December 1, 2009

The Refugee-Industrial Complex: the QIZ in Jordan

In 1997, the U.S. established several Qualified Industrial Zones (QIZ) in Jordan and Egypt, where labor-intensive production (such as textiles and garments), were manufactured for tax-free export to the U.S., under the condition that the financial operation involved an 8% Israeli input. This neo-liberal initiative, aimed at the normalization of Arab countries with Israel by way of the U.S.’s vision for a single economic zone stretching across the Middle East. Endorsed by Condolezza Rice, the Free Trade Agreement for the QIZ was widely promoted as a peace-making measure in the region.

The incentive to agree to this arrangement was regarded by the Jordanians as an opportunity for the creation of a lot of jobs. Yet the reality is that the majority of the workers in the QIZ were recruited by Asian manufacturers in China, Sri-Lanka and Bangladesh. Among the local workers, half come from Palestinian refugee camps located near the QIZs. The entanglement between the two extra-territorial spaces – refugee camp and free-trade zone – add a different layer to the symbolic significance of the QIZ. Recruited among the poorest and most marginalized segments of the population, the Palestinian refugees find themselves, ironically, tied into an economic agreement that normalizes the very relations that segregates them.

There is a gender dimension that further complicates the configuration. Most of the workers are women who have never been in the labor market before. It is their first introduction to the economic sphere and its social implications. They were suddenly exposed to a male boss and to other women from different milieus, and sometimes even from different cultures, as is the case in the factories where Asian workers are mixed with Jordanian women from villages and women from Palestinian refugee camps. They found themselves working side by side with Filipinas, whom, for instance, come to work in shorts and T-shirts during the summer months. Since most of the factories are producing garments and underwear, e.g. for the U.S. chain store Victoria’s Secret, women workers were also exposed to fashionable garments that awakened their self-consciousness about their appearance and social interaction with others. Wage-earning is also problematic for women in patriarchal family and social structures. These exposures were evidently experienced by women as stimulating, and earned suspicion amongst men. While local laborers could return to their families in villages and camps, migrant Asian workers often lived in closed and over-crowded container cities. Their working and living conditions were extremely precarious.

What follows is an interview with Oroub El-Abed, who conducted a field research funded by the Norwegian Fafo, (the Institute for Applied International Studies, Oslo) in the North of Jordan, in 2008. The study included interviews with women working in Al-Hassan Industrial Zone near Irbid who live in the Kufur Yuba town and Azmi El-Mufti (Al Husun) refugee camp.

Ursula Biemann: Your extensive gender study on the QIZ has been more than inspiring for my current video research on extra-territorial spaces in the Middle East, it has been absolutely fundamental for understanding the social transformation triggered by this massive industrial implantation. I would like to ask you some specific questions that have intrigued me all along. In a tribal Muslim society like Jordan, men and women don’t mix in the public sphere. How does the QIZ deal with the gender issue?

Oroub el Abed: The manufacturing industries tried indeed to accommodate the needs of women in order to attract them to the job opportunities in the QIZ. They offer a conservative and respectable work environment which complies to the social, cultural and religious limitations of women in this society. First and foremost, this requires segregated work spaces and means of transportation for men and women. From the beginning, factories made efforts to build trust with the parents and the community. In response to the serious concern about their daughters working in remote areas, out of sight, the factories often held day-visits for parents to learn more about the work environment, the employer and supervisors of the place where their daughters worked. Buses were mandated by factories’ management to only bring women. The same applies to women in the refugee camps: every morning, dozens of buses queue to pick-up women from the camp and drive them to the factories at the QIZs. Factory owners addressed the issue of distance and proximity by not only providing for gender segregated buses, but also by moving factories to the villages rather than moving the workers to the QIZ. Younis El-Omari factory was established in 2004 at the crossroad of several villages to be near peoples’ homes.

The concern for safeguarding the reputation of working women, created an environment of ‘women only’, where only few men have access (for machine maintenance) and always accompanied by supervisors. This segregation can be described as a “de-sexualisation” of work place communities, the sexual connotations of physical closeness between men and women is de-emphasized in an effort to defuse any threat on their reputation. On the other hand, there are rumors as well as true stories of women who have run away with men from the QIZ. A first contact usually happened at the bus station, during the bus ride, in the city centre or in front of the factory. They exchanged numbers and started arranging times to meet in the city during lunch break. A factory like Massira, that employs Jordanian women workers only, prevents women from going on a mid-day leave, unless they have a good reason.

Women workers felt that men were opposed to a mixed environment not only because of concern for women’s reputations but also, by extension, for the reputation of their entire family. It was a pretext to deploy male power, and their regime of control and domination. They vested ‘mixing’ with all the negative attributes possible, including shame, to deter women from working at the QIZ.

We have to recognize that for women at the QIZ, work represents a complex struggle between conforming to traditional gender roles and negotiating social and economic autonomy of wage-earning. It is economic necessity that pushes women into the labor force, but this shift had emancipatory side effects. It created opportunities for change and a break with traditional barriers.

UB: In what way do you see the situation of those women workers living in the Palestinian camps as particular in the overall constellation? After all the free trade agreement supposes a peace arrangement between Jordan, Israel and Palestine.

OA: The QIZ was at the beginning rejected and banned. The opposition, at the forefront was regarding the mixed-gender environment. But for the Palestinian camp dwellers it was not only the idea of working in a limited space where men and women mix, the problem was also working for an Israeli investment. In 2002, during the Second Intifada and the Israeli destruction of some camps and parts of cities in the West Bank, the families in the camp used to go out in the morning and prevent women from getting on the buses to go to work. It was a way to pressure the government of Israel through businessmen and investors who had stakes in Jordan, and have them lobby to stop the attacks against Palestinian cities. A worker from Al Husan camp described the irony of going to work in the morning at the factory, and come back in the afternoon to participate in protests around the camp in 2002. The feeling of guilt and the need to secure a living were in antagonism.

A Jordanian woman from the refugee camp of Azmi El-Mufti echoed these conflicted sentiments, so on the one hand, the dire living conditions, and the need to make money and find the environment that somehow complies to their cultural and financial needs; on the other hand, learning that she worked for an operation that has joint Israeli investment. When she first started to work at the QIZ, Bakhita received a lot of comments from people, that she was working for the “enemy”. She did not care much since these people could not support her with financial help, meanwhile the factory could!

Money and investment in lucrative businesses for both investors and workers are believed to be a successful tool for normalizing the relationship between Israelis, Palestinians and Jordanians. However, Jon Leyne from BBC argued that work at the QIZ had done little to change attitudes in Jordan towards Israel. The peace process was simply privatized by implicating workers who depend on this income, into the political scheme. The conflict is thus faught out in the private sphere.

Montaser Oklah at the Jordanian Ministry of Industry and Trade in an online interview done by Jon Leyne for BBC news in April 2006 commented that, the QIZ is an excellent tool devised by the United States to privatize the peace process. But what he means by that is that it allows people from both sides – the Jordanians, the Israelis as well as the Palestinians – to have a sense of the peace process’s benefits. Because the manufacturing sector boosted exports, investment, and job opportunities in Jordan, he feels that the economic situation built a wall between people’s patriotism and their livelihood strategies. 

UB: Would you say that there is an emancipatory moment in the entry of these young women in the labor market and if so where is it manifested?

OA: Their new role as breadwinners has certainly given space for women to become decision-maker, house-keeper, and a main player at home as well. It has given women the choice to partner with the male figure in the household in shouldering responsibility, giving and receiving support. The majority of women in the camps (whether single or married) have attested to the fact that because of the money they bring to the household, they are more respected, their views are taken into consideration more often, they contribute to the decision-making and the funding of some of the family’s ventures, such as educating a younger brother, building an additional floor or expanding the house.

Change is happening for sure. Men are slowly accepting more to be at par with women at home, in terms of income-sharing and sharing housework. The process is long term, men need to accept women as their peers and partners. Before they head out to the factory and after they return, women still have to clean the house, the difference is that male siblings now help out with whatever tasks she cannot do. This change is part of a social practice inculcated by parents, who divide tasks amongst themselves and their children so that each member of the family feels implicated in the functioning and order of the household, regardless of how small or mundane the task.

UB: Besides these remarkable changes in women’s lives, did they speak about a greater mobility in the public sphere or the advantages of being in contact with women beyond their usual social field?

OA: Economic liberalization and globalized markets have boosted consumption in Jordan. Particularly for women, there is a whole new consumer culture that brings them out of their house and into the public sphere every day. With their new income, women can afford (and enjoy) a more stylish disposition, consuming fashion, make-up, perfumes and accessories. This is most visible with women who are not the main breadwinner of the household, and who spend part of their salary on outings to cafés, restaurants and malls and mobile phones that help them organize this new social life. The factory job allowed women to build friendships, most obviously with other women but also, in a more concealed manner, with men.

Women working at the QIZ appreciate the mobility and exposure. Some women have moved from a rural life to looking for work outside the country. Naimeh, for instance, worked at a traditional farm before working at the factory. During nine months, she divided her time between day-work at the QIZ and training as a hairdresser in the evenings. With the new skills she began to investigate job opportunities in the Gulf, where salaries are much higher than in Jordan. When I interviewed her, Naimeh was expecting to hear from a beauty salon in the UAE, she had recently turned down an offer to work in Saudia Arabia, for a salary of 500JDs. She said: “I don’t have to go and stay in a remote village and live alone. I can leave and get a better job and a better life.”

In the refugee camps, where a salary is vital for coping with quotidian expenses, many women have managed to make a real difference with their income. Nihaya was able to build and furnish a house for the family while her mother-in-law was taking care of her children. The house was registered in her husband’s name becaue it would be inconceivable to have a house registered in the name of a woman in the family. Tagrid, who lives in Al Husun camp, is another story of a ‘dream come true’, she earned a university degree in English while doing night shifts at the QIZ. After her graduation, she was recruited at the factory to be the official translator with the foreign investors. She fulfilled her objectives in getting an education, finding a better job and becoming financially independent.