The refugee crisis that began in 2015 has seen thousands of refugees attempting to reach Europe, principally from Syria. The dangers and difficulties of this journey have been highlighted in the media, as have the political disagreements within Europe over the way to deal with the problem. However, despite the increasing number of women making this journey, there has been little or no analysis of women’s experiences or of the particular difficulties and dangers they may face. A Gendered Approach to the Syrian Refugee Crisis examines women’s experience at all stages of forced migration, from the conflict in Syria, to refugee camps in Lebanon or Turkey, on the journey to the European Union and on arrival in an EU member state. The book deals with women’s experiences, the changing nature of gender relations during forced migration, gendered representations of refugees, and the ways in which EU policies may impact differently on men and women. The book provides a nuanced and complex assessment of the refugee crisis, and shows the importance of analysing differences within the refugee population. Students and scholars of development studies, gender studies, security studies, politics and middle eastern studies will find this book an important guide to the evolving crisis.

This edited volume investigates the political and socioeconomic impact of the Syrian refugee crisis on Lebanon and Jordan, and these countries’ mechanisms to cope with the rapid influx of refugees. The sudden population increase has resulted in severe pressures on infrastructures and services, as well as growing social tensions between the refugees and host communities. These chapters use a transdisciplinary approach to analyse the repercussions of the humanitarian tragedy at three different levels: 1) the changing governmental policies of the two countries towards the crisis; 2) the different perceptions of the Jordanian and Lebanese local communities on the Syrian refugees; and 3) the role played by NGOs and the civil society in both countries in dealing with protracted humanitarian emergencies.

This book examines the unfolding of the Syrian refugee crisis in relation to the spillover of the Syrian civil war in Lebanon and against the background of Lebanon–Syria relations and Lebanon’s socio-political, cultural, legal, and economic conditions. It surveys Lebanon’s response plans to the refugee crisis as part of the development of the international response plans to address the protection and needs of the Syrian refugees and Palestinian refugees from Syria, as well as the impacted host communities and institutions. At the same time, this book emphasizes the dramatic shift in popular and institutional attitudes towards the refugees as a response to and as a growth of the sheer magnitude of the refugee crisis, which made Lebanon the only country in modern history with the highest per capita concentration of refugees in the world. By examining these attitudes against the background of achievements and failures of the response plans, the impact of the crisis on state institutions on the local and national levels, and the collective consciousness of a nation barely surviving the scars of its civil war, this book not only underscores the deepening tragedy of Syrian and Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, but also the consequential tragedy of many Lebanese, who have been forced into poverty and whose livelihoods have been affected by insecurity and the almost complete collapse of social services. As a result, the tragedy of the Syrian refugee crisis has become an international crisis affecting vulnerable persons across nationalities, and, unless it is addressed diplomatically and its response plans sufficiently funded, the tragedy will only deepen across continents.

The massive dimensions of Syria's refugee crisis—and the search for solutions The civil war in Syria has forced some 10 million people—more than half the country's population—from their homes and communities, creating one of the largest human displacements since the end of World War II. Daily headlines testify to their plight, both within Syria and in the countries to which they have fled. The Consequences of Chaos looks beyond the ever-increasing numbers of Syria's uprooted to consider the long-term economic, political, and social implications of this massive movement of people. Neighboring countries hosting thousands or even millions of refugees, Western governments called upon to provide financial assistance and even new homes for the refugees, regional and international organizations struggling to cope with the demands for food and shelter—all have found the Syria crisis to be overwhelming in its challenges. And the challenges of finding solutions for those displaced by the conflict are likely to continue for years, perhaps even for decades. The Syrian displacement crisis raises fundamental questions about the relationship between action to resolve conflicts and humanitarian aid to assist the victims and demonstrates the limits of humanitarian response, even on a massive scale, to resolve political crises. The increasingly protracted nature of the crisis also raises the need for the international community to think beyond just relief assistance and adopt developmental policies to help refugees become productive members of their host communities.

The Syrian refugee crisis seriously challenged countries in the Middle East, Europe, the United States, and elsewhere in the world. It provoked reactions from humanitarian generosity to anti-immigrant warnings of the destruction of the West. It contributed to the United Kingdom’s “Brexit” from the European Union and the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States. This book is a unique study of rhetorical responses to the crisis through a comparative approach that analyzes the discourses of leading political figures in ten countries, including gateway, destination, and tertiary countries for immigration, such as Turkey, several European countries, and the United States. These national discourses constructed the crisis and its refugees so as to welcome or shun them, in turn shaping the character and identity of the receiving countries, for both domestic and international audiences, as more or less humanitarian, nationalist, Muslim-friendly, Christian, and so forth. This book is essential reading for scholars wishing to understand how European and other countries responded to this crisis, discursively constructing refugees, themselves, and an emerging world order.

The book focuses on the largest refugee crisis of our time: the Syrian refugee crisis. It exploits a wealth of survey and registry data on Syrian refugees living in Jordan and Lebanon to assess their poverty and vulnerability status, understand the predictors of these statuses, evaluate the performance of existing policies toward refugees, and determine the potential for alternative policies. Findings point to a complex situation. In the absence of humanitarian assistance, poverty is extremely high among refugees. Current policies including cash transfers and food vouchers are effective in reducing poverty but they remain short of providing economic inclusion and self-reliance of refugees. A shift toward economic inclusion and self-reliance would require a different humanitarian and development paradigm, one that focuses on growth policies for areas affected by refugees where the target population is constituted by refugees and hosting populations alike. This joint study by the World Bank Group and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees helps bridge the historical divide between humanitarian and development work by providing practical solutions for assisting refugees in the short, medium and long-term and to prevent the irreversible loss of social and human capital typically associated with prolonged refugee crises.

Since the early weeks of the so-called Arab Spring, high hopes for democratic, social, and political change in the Middle East have been met with varying degrees of frustration. In the sub-region of the Levant, regional uprisings have turned to violent conflict in places such as Syria, Iraq, and the Gaza Strip. In Syria, popular unrest has caused enormous human suffering in one of the most brutal civil wars the region ever has witnessed, yet the international community has shown an appalling inability to act. Taking the war in Syria as its central point of reference, this book raises the question of whether the developments in the Levant might lead not only to processes of regime change, but also to a fundamental alteration of its entire state system.