This report, based on a rapid gender situation and vulnerability assessment, finds that many refugee men are experiencing severe stress and feelings of powerlessness because they are unable to fulfil their traditional role as family provider and protector. Many refugee women and girls no longer have access to the resources and services they used to have in Syria before the conflict began, which enabled them to fulfil their traditional gender role. The report recommends that humanitarian organisations seek to promote gender equality and to acknowledge and address refugee women and men’s anxieties and fears about their changing gender roles.
Oxfam and the ABAAD – Resource Centre for Gender Equality conducted a rapid gender situation and vulnerability assessment among Syrian refugees and Palestinian refugees from Syria now living in Lebanon. This involved over 150 people. Qualitative research was conducted using focus group discussions and individual interviews with key people and individual refugees in March and April 2013.
The report notes that refugees have lost their jobs, homes and control over their lives, and are still living in fear. Many are suffering from poor health, but cannot get the medicines and health care they need, while many children are no longer able to go to school. Women and men and their children have been subjected to violence and intimidation by armed groups and others, both in Syria and as refugees, and these experiences have led to considerable anxiety, stress, and feelings of powerlessness. The crisis has led to huge changes in the family structure among refugees. Women, men, boys and girls have experienced and reacted to the crisis in different ways. Findings include the following:
- The women’s sense of self-worth is closely linked to their traditional gender role, but as refugees, they are no longer able to provide the quality of care that they were in Syria.
- Women now need to find money to buy food and other essential items. They are often the ones who go to aid agencies to ask for help because many men reported feeling ashamed to do this.
- Being required to undertake activities that are outside of their traditional role makes some women feel that they have lost their gendered identity
- Despite some women reporting a sense of increased empowerment with their new responsibilities, some men resent the changes, which have damaged their self-esteem.
- Refugee men, unemployed in Lebanon, have not been able to fulfil their traditional gendered role as provider for the family.
- Some male respondents regarded themselves as protectors and defenders of their homeland, and being forced to leave has damaged their sense of self-worth.
- Lower self-esteem among refugee men has, in some cases, led to greater violence towards women and children as men abuse their power within the household.
- While women have had to take on a greater role in providing for the family, men have not taken on increased responsibility for household tasks or caring for family members. According to all categories of respondents, most male refugees spend their days in Lebanon either looking for work or staying with their friends for support.
The research findings indicate that humanitarian organisations need to promote gender equality as part of all aspects of programming. This will involve conducting gender and social analysis, and collecting, analysing and using sex and age-disaggregated data. Humanitarian organisations need to acknowledge and address refugee women and men’s anxieties and fears about their changing gender roles. This can be an entry point for challenging attitudes that have traditionally limited women’s participation in social, economic and political life, and for changing long-established social norms, such as women’s restricted freedom of movement. It is also an opportunity to engage men and boys on gender issues, and to provide targeted counselling and mental health services for men who are struggling to cope with low self-esteem.