Cassani, Jacob;
(2023)
Before their sweat dries: labour and family in the Syrian refugee camps of the Biqa’a valley, Lebanon.
Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).
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Abstract
This thesis is concerned with the social life of the Syrian refugee camps of the Biqa’a valley, Lebanon. It argues that the organisation and reproduction of cheap wage-labourers is central to understanding both life in the camps and their relationship with neighbouring towns and villages. Syrian refugee labour is shown to be essential to capitalist agrarian production in the Biqa’a valley. Furthermore, the thesis demonstrates how the social structures which have emerged in this context are based on an accommodation between pre- and non-capitalist family and gender norms and a capitalist regime of production. Rather than challenging one another, a mutually reinforcing accommodation has been found between patriarchal structures of power and the exploitation of cheap labour. The control and organisation of wage labour is outsourced to family structures and founded on extensive unwaged female domestic labour. Based on 17 months of participant observation in one camp and village, this thesis uses ethnographic methods to demonstrate the centrality of labour to Syrian encampments in the Biqa’a valley. It gives a historical overview of pre-Syrian Civil War circular migration, and then addresses specific aspects of camp life and labour organisation. Through thick qualitative analysis, it shows the centrality of labour to camp-village communication, family organisation, Lebanese landownership and usage patterns, non-governmental organisations, and regional mobility. It further argues that wage labour is discursively devalued and comes into tension with other normative hierarchies and shows how this tension is expressed through irony and humour. The thesis concludes by arguing that this accommodation between pre- and non-capitalist socio-cultural norms and capitalist modes of production is normal, rather than exceptional. It constitutes an organic manifestation of capitalist development which is contingent on local context and does not follow the traditional Marxist European trajectory.
| Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
|---|---|
| Qualification: | Ph.D |
| Title: | Before their sweat dries: labour and family in the Syrian refugee camps of the Biqa’a valley, Lebanon |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright © The Author 2023. Original content in this thesis is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) Licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/). Any third-party copyright material present remains the property of its respective owner(s) and is licensed under its existing terms. Access may initially be restricted at the author’s request. |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment > UCL Institute for Global Prosperity |
| URI: | https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10163359 |
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