Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T23:52:23.445Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Religion and Social Welfare in the Lebanon: Treating the Causes or Symptoms of Poverty?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2009

RANA JAWAD
RANA JAWAD*
Affiliation:
Centre for Research in Ethnic Relations, University of Warwick email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article achieves two objectives. It introduces new insights to current thinking on social policy in the Middle East based on a case study of religious welfare in Lebanon. This in turn provides an analysis of how faith-based welfare may connect to social policy more broadly. Focusing on how five of the most prominent Lebanese Muslim and Christian welfare organisations engage with poverty reduction, the article draws attention to the moral dimension of social policy-making. This is illustrated by an analysis of how the Lebanese faith-based organisations (FBOs) define the objects of their interventions and, subsequently, how appropriately they respond to the causes of social problems. The analysis also includes a review of the FBOs' evaluation of their services. The overall argument of the article comments on the extent to which social welfare in Lebanon has scope to act beyond short-term, instrumental or politicised goals. It argues that human need, the ‘social case’ and poverty are three core concepts which determine the design of social interventions, but they also serve to confuse the definition of the object of social policy. The argument concludes that needs interpretation by welfare service providers in Lebanon is the site of deep contention in the policy-making process, since the lack of clarity in defining the object of policies can hamper the effectiveness of services. This means that while the social action undertaken by FBOs in Lebanon is more complex than the private or corporate charity initiatives known in the British or North American faith-based contexts, religious welfare programmes in Lebanon are more focused on palliative in-kind services.

Type
Article
Information
Journal of Social Policy , Volume 38 , Issue 1 , January 2009 , pp. 141 - 156
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Arksey, H. and Glendinning, C. (2007), ‘Informal welfare’, in Powell, M. (ed.), Understanding the Mixed Economy of Welfare, Bristol: The Policy Press.Google Scholar
Attride-Stirling, J. (2001), ‘Thematic networks: an analytic tool for qualitative research’, Qualitative Research, 1: 3, 385–405.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bacon, D. (2006), ‘Faith-based organisations and welfare provision in Northern Ireland and North America: whose agenda?’, in Milligan, C. and Conradson, D. (eds.), Landscapes of Voluntarism, New Spaces of Health, Welfare and Governance, Bristol: The Policy Press.Google Scholar
Becker, S. (2003),‘Security for those who cannot: Labour's neglected welfare principle’, in Millar, J. (ed.), Understanding Social Security, Bristol: The Policy Press.Google Scholar
Bugra, A. (2007), ‘Poverty and citizenship: an overview of the social policy environment in republican Turkey’, International Journal of Middle East Studies, 39: 33–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Choueiri, Y. (1999), ‘Lebanon’, The Middle East and North Africa 2000, Europa Regional Surveys of the World, London: Europa Publications.Google Scholar
Clark, J. A. (2004), Islam, Charity and Activism: Middle Class Networks and Social Welfare in Egypt, Jordan and Yemen, Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Clarke, G. and Jennings, M. (2008), ‘Introduction’, in Clarke, G. and Jennings, M. (eds.), Development, Civil Society and Faith-Based Organizations – Bridging the Sacred and the Secular, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Davis, P. (2004), ‘Rethinking the welfare regime approach in the context of Bangladesh’, Insecurity and Welfare Regimes in Asia, Africa and Latin America, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Erwin, S. (2008), ‘The wondrous wall of separation’, The American Interest, 3: 4, 116–20.Google Scholar
Esposito, J. L. (2000), ‘Islam and secularism in the Middle East’, in Esposito, J. L. and Tamimi, A. (eds.), Islam and Secularism in the Middle East, London: Hurst & Company.Google Scholar
Gough, I. and Wood, G. (2004), ‘Introduction’, Insecurity and Welfare Regimes in Asia, Africa and Latin America, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Graham, M. (2007), ‘The ethics of care, black women and the social professions: implications of a new analysis’, Ethics and Social Welfare, 1: 2, 194–206.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harb, M. (2008), ‘Faith-based organisations as effective development partners: Hezbollah and post-war reconstruction in Lebanon’, in Clarke, G. and Jennings, M. (eds.), Development, Civil Society and Faith-Based Organizations – Bridging the Sacred and the Secular, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Jawad, R. (2002), ‘A profile of social welfare in Lebanon: assessing the implications for social development policy’, Global Social Policy, 2: 3, 319–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jawad, R. (2005), ‘Faith or social insurance: religion and the reconstitution of social policy in the south – a case study of the Lebanon’, Ph.D. thesis, University of Nottingham.Google Scholar
Jawad, R. (2007), ‘Human ethics and particularism: an exploration of the social welfare regime in Lebanon’, Ethics and Social Welfare, 1: 2, 123–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jawad, R. (2008) ‘Possibilities of positive social action: a re-reading of the history of social policy in the Middle East’ (book review), Global Social Policy, 8: 2, 269–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Karshenas, M. and Moghadam, V. (2006), ‘Social policy in the Middle East: introduction and overview’, in UNRISD Social Policy in a Development Context Series, Social Policy in the Middle East – Economic, Political and Gender Dynamics, New York: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Luciani, G. (1990), ‘Introduction’, in Luciani, G. (ed.), The Arab State, London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Midwinter, E. (1994), The Development of Social Welfare in Britain, Buckingham: Open University Press.Google Scholar
Prochaska, F. (1988), The Voluntary Impulse − Philanthropy in Modern Britain, London: Faber & Faber.Google Scholar
Sen, A. (1999), Development as Freedom, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Spicker, P. (2007), The Idea of Poverty, Bristol: The Policy Press.Google Scholar
Shadid, A. (2001), Legacy of the Prophet – Despots, Democrats and the New Politics of Islam, Boulder, CO: Westview Press.Google Scholar
Tyndale, W. (2006), Visions of Development – Faith-Based Initiatives, Farnborough: Ashgate.Google Scholar
UNDP (2002), ‘Arab Human Development Report’, www.undp/ahdr/org, accessed 12 July 2002Google Scholar
Whelan, R. (1996), The Corrosion of Charity, London: Institute of Economic Affairs.Google Scholar