Farah Kobaissy - Organizing the Unorganized: Migrant Domestic Workers in Lebanon

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CAIRO PAPERS IN SOCIAL SCIENCE is a valuable resource for Middle East specialists and non-specialists. Published quarterly since 1977, these monographs present the results of current research on a wide range of social, economic, and political issues in the Middle East, and include historical perspectives.

Submissions of studies relevant to these areas are invited. Manuscripts submitted should be around 150 doublespaced typewritten pages submitted in hard copy or electronically. References should conform to the format of the American Anthropological Association (references with author, date and page parenthetically within the text). Manuscripts are refereed and subject to approval by the Editorial Board.

Opinions expressed in CAIRO PAPERS do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff or of the American University in Cairo. The editors welcome diversity of subject matter and viewpoint.

EDITORIAL BOARD

Maha Abdelrahman Cambridge University	Joel Beinin Stanford University
Amina Elbendary Arabic & Islamic Civilizations, AUC	Sharif Elmusa Political Science, AUC
Nicholas S. Hopkins, Chair Anthropology, AUC	Ann M. Lesch Political Science, AUC
Sean McMahon Political Science, AUC	Hoda Rashad Social Research Center, AUC
Malak S. Rouchdy Sociology, AUC	Reem Saad Anthropology, AUC
Hanan Sabea Anthropology, AUC	Mostafa K. Al-Sayyid Political Science, Cairo U.
Earl L. Sullivan Political Science, AUC	Iman A. Hamdy Editor

For submissions and inquiries,

please contact:

Dr. Iman Hamdy

Cairo Papers in Social Science

The American University in Cairo

P.O. Box 74

New Cairo 11835, Egypt

Tel: +202.2615.1586

Cover photo: Migrant Workers Parade by Pat Sy

Copyright 2016 by the American University in Cairo Press

113, Sharia Kasr el Aini, Cairo, Egypt

420 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10018

www.aucpress.com

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the copyright owner.

eISBN 978 1 61797 732 9

Version 1

Contents

Beyond the Weapons of the Weak: Domestic
Workers Union in Lebanon

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.

.

....

I have incurred endless debts to many people who supported me throughout the journey of completing this study. I owe this work primarily to the members of the executive board of the trade union for domestic workers in Lebanon, who provided the context for the research. I can never be grateful enough for their generosity with their time and resources. I am deeply grateful to Mala, Lily, Gemma, Rose, Suzanne, and Maryam, whose courage and steadfastness inspired me to write and to finish the thesis upon which this work is based.

I am also deeply indebted to Martina Rieker, my academic supervisor, and to Hanan Sabea and Ray Jureidini, the readers of my research, for their continued guidance and insightful comments on the evolving forms of the thesis. Martinas tireless academic, political, and personal commitment toward her students, her unwavering support for us, her endless teasing and sense of humor, constituted part and parcel of my journey and made the MA years a time of true learning and maturing. Many people in the academy have also guided me through the journey of formulating this research and preparing for it. Their own work and their engagement with my research is affirming. I would like to thank Jennifer Yvette Terrel, Arunima Gopinath, and Mallarika Sinha Roy.

This research would not have been completed without the nurturing group of friends and colleagues at the Center for Gender and Womens Studies at the American University in Cairo, who read earlier drafts of the thesis and shared their ideas and academic critiques throughout the writing phase. I owe the many hours of writing, crying, laughing, and support to Kenza Youssefi, Menna Mourad, Sabrina Lilleby, and Sara Verderi.

The research would also not have been possible without the support of friends and family. Special thanks are owed to Maya Elhelou and Mostafa Mohie, whose continuous encouragement, comments, and discussions inspired many of the ideas presented here, as well as to Nabil Abdo, Nidal Ayoub, Hisham Ashkar, Ghassan Makarem, Farah Salka, and Nadine Moawad, whose love, activism, and untiring commitment to social change were and will always be a source of inspiration. I also thank Nadine, Ghassan, and Hisham for helping editing parts of the thesis. To Aslam Khan, who tried his best, despite the distance, to continuously feed my soul with much-needed love. And finally to my mother Olfat and my father Haidarof, who have always provided encouragement for my education and choices in life, however awkward they seemed. This monograph is dedicated to their labor.

Beyond the Weapons of the Weak: Domestic Workers Union in Lebanon

We are here today celebrating equality for all.

Migrants and nationals join together as one.

So, domestic workers, stop dying.

Its time to rejoice and strive...

Heal Beirut,

Make it a better place

For you and me

And the entire workers race.

There are migrants dying.

Do you care for their living?

Make it a better place

For you and for me.

(Extract from a song written and sung
by the domestic workers unionists during the
launching of their union on January 25, 2015.)

On Sunday, May 4, 2015, the occasion of International Workers Day, hundreds of migrant domestic workers and their allies in Lebanon took to the streets, demanding that their union be formally recognized by the Lebanese government. The union has been denounced by the labor minister as illegal, arguing that it will only generate problems instead of solving them. The minister suggested that protection for domestic workers is best guaranteed through new laws, not through union The ministers last statement blatantly expresses the state of fear generated by the thought of workers organizing, migrants in particular, who through their attempt are putting a foot out of their zone of exception into the political and the social space of the nation.

Various sources estimate the number of migrant domestic workers in Lebanon between 150,000 and 200,000 in an overall work force of 1.45 million (Tayah 2012:9). In a country where state provisions for childcare and care for the elderly are absent, the burden falls on the nuclear family, and women in particular, to cope with the organization of care and domestic work. Cheap and precarious migrant domestic labor represents a low-cost solution to the Lebanese care deficit. It is estimated that one in every four families in Lebanon employs a migrant domestic worker (Jureidini 2011a).

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