Part of this post part is of a reseearch that I published in venture Magazine in July 2007 (I think). The article is called out of Sync. I have chosen parts of it for today’s post.This article was heavely edited… so don’t be surprisedif it looks professional!

            The question of labour rights is something that has been constantly on my mind lately. Mostly because I have recently joint the labour force in Jordan… well obviously I am not in the blue collar sector. I have a highly respectable position at a highly respectable sector. However being one of  millions of people who earn their living by doing actual work,  makes me wonder what the situation is in the blue collar sector if this is how it is in the white collar sector.

           I have several thoughts that I would like to share in the coming few months,  but today I would like to start at a very safe place: the culture of shame.

           I am one of those who don’t believe in the culture of shame. I add my voice to those who claim that this is an expression invented by the government to cover their failure to solve concrete problems, such as unemployment, low wages and human rights violations; and what better exit  than blame the people?

Picture taken from my window

Decoding the “Culture of Shame”

           In a study conducted by the Ministry of Labour a few years, the disconnect between available Jordanian jobseekers and vacant jobs is addressed partly as a logistical challenge, and partly an entrenched social reality.

            “This mismatch comes from the geographical distance between job opportunities and job seekers,” said Ghada Salem, (She was an economic researcher at the Ministry of Labour, as well as a Procurement Officer at the World Bank when this article was originally wrote). The research also shows that the general impression is that the productivity of Jordanians is lower than the productivity of foreign workers. Not only that, but that Jordanians have higher expectations from job opportunities in terms of benefits and positions. “Sometimes even if there are opportunities, it is difficult to find Jordanians who are willing to take up these jobs, partly because of their expectations and partly because of the culture,” said Salem.

           In one of the projects that I managed a few years ago; I was faced with a situation that almost  made me fall in the trap of believing in the culture of shame. The project was  a 24-month experimental initiative aiming to link unemployed women with work opportunities through helping them understand their own skills using the portfolio of competences model.  

            The project hasn’t been simple. Local training coordinator Mrs. Ibdah from Wadi Al Rayan in Northern Ghor told Venture, “These women do not want to work. Don’t waste your breath on them.”

           The program had administered an eight week skills training to 30 women for jobs in local textile factories in Irbid, and I couldn’t understand why the women declined jobs after completing training. “They all were very excited about the possibility of steady income less than a week ago,” Ibdah  said. “Now that we have found them opportunities in the textile industry, most of them used their male kin as an excuse for not working in the factories.”

            The negative perception of working in factories is not uncommon; as research conducted by the Economic Research Unit at the Centre for Strategic Studies (CSS) of the University of Jordan showed that Jordanians refuse to work at a number of jobs.  69 percent of the unemployed in Jordan refuse to work as agricultural workers, 82 percent refuse to work in construction, 79 percent as building guards, 71 percent as messengers for companies and 75 percent would not work as waiters.

           Whilst these attitudes may seem arbitrary, the research shows that a clear majority of the unemployed males would accept these jobs (with the exception of cleaning) at a salary of 200JD per month. The study suggests that the primary aversion of these jobs is not the commonly referenced Jordanian “culture of shame,” but the meagre financial returns associated with these sectors.

           This is one important explanation for the challenges presented by the women of Wadi Al Rayan. After internal research, participants admitted that some of their reluctance to work is related to transportation fees that they have to bear in order to travel to their work places in Irbid. “I will take home about 100 JDs after all the deductions, the bus from al Wadi to Irbid costs around 120 Piasters everyday. This leaves me with about 70 JD at the end of the month,” said Mrs. Khateeb, one of the target women. “It is just not worth it.”

Insecurity Kills the Economy

          Low wages alone don’t tell the whole story. Poor benefits, a perceived lack of stability and difficult working conditions also drive a wedge between Jordanians and growth industry jobs. Many unemployed simply don’t have faith in the private sector’s ability to provide for them and their families.

            Construction is such an example. Despite the fact that 23.8 percent of the labour force is in construction, Jordanian participation has declined almost 50 percent between 1987 and 2003, due to unattractive salaries and working conditions. Today, the vast majority of those currently working in this sector are non-Jordanians.

           According to a study by the European Training Foundation, the overwhelming majority of business enterprises in Jordan are small: 94 percent have four or fewer workers. And few small companies can match the benefits of being employed in the public sector. “I can be sacked any time in the private sector, but in the public sector, I have both the stability and the benefits,” said Mahmoud Abdallah, an unemployed young man from Irbid.

            Insecurity is one of the most prominent reasons cited by the Wadi Al Rayan target women. In order to take a job in the Irbid factories, the women needed to surrender a significant portion of their guaranteed National Aid income. In the end, this proved unattractive.

             Dr. Ahmad Kafawen (was the general manager of the National Aid Fund at the time) explained that a household of five or more receives a monthly allowance JD156.  If the head of the family starts working, this allowance will be decreased by the amount of the monthly salary. This means that if a woman heads a family, she will actually take home less money—after transportation costs—than if she stayed at home. Furthermore, there is a clear government policy that if a woman refuses a job opportunity, she would lose her national aid anyway. The result is that most women do not attempt to look for jobs. 

             Perhaps this helps explain the appeal of the public sector and the Armed Forces. The jobs are considered very stable, and the benefits offered are attractive; including social security, retirement plans and health insurance, for both the worker’s nuclear family and parents.

               “Young men work at the factories temporarily, they stay around till they get a job in the public sector, and they take them, even if the payment is less,” said Mohamed Injadat, General Manager of a textile factory in one of the QIZs in Al-Ghor. “They feel that jobs at the public sector are more secure.”

 Domestic Disturbance

              The vast majority of domestic helpers in Jordan are non-Jordanians. According to a new report by the Ministry of Labour’s information and studies department, the number of legal domestic helpers in the country is just over 38,000, of which some 18,000 are Indonesians, 11,000 from Philippines, 8,000 Sri Lankans and 350 Egyptians. Jordanians avoid this growth sector for many reasons, but most prominent are deep-seated concerns about working conditions. (I wonder how relevant is the resistance from several countries, such as India, SriLanka, Philppines… etc to send domestoc workers to Jordan related to the working conditions? I think, this was coming eventually)

             As current Jordanian labour law excludes domestic workers, plentiful circumstantial evidence suggests that they are rife for mistreatment. Article Three of the National Labour Law states that “servants who are working for houses, their gardens, their cooks…and those of similar capacity,” are excluded, explains Mr. Amjad Wishah, Director of Migrant Workers Directorate. 

            He says the exemption aims to preserve the private nature of the home: “It is difficult to send inspectors to supervise the labour in private houses. However, we are aware of the problems that rise from the current situation; we are working on a mechanism to include them in the law while respecting the home’s privacy.”

            The exemption has understandable impacts on Jordanians’ willingness to be domestic workers, says Assem Rababa’a, Head of Aballah, a human rights organization advocateing for Arab rights in Israel. “The nature of work, which requires women to sleep at the employer’s house, long hours, low financial returns and the fear of abuse are all reasons why Jordanians don’t allow their daughters to work in this sector.”

             Faced with low salaries, the home governments of domestic workers in Jordan are stepping in. The Philippines Ministry of Labour has increased the pay scale of domestic workers to $400 a month effective March 2007. Louisa Reyes, a Welfare Officer at the Embassy of Philippines in Amman, pointed out that when the salaries were first increased, the government hoped that families who could afford a larger salary would be more educated, thus decreasing the likelihood of abuse of Filipina workers. 

           Physical, psychological and verbal abuse is alarmingly common, according to Reyes. “Of the complaints we get [from domestic workers], 40 to 50 percent …are about physical abuse. And another 10 to 15 percent are about sexual abuse.”

                 To investigate the life of a foreign domestic worker is to delve into unpleasant stories. The Embassy hears complaints that live-in domestic workers are rarely allowed to leave the house, visit their friends or go for a walk. It’s not unheard of in Jordan that they are even locked up in empty apartments. In some cases, families (and/or employment agencies) go as far as confiscating the domestic worker’s passport, further hindering their ability to defend themselves.

Clever Can Go a Long Way

           The labour crisis in Jordan is forcing organizations to find innovative solutions. One example comes from the NGO community. In response to the difficulties presented by the Labour law exemption, one project is training Jordanian women to be domestic workers, but avoiding private homes altogether. Izdihar, funded by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation, focuses on professional office cleaning. By avoiding domestic settings, the project faces the “culture of shame” that hinders the free movement of women from conservative areas and implying disrespect for manual and blue-collar work.

              Izdihar attracts unskilled women, trains them for 4 months and then certifies them. “We are starting training course number twelve,” said Nawal Khalil, the Project Coordinator. “85 percent of our trainees find jobs, mostly in hospitals and hotels, however families still do not allow their daughters to work in houses,” she said. Once these women were given favourable wages, social security and health insurance, resistance from their families faded.

              The Greater Amman Municipality found an ingenious solution to workers’ reluctance to work in the sanitary sector. Mr. Ali al-Askar, Deputy Manager for the District Affairs at the Municipality pointed out that the Municipality needed new strategies to encourage Jordanians to work in the sector. First, the city changed the job title for sanitation workers, from Cleaning Officer to National Officer. By locating employees’ regular routes neighbourhoods other than their own removed much of the stigma of their work. These changes, coupled with a small increase in salaries and monthly productivity awards dealt with a major taboo. 

            Mr. al-Askar said that the Municipality does not have exact figures, but he says the shortage in the number of sanitation workers has eased.

            GAM’s successes don’t discount the notion that big initiatives may be required in other sectors. With efficient implementation, the impact of the Ministry of Labor’s new plan to recruit 30,000 unskilled workers—via the Army—for training in the construction sector could make waves throughout the industry. The plan calls for trainees to receive all the benefits afforded to military personnel during the project’s duration.

              This will provide Jordanian unemployed youth with the sense of security they search for, when they are seeking employment, and in the long term, they will have more benefits if they stayed with the armed forces,” said Shawkat Ababneh, the Deputy Manager for the National Training and Employment Center.

Source:  Centre for Strategic Studies (CSS) of the University of Jordan

 The comment brought up a conversation that keeps repeating itself in my life: Women and property. 

 Stories about women and property

 In a conversation I had with N. couple of years ago, she complained about this particular issue. N and her husband made an agreement that anything they will purchase after they got married, should be registered in both their names, regardless of who brings the bread home. She felt, at that point, that she had given up her career to take care of him and the children, and felt that she deserved to share his money and his property. She complained however, that every time they purchased something, things worked out in a way that the property ended up to be registered in his name alone!

E. on the other hand, was getting engaged. Her fiancé was about to purchase their dream house, she suggested that she should pay part of it and co-own it with him. But the idea was shot down before it even got the chance to reach his parents…. He told her clearly, that his family would find this offensive.  It would have given the impression they could not afford buying the house and therefore she had to help… her intention was to co-own the property that was going to live in anyway.   (She ended up buying a piece of land somewhere with the money she was going to contribute to the house)

L. is a third example…. She comes from one of these business oriented families. The family buys property and land for girls in the family in return for their share of the family business. However, they don’t allow them to be part of the business…

What do they say?

Would women give up their marriage or stop getting married if they have lands?

Hala (house wife, 54)

“Bullshit! Women have the right to own land. Fatima, the prophet’s daughter, owned a small garden, and she stuck to Ali till the end.  Why can’t other women do the same?”

 Kifah (counsellor , 39)

A lot of women choose husbands based on their financial status. If they own property, the pressure to choose financial support becomes much less, and therefore they choose based on compatibility. Therefore I think It is the opposite, if women are financially independent, the quaity of their choises improves.)

 Maria (teacher, 61)

“This is the masculine perspective. A woman would never leave a husband that she respects and loves for land. At a certain age, companionship becomes the most important thing for women… However, maybe men have been getting away with a lot in the name of financial support. The question that should be asked… do they deserve to be with the woman they are with? Only independent women can answer this question.”

Lara (Marketing guru 26)

I don’t believe women would stop getting married if they own land, or maybe this is the way things are here in Jordan.

I think men feel threatened that women can leave them any time since they can become independent after owning a piece of land. This is only in the minds of men where they should be the providers, but women in nature need to settle down and have a family, it’s instinctive. However, if women live in an environment where they need to rebel and retaliate then this would be their chance to prove that they do not need men.

Either way it’s good to show men that women are not to be taken for granted, to sleep with one eye open

 Hamza ( salesman, 24)

It is true. We know how women think (so emotionally ) and they have speedy reactions. If she gets angry with her husband for any small reason, she will leave, because she has the land and can live alone.

 Issam (IT guru, 31)

I can’t help but laugh. Please excuse me but this is the silliest logic I’ve heard for a long time.
While financial dependence on the man is dominating in the marriage relation, I can’t see how financial well being of a woman could lead to a tendency to abstain from a relationship or marriage.

 I would like to take the thought a step back, a peek in the recent history.

Women property rights in the ottoman empire

According to Amira El-Azhary Sonbol in her study Women of  the Jordan (2003), Ottoman records show that women’s property rights were implemented at all levels of the Islamic legal system. They show that “no one, including the husbands or even fathers, could make use of women’s property without their consent, and women appealed to the courts when anyone tampered with their assets.”

It seems that women’s property rights started declining with the European colonization.  Women got caught between the western imperialism and the conservative Islam that started spreading faster and faster.

Back to today’s world

I no longer think it is about women at all… I think it is about the land.  I just learnt that some tribes have an unwritten agreement, where, people should not sell land outside the tribe. Land equals status and bargaining power, therefore should stay within the tribe. The problem in the case of women is when they marry outside the tribe. In that case, land will be no longer the property of the tribe.

According to a survey that was conducted by freedomhouse, women’s access to inheritance, housing, and property is affected by their educational level, family support systems, economic status, and access to legal information and mechanisms. One thing for sure, women don’t get their share of inheritance or property.  In some cases, when they are not financially independent, and don’t have any providers, they cede their share of family land to their brothers, in return of economic support.

The problem is that governments do not take aggressive steps to enforce women’s inheritance and property rights and often allow abuses to go unpunished.

Where are the safety procedures?

First thing i see in the morning are these men risking their lives for their daily bread… I wonder, why we don’t have policies that ensure safety for these human beings in Jordan?

I had to hold my breath again… the nearest land, which is Malta refused not only to receive them but they also refused to receive the legal fishing boat that saved, because Malta has more immigrants than they can deal with, and they are under strict rules by the EU in dealing with this emerging xenophobia.

So these immigrants are stuck in the sea under the sun, without food, without water and without hope!

I left quickly to reach the German embassy to apply for visas for the students participating in exchange porogram that Lina and I are organizing in Muenster Germany… Our biggest challenge so far has been the visa. However challenges are going up and down like the stock market with the changes in the political climate. We had all the papers organized and ready,  but we could not even get someone to give us an appointment and for days we went back to stand in line with the tens of people standing under the suffocating sun in jabal Amman waiting to be looked at, some of them have been coming back for weeks and have been sent home day after day.

We obviously had a different case as we are a group of students who are going for 15 days to have fun, while these tens of people mostly Iraqis are waiting in line to immigrate to start a life, as they are suffering in their country and they can’t find jobs, and they can’t afford sending their children to private schools.

We finally were able to get an appointment due to Lina’s insitence  and resourcefullness and because we got the German hosting comapny to call the embassy from Germany, and we were not only in, but we were treated with priority as well.

In the waiting hall, I saw an iraqi woman crying her heart out, begging the officer to allow her the visa,  saying her husband is sick and he needs her and he is there. It was distrurbing to see such a dignified woman begging. I saw a man screaming his heart out at another officer in desperation telling them that they have taken 5000 JD that he deosn’t have.

It was a  very stressful day emotionally as I was waiting hour after in the waiting hall and realizing that I probably was the luckiest one there, as everyone has a story and some of them are reaaly dramatic that might involve life and death situations..

Immigration has risen as a political problem relatively recently. It was inherited as a third world problem after the de-colonization in the sixties…. because colonialism had this dream of creating nicely organized nations where the same people live in the same places, forgetting that human beings move by nature and so the concept of  bournadaries appeared. Charles Tilly claimes that the refugees are a problem that appears because of wars and problems created and kept alive by the first world…

The result are these people I saw today waiting in the sun hoping for a better and brighter future.

This remindes me of Ghassan Kanafani men in the sun… the only thing I would say about this book, if you are already depressed don’t read it…when I did, I stayed home for a whole week, unable to deal with the harshness of this world.

When I am preparing a seminar, I don’t maintain that calm pompous dignity with which I face my audience during the seminar! And this IS the problem. I have been becoming aware of how structured and rigid I am. It could be that I come from a business background where time means money and I have to be aware of every minute, or it could be my Arabic thirst to compete and prove myrself and become the best. We all want to be the mudeer, dont we? I definitely don’t think many Europeans need to prove anything, their social system takes care of them. Their health, education and retirement days are taken care of, so many of these people are perfectly happy pushing the same button at work for thirty years, if not more! And unleash the energy in planning their vacations to go to exotic place like hunting in South Africa or backpacking around Europe! and honestly lucky them, i guess this is what makes Europe the great place it is.

Ok picture it… an Arab lady trying to convince two English ladies to do as she wishes, because of course, she is right!…my partners are charming voluptuous Rayenne, who is of French and Brazilian origins but grew up in London, and classy feminine Rahima who is a Bengali and who also grew up here in London. Their methods are loose and unorganized and really don’t get things done! Although very smart and we ended up our seminar with a round of applauds which is not the everyday case. It was hard getting my partners to organize themselves and get down to results without giving them the idea that we Arabs are ruthless, authoritarian, bastards… So I used my best tone that I learnt in social occassions in Amman and used sentences like “I think what you are trying to say is…?” and “if I understood correctly…” replacing sentences like “min 3eini bint 3ammi…” and “tikramou…” or ” inta o2mor…” which are not translatable! I mean if I say you order or from my eye my cousin…i would have got a HA?!!

oh the seminar was about child labour and human rights. … “friends” is on TV, that episode where Brad Pitt is also on the show… does anyone agree that Angelina Jolie is really the one controlling the relationship and he is like a toutou?.. Anyway… mish mawdou3na…

We met one time before, and we agreed to group the class into five categories and have them prepare arguments in their roles. One category is the children, another one is the parents, the third category is the owners of the mine, the fourth category is the government and the fifth one is the international aid workers! And what an interesting contradicting combination of ideas resulted… ifft my head is still swirelling with excitement!

One example I argued , was that the west wants to impose certain ideas on the third world countries, such as democracy, liberty in women clothing and education, which are very nobel but naiive. The west believes that education in the antidote of child labour in the third world, but what about the western children who are targetted as consumers, who are very aware of brands. These children start feeling low self esteem and shame at very early age, because of their families’ inability to buy them stuff like the other kids, so they go work to make little money to be able to afford these things… in this case these children are also forced to work… why is it not considered child labour and is encouraged, while the idea of children who are forced to work because their families will starve otherwise and have absolutely no other way is banned and condemned?? Not that I am defending the idea…but well…

Anyway… I really don’t want to talk about this anymore… I want to make myself a nice warm cup of tea and watch friends… a girl can relax every now and then…. can’t she?

This lady is in so much trouble. Racisim, Abuse, Theft, Fraud she signed that they take 1000 $ but only gives them 100 minor exploitation and molest 7azha il m3atar the maids are 16 and 17! … you name it! I was surprised… actually I was so fascinated with the story that I caught myself jumping around saying Bravo 3aleihom!! She deserves it!

I mean come on… vive la revolution!

This reminded me of a something related. When I went to France last year. This French guy was telling us how he was horrified when he was in Beirut at how they abuse the maids… and he went into a detailed description how maids are being hit, sleep in balconies or in the kitchen floor, sometimes raped…how they work non stop for hours and hours and then get slapped or bashed if anything goes wrong… I remember seeing all those appalled expressions on those pretty French faces. I was so ashamed to say that these stories are very familiar in Jordan, so I pretended to be as surprised and horrified as the French and heard myself repeating words like “Really?! They do this in Beirut?! “ OH MY GOD!” “How could anyone be so cruel?” “How could humanity stoop so low!!?”

Maids in Jordan and other places apparently are treated like slavesor maybe worse! Even in the most CHIC families, where everyone is so elegant and refined, where the lady of the house is so busy with charity, the master is a very prominent member of society, the sons are successful and the daughters are beyond attractive and smart!… you would see the maids living in totally unstylish conditions… so if you have a maid, and your maid works more than 8 hours a day and she does not have her own bed and gets slapped or yelled at for only 100$ then …. BEWARE… Because you are just another person who fell into the hypocrisy and the trap of dehumanizing the maids and you are in contradiction with human rights, and amnesty international and international law and maybe… just maybe one day you will find yourself in as much trouble as our Saudi friend is!