The Borderwork of Humanitarianism During Displacement from War-Torn Syria: Livelihoods as Identity Politics in Northern Lebanon and Southeast Turkey

• Estella Carpi ^[1]
  1. [1] University College London

     University College London

     Reino Unido

     
• Localización: Mobility and Forced Displacement in the Middle East / Zahra Babar (ed. lit.), 2020, ISBN 9780197531365, págs. 33-53
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • This chapter attempts to add nuance to the scholarly debate on the security politics of borders and invites its readers to consider the practices and identities of refugees, host border societies, and earlier border migrants in a way that considers their pre-crisis (im)mobility status within the hybrid human realm of the border. The vacillating status of earning a living across the border in times of peace pervades the space of local citizenship during displacement. Against this backdrop, a clear-cut humanitarianism along borders—purporting to distinguish who is the host and who is the guest—acts as a force intended to preserve nation-state privileges. This vacillating status between borders represents the local citizens’ desire that the refugees return home as soon as possible; the refugees, in turn, are left to deal with the paradox of this request, as they are unable to definitively choose either site. It is in this vein that this chapter engages with ungraspable categories of life—and humanitarian labels—pushing border-crossing beyond a matter of life or death, and draws on the taxonomies that humanitarian borderwork and national border policies engender.