Expat, Local, and Refugee

Abstract

In migration studies, humanitarian work and workers are studied as benefactors or managers of migrants and refugees. This article inverts the gaze from “researching down” refugees to “studying up” the humanitarian structure that governs them. The article studies how the humanitarian industry ballooned after the Syrian refugee response in Jordan due to the influx of expatriate humanitarians as economic migrants from the global North to refugee situations in the host country in the global South. It examines the global division of mobility and labor among expatriate, local, and refugee humanitarian workers, investigating the correlation between geographic (horizontal) mobility and social/professional (vertical) mobility, demonstrating that the social and professional mobility of workers depends on their ability to access geographic mobility. Thus, rather than advocating for and facilitating global mobility, the humanitarian industry maintains a colonial division of labor and mobility. This raises the question: who benefits most from humanitarian assistance?

“The Brains Are Frozen”: Precarious Subjectivities in the Humanitarian Aid Sector in Jordan

“…In line with earlier studies (Muñoz-Arce & Duboy-Luengo, 2023;Pentaraki & Dionysopoulou, 2019;Reininger et al, 2022), this research showed that precarity affects not only aid-recipients as is often thought, but also university-educated professionals such as aid workers. Prior studies on aid work discussed the uneven distribution of labour precarity and the intersection between existing (colonial) power inequalities and labour conditions (Farah, 2020;Ong & Combinido, 2018;Pascucci, 2019). This study builds upon these works but adds a layer of complexity by looking at precarity through the lens of emotions and shows the comparability of the above-mentioned emotions and experiences of precarity between national and international aid professionals.…”

“…This in turn leads to short-term contracts for employees, as job security depends on funding. These neoliberal structures are accompanied by structures of ongoing coloniality which means that precarious labour conditions are differentially distributed between national and international professionals, which is discussed below (Farah, 2020;Ong & Combinido, 2018;Pascucci, 2019).…”

“…Less well-examined are university-educated professionals' experiences of precarity, such as social workers or aid professionals (Pascucci, 2019;Pentaraki & Dionysopoulou, 2019). Although recent important works (Farah, 2020;Fassin, 2010;Ong & Combinido, 2018;Pascucci, 2019Pascucci, , 2023Ward, 2021) have begun to research labour and precarity in humanitarian aid, these issues remain underexplored. Based on one year of fieldwork in Amman, this article seeks to address this gap, shedding light on the lived experiences of those who perform the labour of caring for vulnerable communities in Jordan.…”

“…However, this precarity is formed and influenced by colonial structures of inequality and neoliberalism that shape the humanitarian sector in Jordan, which results in "differentiated precarities" for national and international aid workers (Campbell & Tobin, 2016;Farah, 2020;Pascucci, 2019). In this article, I look at precarity through the lens of emotions and ask what aid professionals' emotions reveal about precarity in aid work.…”

Beyond the right to work

“…(Jerash camp, Palestinian no ID, Male,[30][31][32][33][34][35] This is also corroborated by other interviewees. Often they are asked to do the same type of work as a staff member but only receive some compensation for travel expenses (this was also reported by Farah, 2020) or no compensation at all. For example, one Syrian who worked as a volunteer for a radio station noted that whereas a Jordanian volunteer received a compensation of 100-150 JD to cover transportation, a Syrian would not receive any compensation, though it was noted that with time he received something.…”