Being recognized as “someone”: Filial care and the reconfiguration of gender identities among Syrian refugees in Switzerland
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.20377/jfr-1432Keywords:
Syrian refugees, transnational care, filial duty, reconfiguration of genderAbstract
Objective: We set out to examine how the reconfiguration of gender identities among Syrian refugees in Switzerland is shaped by the moral duty to care for aging parents living in Syria or third countries.
Background: Syrian refugees in Switzerland face prolonged legal uncertainty, financial insecurity, and social marginalization. At the same time, they strive to fulfill responsibilities toward parents and sometimes siblings who live abroad. Applying the circulation of care framework, this article explores how such transnational care responsibilities influence the reconfiguration of gender identities.
Method: The analysis draws on in-depth, semi-structured interviews conducted with 16 Syrian refugees living in different Swiss cantons.
Results: Our findings show how men shift away from their identity as male provider to embrace masculinities based on moral responsibility, emotional support, and the protection of parents and siblings in Syria or third countries. Meanwhile, new femininities emerge as women gain more autonomy within the nuclear household and more authority within transnational family networks, where they often assume financial and decision-making responsibility.
Conclusion: Although transnational care responsibilities create an emotional burden, they also serve as a source of recognition and social validation. They provide refugees with a coherent sense of identity in contexts otherwise marked by stigma, paternalism, and restricted mobility. The article contributes to family and migration studies by showing how gender identities are reconfigured within extended transnational networks, rather than solely within the nuclear family.
References
Abu-Lughod, L. (2013). Do Muslim women need saving? Harvard University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674726338
Affleck, W., Thamotharampillai, U., Jeyakumar, J., & Whitley, R. (2018). “If One Does Not Fulfil His Duties, He Must Not Be a Man”: Masculinity, Mental Health and Resilience Amongst Sri Lankan Tamil Refugee Men in Canada. Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry, 42(4), 840–861. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11013-018-9592-9
Alkan, H. (2022). Caring for relations: Syrian refugees between gendered kin contract and citizenship in Germany and Turkey. Citizenship Studies, 26(6), 746–762. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13621025.2022.2103969
Allsopp, J. (2017). Agent, victim, soldier, son: Intersecting masculinities in the European “refugee crisis”. In A gendered approach to the Syrian refugee crisis (pp. 155–174). Routledge. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315529653-10
Amelina, A., & Bause, N. (2020). Forced migrant families’ assemblages of care and social protection between solidarity and inequality. JFR-Journal of Family Research, 32(3), 415–434. DOI: https://doi.org/10.20377/jfr-375
Asaf, Y. (2017). Syrian Women and the Refugee Crisis: Surviving the Conflict, Building Peace, and Taking New Gender Roles. Social Sciences, 6(3), 110. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci6030110
Asile.ch. (2025, September 10). Procédure, status et permis – Permis F réfugié.
Baldassar, L. (2015). Guilty Feelings and the Guilt Trip: Emotions and Motivation in Migration and Transnational Caregiving. Emotion, Space and Society, 16, 81–89. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emospa.2014.09.003
Baldassar, L., & Merla, L. (Eds.). (2014). Transnational families, migration and the circulation of care: Understanding mobility and absence in family life. Routledge. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203077535
Baldassar, L., Baldock, C. V., & Wilding, R. (2006). Families caring across borders: Migration, ageing and transnational caregiving. Springer. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230626263
Boccagni, P. (2015). Burden, blessing or both? On the mixed role of transnational ties in migrant informal social support. International Sociology, 30(3), 250–268. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0268580915570508
Cangià, F., Davoine, E., & Tashtish, S. (2021). (Im)mobilities, waiting and professional aspirations: The career lives of highly skilled Syrian refugees in Switzerland. Geoforum, 125, 57–65. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2021.06.015
Carbajal, M., Ramírez, C., Cavagnoud, R., & Stefoni, C. (2023). Reconciling emotional caregiving and self‐fulfilment: Peruvian migrants in Switzerland supporting parents in Peru. Global Networks. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/glob.12437
Carbajal, M., Baghdadi, N., & Otmani, I. (in press). Le soin émotionnel à distance : le rôle des parents dans la vie des migrant·es syrien·nes en Suisse. In A. Mahfoudh & L. Labidi (Eds.), Vieillir ici et ailleurs : Regards croisés Nord-Sud. Tunis: Latrach Éditions.
Chan, C. (2017). Not Always “Left-Behind”: Indonesian Adolescent Women Negotiating Transnational Mobility, Filial Piety and Care. The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, 18(3), 246–263. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/14442213.2017.1311372
CNN. (2024, December 8). Syria civil war news: Live updates.
Connell, R. (2014 [1995]). Masculinités. Enjeux sociaux de l’hégémonie. Éditions Amsterdam.
Connell, R. W. (1987). Gender and power: Society, the person and sexual politics. Stanford University Press.
El Masri, R., Harvey, C., & Garwood, R. (2013). Shifting sands: Changing gender roles among refugees in Lebanon.
Elliott, K. (2016). Caring masculinities: Theorizing an emerging concept. Men and masculinities, 19(3), 240–259. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1097184X15576203
Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, E. (2014). Gender and forced migration. In E. Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, G. Loescher, K. Long, & N. Sigona (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of refugee and forced migration studies (pp. 395–408). Oxford University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199652433.013.0010
Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO). (2022, October 8). Protracted crises and conflicts: Knowledge sharing platform on emergencies and resilience.
Freedman, J. (2024). Women and gender in asylum and refugee law and policy. In J. Freedman (Ed.), Research handbook on asylum and refugee policy (pp. 251–266). Edward Elgar Publishing. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4337/9781802204599.00026
Gass, A. (2014). Becoming the “refugee”: Creation of a gendered subjectivity among male asylum seekers in Switzerland. Tijdschrift Voor Genderstudies, 17(2), 115–129. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5117/TVGEND2014.2.GASS
Gold, M. (2019). Liminality and the asylum process in Switzerland. Anthropology Today, 35(3), 16–19. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8322.12506
Griffiths, M. (2015). “Here, man is nothing!”: Gender and policy in an asylum context. Men and Masculinities, 18(4), 468–488. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1097184X15575111
Habib, N. (2018). Gender role changes and their impacts on Syrian women refugees in Berlin in light of the Syrian crisis.
Hartonen, V. R., Väisänen, P., Karlsson, L., & Pöllänen, S. (2022). A stage of limbo: A meta-synthesis of refugees’ liminality. Applied Psychology, 71(3), 1132–1167. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/apps.12349
Ho, E. S., & Chiang, L. N. (2017). Long-distance filial piety: Chinese families in Australasia caring for elderly parents across borders. Translocal Chinese: East Asian Perspectives, 11(2), 278–311. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/24522015-01102006
Ingvars, Á. K., & Gíslason, I. V. (2018). Moral mobility: Emergent refugee masculinities among young Syrians in Athens. Men and Masculinities, 21(3), 383–402. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1097184X17748171
International Crisis Group. (2022, May 9). Syria: Ruling over Aleppo’s ruins (Middle East Report No. 234).
Joseph, S. (1993). Gender and relationality among Arab families in Lebanon. Feminist Studies, 19(3), 465–486. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/3178097
Joseph, S. (1996). Gender and citizenship in Middle Eastern states. Middle East Report, 198, 4–10. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/3012867
Kaidouha, K. (2025). Syrian families in Germany: The multi faceted reality of adaptation to a new surrounding. Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH and Co. KG. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5771/9783748952244
Kandiyoti, D. (1988). Bargaining with patriarchy. Gender and Society, 2(3), 274–290. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/089124388002003004
Kiselev, N., Pfaltz, M., Schick, M., Bird, M., Hansen, P., Sijbrandij, M., … & Morina, N. (2020). Problems faced by Syrian refugees and asylum seekers in Switzerland. Swiss Medical Weekly, 150, w20381. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4414/smw.2020.20381
Krabbe, B. M. J. (2017). Masculinities in Conflict (Master’s thesis, Utrecht University).
Krzyzowski, L., & Mucha, J. (2014). Transnational caregiving in turbulent times: Polish migrants in Iceland and their elderly parents in Poland. International Sociology, 29(1), 22–37. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0268580913515287
Lokot, M. (2018). Syrian refugees: Thinking beyond gender stereotypes. Forced Migration.
Lokot, M. (2024). Decision making, violence, resistance, and love: Contested and complicating narratives of Syrian marriages. Violence Against Women, 30(1), 31–53. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/10778012231207037
Merla, L. (2010). La gestion des émotions dans le cadre du devoir filial. Le cas des migrants salvadoriens vivant en Australie occidentale. Recherches sociologiques et anthropologiques, 41(41-1), 39-58. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4000/rsa.186
Merla, L. (2012). Salvadoran transnational families, distance and eldercare: Understanding transnational care practices in Australia and Belgium. In Migration, Familie und soziale Lage: Beiträge zu Bildung, Gender und Care (pp. 295–312). VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-531-94127-1_15
Merla, L., Kilkey, M., & Baldassar, L. (2020). Examining transnational care circulation trajectories within immobilizing regimes of migration: Implications for proximate care. Journal of Family Research, 32(3), 514–536. DOI: https://doi.org/10.20377/jfr-351
Miller, T., and Dermott, E. (2025). Syrian refugee dads in the UK: Gendered practices of involvement. In T. Miller, L. Plantin, and A. Westerling (Eds.), Doing fatherhood: Navigating contemporary practices of involvement. Bristol University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.51952/9781447372448.ch013
Näre, L. (2020). Family lives on hold: Bureaucratic bordering in male refugees’ struggle for transnational care. JFR-Journal of Family Research, 32(3), 435–454. DOI: https://doi.org/10.20377/jfr-353
Nasser-Eddin, N. (2017). Gender performativity in diaspora: Syrian refugee women in the UK. In J. Freedman, Z. Kivilcim, & N. O. Baklacioglu (Eds.), A gendered approach to the Syrian refugee crisis (pp. 142–155). New York, NY: Routledge. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315529653-9
Newhouse, L. S. (2021). On not seeking asylum: Migrant masculinities and the politics of refusal. Geoforum, 120, 176–185. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2021.01.024
Palillo, M. (2018). “If I die here, I’m a hero!” On masculinity and vulnerability among male asylum seekers. Journal of Extreme Anthropology, 2(1), 28–45. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5617/jea.6030
Rabo, A. (2005). Family law in multicultural and multireligious Syria. In G. Collste (Ed.), Possibilities of religious pluralism. Linköping University Electronic Press.
Reuters. (2024, December 10). Switzerland suspends Syria asylum proceedings after Assad’s fall.
Ryan, L., Lopez, M., & Rasa, M. (2024). “It hurts my heart”: Afghan women in London negotiating family relationships and (im)mobility regimes across borders. Population, Space and Place, 30(3), e2814. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/psp.2814
Sampaio, D. (2020). Caring by silence: How (un)documented Brazilian migrants enact silence as a care practice for aging parents. Journal of Intergenerational Relationships, 18(3), 281–300. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/15350770.2020.1787038
Santana de Andrade, G. (2024). Refugee’s resistance: Analysing survival strategies through the prism of intersectionality. In J. Freedman (Ed.), Research handbook on asylum and refugee policy (pp. 221–237). Edward Elgar Publishing. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4337/9781802204599.00023
Seidler, V. J. J. (2007). Masculinities, bodies, and emotional life. Men and Masculinities, 10(1), 9–21. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1097184X07299636
State Secretariat for Migration (SEM). (2025, September 15). Regroupement familial.
State Secretariat for Migration (SEM). (2026, May 31). Statistique sur les étrangers, mai 2026. State Secretariat for Migration.
https://www.sem.admin.ch/sem/fr/home/publiservice/statistik/auslaenderstatistik/archiv/2026/05.html [retrieved: October 15, 2025]
Suerbaum, M. (2018). Becoming and “unbecoming” Refugees: Making sense of masculinity and refugeness among Syrian refugee men in Egypt. Men and Masculinities, 21(3), 363–382. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1097184X17748170
Taha, D. M. (2020). Like a tree without leaves: Syrian refugee women and the shifting meaning of marriage. Mashriq and Mahjar, 7(1), 1–26. DOI: https://doi.org/10.24847/77i2020.245
Tracker, G. C. (2024). Conflict in Syria. Council on Foreign Relations.
Turner, L. (2020). Syrian Refugee Men in Za’tari Camp: Humanitarianism, Masculinities, and “Vulnerabilities.” Civil Society Review. DOI: https://doi.org/10.28943/CSR.004.004
Tuzi, I. (2020). Forced migration and gender relations: The impact of displacement on masculinity among Syrian refugees (Working Paper No. 5/2020). Dipartimento di Scienze Sociali ed Economiche.
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). (2024, December 12). Syria: UNHCR comment on asylum processing suspension and returns.
United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). (2022, February). Humanitarian needs overview: Syrian Arab Republic.
Van Raemdonck, A. (2023). Syrian refugee men in “double waithood”: Ethnographic perspectives on labour and marriage in Jordan’s border towns. Gender, Place & Culture, 30(5), 692–713. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/0966369X.2023.2178390
Weppi, A. (2018). Syrian women and society. Sharq in partnership with the Konrad Adenauer Foundation.
Wyss, A. (2022). Navigating discourses: Masculinities, racialisation and vulnerabilities. In I. T. Tellermann, J. B. Scherschel, & S. Korteweg (Eds.), Navigating the European migration regime (pp. 48–73). Bristol University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.51952/9781529219623.ch003
Yalim, A. C., & Critelli, F. (2023). Gender roles among Syrian refugees in resettlement contexts: Revisiting empowerment of refugee women and needs of refugee men. Women’s Studies International Forum, 96, 102670. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2022.102670
