate acknowledgement of gendered aspects of the asylum frameworks and processes, and crucially the differential impact thereof. The gaps in the legally binding instruments governing this area of human rights protection, and the minimal attention to the connection between theory and practice and its resulting consequences, are highlighted by some authors.
{"title":"Concluding Reflections from the former UNHRC Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, its Causes and Consequences (2009–15)","authors":"R. Manjoo","doi":"10.1093/rsq/hdac014","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdac014","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 This concluding chapter provides an overview of the chapters, as well as briefly highlighting the relevant normative frameworks applicable to the issues addressed in this special edition journal. The authors have addressed structural, institutional, and individual gaps and challenges in the refugee protection sphere and have raised concerns about the lack of adequate acknowledgement of gendered aspects of the asylum frameworks and processes, and crucially the differential impact thereof. The gaps in the legally binding instruments governing this area of human rights protection, and the minimal attention to the connection between theory and practice and its resulting consequences, are highlighted by some authors.","PeriodicalId":39907,"journal":{"name":"Refugee Survey Quarterly","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2022-07-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42940963","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The article argues that although the gradual recognition of non-State actors as agents of persecution was hailed as a success in ensuring better protection for refugee women at risk of harm from their community or family, the associated development of non-state actors as agents of protection has had a detrimental impact on the protection of refugee women in Europe and more globally. More specifically, the article identifies various everyday practices of reliance on male family members and undefined social networks as actors of protection. These co-constructing practices are exercised by different entities involved in refugee status determination processes, including governments, national and regional courts, and regional and international asylum agencies. Although the trend has gone largely unnoticed, it has resulted in a sliding scale of protection for refugee women. The article argues that endorsing non-State actors of protection, such as male family members and undefined social networks, amounts to a requirement that women seeking asylum take action to avoid being persecuted by placing themselves under the protection of those private actors. This is contrary to international refugee law doctrine, fails to consider the possibility of new forms of harm and is, in itself, a breach of women’s human rights.
{"title":"Non-State Actors of Protection and the Sliding Scale of Protection for Refugee Women","authors":"Christel Querton","doi":"10.1093/rsq/hdac020","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdac020","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 The article argues that although the gradual recognition of non-State actors as agents of persecution was hailed as a success in ensuring better protection for refugee women at risk of harm from their community or family, the associated development of non-state actors as agents of protection has had a detrimental impact on the protection of refugee women in Europe and more globally. More specifically, the article identifies various everyday practices of reliance on male family members and undefined social networks as actors of protection. These co-constructing practices are exercised by different entities involved in refugee status determination processes, including governments, national and regional courts, and regional and international asylum agencies. Although the trend has gone largely unnoticed, it has resulted in a sliding scale of protection for refugee women. The article argues that endorsing non-State actors of protection, such as male family members and undefined social networks, amounts to a requirement that women seeking asylum take action to avoid being persecuted by placing themselves under the protection of those private actors. This is contrary to international refugee law doctrine, fails to consider the possibility of new forms of harm and is, in itself, a breach of women’s human rights.","PeriodicalId":39907,"journal":{"name":"Refugee Survey Quarterly","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2022-07-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44247577","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"“Our Wish Is To Be Human Again”: Refugee Women Speaking Up and Taking Space","authors":"Loraine Masiya Mponela","doi":"10.1093/rsq/hdac016","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdac016","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":39907,"journal":{"name":"Refugee Survey Quarterly","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2022-07-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47936530","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Failures in UK decision-making for women seeking protection from gender-based violence vary depending on the claimant’s (purported) sexuality. These failures are attributable, at least in part, to the application of the particular social group Refugee Convention ground which channels claims along two distinct pathways: one path, for women assumed to be straight, focuses on the violence that threatens them; in contrast, for lesbian and bisexual women, the focus is on their sexuality. In either case, the claimant’s autonomy and individuality is eclipsed, but different stereotypes come into play depending on her (imputed) sexuality. This article argues that greater use of the political opinion Convention ground, and a holistic, rights-based approach would improve refugee status determination for all women, regardless of their sexuality.
{"title":"Pathways to Refugee Protection for Women: Victims of Violence or Genuine Lesbians?","authors":"M. Dustin","doi":"10.1093/rsq/hdac013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdac013","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Failures in UK decision-making for women seeking protection from gender-based violence vary depending on the claimant’s (purported) sexuality. These failures are attributable, at least in part, to the application of the particular social group Refugee Convention ground which channels claims along two distinct pathways: one path, for women assumed to be straight, focuses on the violence that threatens them; in contrast, for lesbian and bisexual women, the focus is on their sexuality. In either case, the claimant’s autonomy and individuality is eclipsed, but different stereotypes come into play depending on her (imputed) sexuality. This article argues that greater use of the political opinion Convention ground, and a holistic, rights-based approach would improve refugee status determination for all women, regardless of their sexuality.","PeriodicalId":39907,"journal":{"name":"Refugee Survey Quarterly","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2022-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44561483","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Using feminist theories of geolegality, geopolitics, and intersectionality, this article presents Syrian refugee women’s experiences and perceptions of both formal and informal security providers in Amman and Beirut in 2016–2017. Based on qualitative data from refugee women based in these cities since the onset of the Syrian civil war, this article argues three related points regarding urban refugee women and their experiences with security providers. First, that although not gendered at the State level, refugee law is applied in gendered ways in the everyday by State and non-State security providers and that this has direct outcomes as to how refugee women perceive and access security services in their host cities. Secondly, that whilst women perceive both formal and informal security providers in ambivalent terms, they are deeply appreciative of State security presence in urban areas which seem vulnerable to tension and conflict. Lastly, in order to understand ambivalent experiences of (in)security of (in)formal security providers, we need closer examinations of the ways in which identity interacts with structures of policy, law and culture, using feminist theories of intersectionality and geolegality.
{"title":"Ambivalent (In)Securities: Comparing Urban Refugee Women’s Experiences of Informal and Formal Security Provision","authors":"S. Linn","doi":"10.1093/rsq/hdac011","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdac011","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Using feminist theories of geolegality, geopolitics, and intersectionality, this article presents Syrian refugee women’s experiences and perceptions of both formal and informal security providers in Amman and Beirut in 2016–2017. Based on qualitative data from refugee women based in these cities since the onset of the Syrian civil war, this article argues three related points regarding urban refugee women and their experiences with security providers. First, that although not gendered at the State level, refugee law is applied in gendered ways in the everyday by State and non-State security providers and that this has direct outcomes as to how refugee women perceive and access security services in their host cities. Secondly, that whilst women perceive both formal and informal security providers in ambivalent terms, they are deeply appreciative of State security presence in urban areas which seem vulnerable to tension and conflict. Lastly, in order to understand ambivalent experiences of (in)security of (in)formal security providers, we need closer examinations of the ways in which identity interacts with structures of policy, law and culture, using feminist theories of intersectionality and geolegality.","PeriodicalId":39907,"journal":{"name":"Refugee Survey Quarterly","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2022-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42777592","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Erratum to: Accountability in Humanitarian Action","authors":"","doi":"10.1093/rsq/hdac001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdac001","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":39907,"journal":{"name":"Refugee Survey Quarterly","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.2,"publicationDate":"2022-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44651434","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}