Thread by @aysegulkayaoglu

My article with @zeynepmencutek and @mmerdogan1103 just got published in the Journal of Immigrant and Refugee Studies! 🤗

It is about the return aspirations of Syrian Refugees in Turkey.

For the free copy: tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.108…

And here is a thread about it (1/n)

Based on the analysis of quantitative and qualitative data, we found that Syrian refugees’ return aspirations are shaped mainly by fear, uncertainty and lack of trust regarding Syria’s situation.

(2/n)

For the majority, the end of war is a sine qua non to return to Syria but would still fall short of ensuring it alone without safety, livelihood opportunities and essential services in heath and education.

(3/n)

These people are also stuck in an “involuntary stay” situation that fundamentally challenges the ‘voluntary return’ concept long accepted as a durable solution to mass displacement.

(4/n)

A higher level of social integration first increases and then sharply decreases the wish for never return and conditional return. Furthermore, unconditional return wishes first slightly drops but then abruptly increases as the social integration level rises. (5/n)

1- In line with our qualitative analysis, individuals between 25 and 64 mentioned the Syria-related factors more, although younger ones never did so.
2-Survey data show that 80% of male respondents pronounce Turkey-related factors while this rate decreases by half for females.

3- Qualitative data also reveal some insights on the role of marital status. On the one hand, married individuals frequently mention Turkey-related factors for their never return wishes. Widowed or divorced women, on the other hand, rarely said Syria-related factors.

(7/n)

4- Gender matters!
a) Syrian male interlocutors complain about gender mixing in the public sphere and the rise in divorce cases initiated by women in the Syrian community in Turkey.

(8/n)

5- Refugee women entering the labor market due to necessity and being more exposed to gender norms of equality -> partial empowerment of them and expectedly lower willingness to return to Syria than men who are seeking to continue traditional values and gender roles.

(9/n)

6- Children influence return plans, particularly in relation to the situation in Syria+ The presence of sons leads to a decrease in the tendency to return due to the risk of forced military conscription +Having small children makes some families avoid returning as well.

(10/n)

To test our hypotheses about the drivers of return wishes, we also used a quantitative analysis. We fit both a structural equation model (SEM) and a generalized structural equation model (GSEM).

(11/n)

This figure 👇summarizes the direct and indirect relationships with our control variables and the return wishes of refugees.

(11/n)

At least four theoretical lessons can be drawn from this case:

(12/n)

1- refugees’ return aspirations cannot be treated as a single situation of “want to return to the home country” versus “want to stay in the host country.” It should rather be placed in a broader spectrum, as we tried to reflect through never, conditional and unconditional return.

2- factors shaping refugees’ return wishes are slightly different from those of labor migrants, such as demographic dynamics overwhelmed by home-country-related development.

(14/n)

3- structural, cultural and social integration are found to be very relevant to return aspirations. Both cultural&social integration directly&indirectly affect return wishes, while structural int affects them only through its impact on socio-psychological experiences of refugees.

4- Fourth, all of the integration aspects significantly interact with underestimated factors – perceived discrimination, experiences and socio-cultural distance – that act as mediators in our empirical research.
(16/n)

Instead of overemphasizing the return options, both host countries&international community should have looked for pathways to enhance 2 other durable solution mechanisms:
(1)integration with lower levels of discrimination in the host countries
(2)resettlement to third countries.

Now it is time to celebrate the publication of this paper which took almost 2 years of hard work!

Needless to say, huge thanks goes to all anonymous reviewers and the great editor @triandafyllidou!