Journals articles
Ala Alrababah, Daniel Masterson, Marine Casalis, Dominik Hangartner, and Jeremy Weinstein (forthcoming), The Dynamics of Refugee Return: Syrian Refugees and Their Migration Intentions, British Journal of Political Science (accepted for publication).
In order to understand how refugee crises end we require an understanding of when and why refugees return home. We study the drivers of refugees’ decision-making using original observational and experimental data from a representative sample of 3,003 Syrian refugees in Lebanon. We find that conditions in a refugee’s home country are the primary drivers of return intentions. Refugees’ decisions are influenced primarily by safety and security in their place of origin, their economic prospects, and the availability of public services. Personal networks and confidence in information are also important. By contrast, the conditions in refugee-hosting countries––so-called “push” factors––play a much smaller role. Even in the face of hostility and poor living conditions, refugees are unlikely to return unless the situation at home improves significantly. In addition to the data from Lebanon, we explore the generality of our findings using a second original survey of Syrian refugees in Jordan.
A pre-publication draft can be read here.
Ali Ali (2021) Disaggregating Jordan’s Syrian refugee response: The ‘Many Hands’ of the Jordanian state, Mediterranean Politics.
This is a disaggregated study of different factors which shaped Jordan’s Syrian refugee response. It considers the response’s internal workings and how hosting a large displaced population from the Mediterranean state of Syria is distributed across different public institutions with the involvement of international actors. The argument is that an agenda intent on securing the status quo influences the response, but that it is not always coherently implemented by the many hands of the Jordanian state. The main aims are to resist the permanence of Syrians so as not to undermine the demographic balance that favours Trans-Jordanians; to secure income for hosting Syrians; and to limit the possibilities for formal Syrian economic competition with Jordanians. At the same time, and related to these aims, there are initiatives to render Syrians legible, and these legibility initiatives serve different goals depending on which hand of the state is enacting them. The paper is based on qualitative fieldwork conducted from December 2016 to March 2017 in Jordan. It features interviews with Jordanian officials from national and municipal institutions, and with staff from international organizations.
Ali al-Ali et. al (2021) What difference do mayors make? Municipal politics in the Syrian refugee response in Lebanon and Turkey.
With the majority of refugees now in urban areas, mayors and municipal authorities have been recognized as increasingly important policy actors in the global refugee regime. However, there has been little systematic academic research exploring the conditions under which mayors make a difference to refugee-policy outcomes. Theoretically, the paper outlines a heuristic framework aimed at disaggregating key variables, including the independent influence of mayors, in shaping municipal-level outcomes. Empirically, the article assesses the role of municipal authorities and mayors in the two most numerically significant host countries for Syrian refugees: Turkey and Lebanon. It comparatively examines variation across six metropolitan municipalities to show that mayors matter because they may mediate the implementation of national policies and because they sometimes adopt supplementary refugee policies and practices at the municipal level, which may be more or less proactive or more or less restrictive than central-government policy.
Book Chapters
Ali al- Ali (2020) Displacement and state transformation; The coercion and systemic discarding of the Mandaeans and Palestinians of Iraq 2003–2010
This chapter examines the displacement of under-researched minority populations of Iraq who were targeted after regime change in 2003. It shows how the Palestinians of Iraq were portrayed—rightly or wrongly—to be loyal to the old order; while the Sabaean Mandaeans, an ancient religious minority, were marginalised and regularly targeted in post-Saddam Iraq, and what the implications were for displacement. The chapter makes a conceptual contribution with the notion of systemically discarded populations: groups deemed to be superfluous or threatening to a nascent political order that emerges after acute systemic transformations. Being systemically discarded is a process that involves exclusion and displacement. Displacement is not equated with forced migration, rather it is a process through which the displaced are subjected to increased constraints and threats in their daily lives. Forced migration is a possible outcome of this process. The chapter’s additional scholarly contribution is the introduction of concepts from moral philosophy to explain the coercive elements of the displacement process. The process is conceptualised as one with phases and counter-phases, during which the discarded and displaced populations use material and other resources available to them to resist exclusion and evade threat. The chapter is based on extended interviews with Iraqis who were resident in Syria during 2010 and 2011.
Ali al- Ali (2020) ‘Baghdad: War and Insecurity in the City’ in Cities at War: Global Insecurity and Urban Resistance.
Policy Briefs
How do state and civil society stakeholders in Jordan view the EU-Jordan compact? January 2023
Mansur, Y, Yassin, N, and Mourad,Y., et al, 2023. How do state and civil society stakeholders in Jordan view the EU-Jordan Compact? Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs (IFI), American University Beirut.
Demagogy, improvisation, populism and politicization: the case of the EU-Lebanon compact January 2023
Anouti, S, Yassin, N., Mourad, Y., Awab, Z., 2023. Demagogy, improvisation, populism and politization: the case of the EU-Lebanon Compact, Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs (IFI), American University Beirut.
Turkey-Eu politics through the lens of civil and state actors January 2023
Nimer, M., Arpacik, D., Yassin, N., Mourad, Y., 2023. Turkey-EU politics through the lens of civil and state actors, Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs (IFI), American University Beirut.
Integration and Well-Being of Syrian Youth in Turkey
Rebecca Bryant and Maissam Nimer outline the findings of the Responsible Deal research into the lives and livelihoods of Syrian youth living in Turkey. These findings were presented at the closing conferences of the project in May and June 2022.
Bryant Nimer Policy Brief Syrian Youth Turkey
Roundtable Discussion: Supporting Syrian Refugees
A note containing key points made at the Brussels expert roundtable co-hosted by the European Council of Foreign Relations (ECFR) on the 6th May 2022.
LSE ECFR Readout Brussels Expert Roundtable 2 (1)
Syrian Refugees in Global Context: Protection, Insecurity and Governance
A note containing key points made at the public conference organised by on the 21st June 2022 at the RSA, London.
LSE Readout Responsible Deal Conference 21st June
Returning Home? Conditions in Syria, Not Lebanon, Drive the Return Intentions of Syrian Refugees
A comprehensive report published by IPA’s Peace & Recovery Program with support of researchers from the Immigration Policy Lab (IPL). The report constitutes a representative survey of 3,000 Syrian refugees in Lebanon from August-October 2019 to learn about their return intentions. It finds the conditions in Lebanon do not play an important role in predicting return intentions, but rather local conditions in people’s hometowns.
The Dynamics of Refugee Return: Syrian Refugees and Their Migration Intentions
A study on the drivers of refugees’ decision-making using original observational and experimental data from a representative sample of 3,003 Syrian refugees in Lebanon. The papers finds that conditions in a refugee’s home country are the primary drivers of return intentions.