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Whilst feminist geopolitical scholarship emphasises the multiple and overlapping macro and micro scales of (in)security, a crucial aspect which is underplayed is the significance of the legal: of borders and status. Whilst feminist geopolitics explores refugee’s experiences of spatiality, mobility and security, feminist geolegality provides an addition avenue of theorising, in considering how macro issues of state law shape spatial experiences of the everyday. Refugees operate and exist within global, national and regional structures and institutions. Their legal status, that is, the way in which they are labelled and categorised by wider structures, has fundamental repercussions for their lives and their experiences of (in)security (Zetter, 2007; Brickell & Cuomo, 2019). Moreover, these repercussions are scaled, as laws that pertain to refugees legalise or illegalise their presence at varying spatial scales and shapes the spatially-bounded institutions and resources that they can access. Legal geography focuses not only on the shaping and boundary creating relationship between the law and the individual, but the specific ways in which this is embedded in the spatial. Legal geography, also interchangeably referred to as geolegality, is not so much a field, but rather:

‘braided lines of inquiry that have emerged out of the confluence of various intellectual interests… (it is) a stream of scholarship that makes the interconnections between law and spatiality, and especially their reciprocal construction into core objects of inquiry (Braverman et al., 2014, p. 1).

From a geolegal perspective, law is always grounded in the spatial, and space is inscribed with legal meaning. In these studies, space is foregrounded and serves as an organising principal (ibid, p1 -2). Legal Geographers examine the ways in which territories, and those within them, are inscribed by legal means and the ways in which legal rule localises people’s rights and obligations in space (Von Benda-Beckmann & Von Benda-Beckmann, 2014). Delaney emphasises that the ‘legal’ is associated with statist organisations but includes other expressions of legality, such as customs and norms (Delaney, 2015, p. 97). As such, legal geography encompasses a broad range of rules, rights, laws, customs and norms that claim societal authority, can engage in consequential ‘punishments’ and is also broadly interested in ideas of social justice and the ways in which this is spatialised (Delaney, 2016). Within this thesis, many of the legal concerns related to refugees are rooted in policies, which are informed by law but are typically not inscribed ‘laws’ in themselves. For example, Lebanon has chosen not to govern the Syrian refugee crisis within its borders by law, but by ‘government decisions’ (Janmyr, 2016). Despite not being ‘law’, government decisions and policies have wide ranging legal, and therefore social, impacts and are backed by authoritative powers. Noting Delaney’s broad definitions above, legal geography is not only concerned with law that is embedded and authorised

74 by statist organisations but wide and varied forms of legality that permeate and construct day to day lives.

Whilst much geolegal research investigates the ways in which space and law are mutually co- constitutive, it is the emphasis on social boundary drawing that geo-legality frequently highlights which is a helpful concept for this thesis. Delaney (2015, p. 99) emphasises the way in which law ‘draws lines, constructs insides and outsides, assigns legal meanings to lines and attaches legal consequences to crossing them’. Frequently geo-legalists points to how refugees are prime examples of this in action, but thus far there appears to be little work that engages with refugee populations from an explicitly geolegal perspective. Refugees are frequently illegalised through the crossing of borders (boundaries) in a bid to find safety, or indeed, for leaving the boundaries and confines of refugee camps in order to seek livelihoods (for example see: Kiama & Likule, 2013; Pickering 2012). Law shapes the ways in which refugees can (or can’t) access medical care, education and labour opportunities and live safely in host communities. For example, legal manoeuvring around defining an individual as a refugee allows Governments to justify the provision (or removal) of protection frameworks for individuals from particular nations (Zetter, 2007). Furthermore, it shapes the spaces that they are welcome in, and indeed, can shape host communities’ attitudes towards them (Campbell, 2006). Many refugee scholars emphasise the challenge of refugees establishing livelihoods in contexts where they often lack legal status or rights to work (Grabska, 2006). This has a direct spatial effect. Refugees in these circumstances are compelled to live in socially marginalised areas of the city for their affordability and anonymity, which then further enhance their insecurity (Dominguez & Menjivar, 2014). Legislation that prevents their access to the labour market, results in refugees working in informal spaces, or private domestic spaces, which has particular gendered repercussions of exploitation and insecurity, as explored in the first section of this chapter (Buscher and Heller 2010). Thus, attention is required as to how law, legal documentation and other policies relating to refugees in host communities is constructed. This can assist in understanding refugees’ restrictions and/or opportunities and insecurities and allows for opportunities to explore the spatiality of this relationship. Comparative work can be useful here, as analysing how laws operate in different contexts and how this shapes the ways refugees are policed, or how laws and policies provide them with particular rights and opportunities, will make it clearer how the law shapes social behaviours and networks rights to the micro, neighbourhood level.

Geolegal work on plural forms of law and their reciprocal relationships with space is also relevant. Legal pluralism can be understood as a concept which:

75 ‘draws attention to the possibility that law of various kinds, with different foundations of legitimacy, validity, power and authority, and with different degrees of institutionalisation and formalization, can coexist with the same social space, often at different scales (Von Benda- Beckmann & Von Benda-Beckmann, 2014, p. 34)

For example, within the same ‘space’ of a community, different scales of law can operate in tandem. Religious or customary laws can function (and compete for legitimacy), alongside global human rights laws and/or state law regarding issues such as marriage, domestic violence, land and property rights. State and religious courts can also operate in conjunction, or overlap, as can various providers of security and justice. As addressed earlier, refugee communities can often seek out alternative methods of security or justice provision, if they feel unable to access formal services due to the scrutiny they bring. As such, geolegality places a spotlight not only on the macro structures of state and international law, but also on alternative formal and informal structures and institutions who enact laws and policies and are grounded into communities.

Legal geography has been criticised by feminists for failing to acknowledge categories of difference in its analysis, and for its tendency to focus on wider transnational structures. For example, Meth et al.’s

(2019) research has demonstrated the ways in which different legal structures at work in communities have gendered effects. They highlight how security in marginalised communities is shaped by both formal and informal mechanisms of law and influenced by gendered biases. This research demonstrates the importance of examining the intersectional impacts of geolegality on various identities. To address these issues, Brickell & Cuomo (2019) have offered a theory of feminist geolegality. This theory is presented as a grouping and overlapping of feminist geopolitics and legal geography, which emphasises embodied accounts of the effects of law, as well as methodologies of intersectionality (Brickell & Cuomo, 2019, p. 107). As such, feminist legal geography has moved critical attention:

‘from the macro level of political analysis to more complex engagements between private and public spheres; to diffuse, multifaceted and relational understandings of power and empowerment; to social and cultural citizenship; and to political geographies that fluidly cut across gendered constructions of “formal” and “informal” (Statz & Pruitt, 2019, p. 1113). Brickell & Cuomo (2019) point to the importance of engaging in feminist epistemology and thus employing an approach that demonstrates how power is enacted in everyday encounters. They echo calls in feminist geopolitics to ground investigation in lived experiences and to explore the ways in which law plays out in intimate life (and indeed how intimate life shapes law). State refugee laws and policies are typically worded in gender neutral ways, overlooking gendered differences in how women

76 and men experience refugee-ness (Freedman, 2015). Yet law has gendered and spatial effects. As such, feminist geolegality encourages attention to the ways in which law shape gendered experiences, particularly the spatial nature of these experiences.

Feminist geolegality is fairly embryonic, however it does usefully encourage a wider assessment of the relationship between scales of law and space, and how these in turn can have gendered affects and outcomes. Reflecting on the ways in which refugee’s lives, opportunities and day to day experiences of security are widely shaped by law and the gendered vulnerabilities that this facilitates, refugee settings would benefit from the analysis of a feminist geolegal approach. This allows for a deeper consideration of the ways in which different laws and policies operate at different scales to shape spatial experiences of the everyday. Regarding this thesis, a feminist geolegal approach encourages an examination of how different scales of law play out in the everyday, spatial experiences of refugee women and how different laws and policies create spatial boundaries of the permitted and forbidden in host cities (Fenster, 1999).

Conclusion

This chapter has analysed refugee literature that explores the experiences of urban refugees living in cities of the majority world, and where possible, highlighted the gendered experiences of urban refugee women in these contexts. Specifically focusing on issues of shelter and livelihoods, legal status and protection, access to security and justice institutions and relationships with host communities, the first part of this chapter demonstrated the complex experiences of insecurity that urban refugees face and how these are often relational and overlapping. Current literature demonstrates that women do experience refugee-ness in differing ways to men. Indeed, these differences in experiences would be enriched using intersectional approaches, which rarely seem to be undertaken. Women experience a mixed and complex experience of new roles when they become refugees, which lead to varying experiences of both security and insecurity. Women are clearly at risk to gender based violence both within and outside their dwellings in their host communities. However, they also experience new roles and opportunities – some of which are empowering, and others very much the opposite. There are notable gaps in the literature and several questions emerge. For example, to what extent do gendered (and other) identities shape experiences of (in)security within host communities? As women are frequently highlighted as the victims of gender-based violence emerging from intimate partners to landlords and police, do they seek out formal methods of protection (such as police) or do they use informal avenues that are often critiqued for their patriarchal deference, and what are their impressions of these providers?

77 Considering the literature reviewed in this chapter, Fawaz & Akar’s (2012) description of the contested, confusing and overlapping scales of (in)security at the city scale point to some of the realities that urban refugee communities face. Refugees are often perceived as a threat and a source of insecurity (Chimni, 1998) but in themselves negotiate a multitude of insecurities from the micro to the macro. Urban refugee literature is predominantly focused on the varying scales and aspects of insecurity that refugees experience, and thus feminist theories of geolegality, human security and geopolitics are particularly valuable in theorising and conceptualising these experiences. These theories ground ideas of law and security in the everyday and focus on how wider structures and scales affect the lived experiences of those most marginalised. A feminist geopolitical lens probes questions about the scalar and relational aspects of insecurity that refugee women might experience, whilst a feminist geolegal approach highlights the ways in which refugee policies and laws shape the spaces that refugee women are ‘permitted’ or ‘forbidden’ from accessing and the ways in which law draws boundaries that place refugee women in situations of vulnerability and exploitation (Fenster, 1999).

The last theoretical chapter will focus more specifically on the Syrian refugee crisis and the approach that Lebanon and Jordan have taken towards the incoming refugee populations.

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Chapter Four: Jordan and Lebanon and their refugee policies

The previous two chapters have explored theoretical concepts of identity, agency, space and security, and the relationship between these, alongside literature that explores the experiences of urban refugees, in order to build a conceptual framework which underpins the empirical chapters of this thesis. This chapter changes direction to focus more specifically on the states, cities and refugee populations that are the object of this thesis’s investigation. It introduces each of the case study contexts and assesses the state structure and security apparatus at work in each nation. Differences in state capacity and operations of security services are important structural elements to consider regarding refugee’s quotidian experiences in their host cities. Noting how international relations theory has often labelled these states as either strong (Jordan) or weak (Lebanon), this chapter begins by exploring the usefulness of this paradigm alongside an examination of state and security structures within each country. Alongside this analysis, an exploration of each nation’s capital city is presented. These cities are the economic epi-centres of both nations and are shaped by the same ongoing and historic socio-political issues which structure these states as ‘strong’ or ‘weak’. The second part of the Chapter explores Lebanon and Jordan’s policies regarding Syrian refugees from the beginning of the crisis in 2011 up until 2017 (when the fieldwork for this thesis was completed). It analyses the ways in which each state’s complex history of hosting other refugee populations, social demographics and economic reliance on migrant workers shapes decisions towards Syrian refugees accordingly.