A cadre of educated middle-class Syrian refugees dedicated to improving conditions for Syrians at... more A cadre of educated middle-class Syrian refugees dedicated to improving conditions for Syrians at home and in Lebanon are building a civil society in exile but face obstacles to consolidating their presence and becoming more effective.
Refugees are commonly depicted as unambiguous, helpless victims of external circumstance, with li... more Refugees are commonly depicted as unambiguous, helpless victims of external circumstance, with little or no capacity for agency. This assumption is challenged through an in-depth case study based on interviews with urban, educated Syrian refugees in Lebanon, exploring the ways in which their lived experience supports or contradicts prominent popular and scholarly representations of refugeehood. Undermining the stereotype of the dependent refugee relying on aid agencies for survival, these urban refugees offer assistance to other refugees and exercise their agency through involvement in a nascent Syrian civil society movement in Lebanon, despite the presence of impediments to reaching their full potential in this field. Agency is also in evidence in urban refugees’ complex relationship with the label of refugeehood, which they sometimes reject outright as a result of its stigmatising association with dependency and other negative traits. And contra the widespread perception of refugees as a purely humanitarian concern, my interlocutors live a highly politicised existence in which political judgments have constantly to be weighed up even in apparently mundane circumstances. Just as they do not passively accept the refugee label, neither do urban refugees passively accept one-dimensional representations of Syria and Syrian refugees, instead undertaking to insert their own voices into the narrative through online activism or giving interviews to researchers and journalists. Nonetheless, the success of these efforts is limited as the group remains largely excluded from the media and academia and highly constrained by structural factors beyond their control.
A cadre of educated middle-class Syrian refugees dedicated to improving conditions for Syrians at... more A cadre of educated middle-class Syrian refugees dedicated to improving conditions for Syrians at home and in Lebanon are building a civil society in exile but face obstacles to consolidating their presence and becoming more effective.
Refugees are commonly depicted as unambiguous, helpless victims of external circumstance, with li... more Refugees are commonly depicted as unambiguous, helpless victims of external circumstance, with little or no capacity for agency. This assumption is challenged through an in-depth case study based on interviews with urban, educated Syrian refugees in Lebanon, exploring the ways in which their lived experience supports or contradicts prominent popular and scholarly representations of refugeehood. Undermining the stereotype of the dependent refugee relying on aid agencies for survival, these urban refugees offer assistance to other refugees and exercise their agency through involvement in a nascent Syrian civil society movement in Lebanon, despite the presence of impediments to reaching their full potential in this field. Agency is also in evidence in urban refugees’ complex relationship with the label of refugeehood, which they sometimes reject outright as a result of its stigmatising association with dependency and other negative traits. And contra the widespread perception of refugees as a purely humanitarian concern, my interlocutors live a highly politicised existence in which political judgments have constantly to be weighed up even in apparently mundane circumstances. Just as they do not passively accept the refugee label, neither do urban refugees passively accept one-dimensional representations of Syria and Syrian refugees, instead undertaking to insert their own voices into the narrative through online activism or giving interviews to researchers and journalists. Nonetheless, the success of these efforts is limited as the group remains largely excluded from the media and academia and highly constrained by structural factors beyond their control.
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