“We Can Never Go Back to How Things Were Before”: A Qualitative Study on War, Masculinities, and Gender Relations with Lebanese and Syrian Refugee Men and Women.

“We Can Never Go Back to How Things were Before”* is a qualitative study carried out as a partner study to the International Men and Gender Equality Survey – Middle East and North Africa (IMAGES MENA). This study aims to contribute to a greater understanding of how masculinities and gender relations are affected by the post-conflict setting and by the impact of conflict-related displacement in Lebanon. The study highlights various accounts by Lebanese and Syrian men and women of men’s gendered roles, gender norms and expectations of male and female behaviors, and gendered effects of conflict. Equally important, it provides accounts of men in Lebanon pursuing alternative notions of masculinity in the face of conflict and displacement.
The participants in this research represent a diverse sample, each portraying a particular political, social, and economic context central to Lebanon, which strengthens the results of this study. It also gives voice for different perspectives on the transitional state of gender roles in Lebanon. The results of this qualitative study allow for a set of recommendations to address masculinities through different types of programming within the Lebanese context.
The study includes quantitative and qualitative research with men and women aged 18 to 59 in Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, and Palestine.
The quantitative report presents the first round of IMAGES data collection in the MENA region that was carried out from April 2016 to March 2017, and aims to contribute to a greater understanding of how masculinities and gender relations are affected by the post-conflict setting and by the impact of conflict-related displacement in Lebanon.
The qualitative study highlights various accounts by Lebanese and Syrian men and women of men’s gendered roles, gender norms and expectations of male and female behaviors, and gendered effects of conflict. Equally important, it provides accounts of men in Lebanon pursuing alternative notions of masculinity in the face of conflict and displacement. The participants in this research represent a diverse sample, each portraying a particular political, social, and economic context central to Lebanon, which strengthens the results of this study. It also gives voice for different perspectives on the transitional state of gender roles in Lebanon.
* The report is available in Arabic and English, in addition to the full quantitative IMAGES MENA study report here.