The kafala system is not new to most Lebanese people and is often referred to as “modern day slavery.” For those unaware, the kafala system is a sponsorship system that brings migrant domestic workers from various countries to work in Lebanese households, an estimated 250,000 workers. The sponsor, or kafeel, takes responsibility for the migrant domestic worker providing her housing, food, basic necessities, and their agreed upon wage. This framework is exploitative and restrictive causing multiple migrant domestic workers to be trapped, overworked, abused, sexually exploited, trafficked, and abandoned. Migrant domestic workers are left out of the Lebanese labor laws hence they possess no means of legal protection leaving their employers to be the only authority they can turn to. If the workers try to leave against the will of the employer they are often returned to their sponsor or deported.
While the kafala system gives employers full control over the workers’ lives, there are a variety of misconceptions that both the worker and employer believe in that I recently learned while attending a workshop for the unionization of migrant domestic workers. Firstly, there is no legal statement in the contracts that the employer has the right to withhold the passport of the worker while under employment. This is a concept that emerged to entrap and control the worker by employers limiting the movement and freedom of the worker. It is important to note that most employers do not know what is even written in the contract when asked, they just assume they possess this right. One worker in the workshop was baffled how the employer would not read the contract they signed.
This brings me to my next point: the contract is written in Arabic, a majority of migrant domestic workers cannot understand the contract they have to sign entrusting the agencies to have written up the aforementioned agreed upon propositions. There are also no other methods for migrant domestic workers to apply and come to Lebanon to find jobs other than the kafala system. Economically, recruitment agencies have earned around $57.5 million in revenues, the General Security made $36.5 million, and the ministry of labor $6.1 million. This multi-million industry thrives on the neglect and exploitation of these workers.
A majority of issues emerge from social issues stemming from the patriarchal society that mixes into the kafala framework. The biggest of which is the social conception that domestic work is not real work. Lebanon is built on a highly patriarchal society that often diminishes or completely ignores the work women do in households and expects them to “obey” their husbands, fathers, and brothers. This gender inequality not only harms the perception of a working woman but of domestic labor as a whole. Therefore, the migrant worker being both a woman and domestic worker is undervalued at the gender level but additionally as a labor force. This is detrimental to their view as professional paid workers and not as slaves that have to obey their employers. Which is rather ironic considering domestic workers have been reported having to teach the wives of their employers simple tasks such as washing dishes (stated by one of the migrant domestic workers at the workshop I attended). A massive area often ignored is also the care economy;emotional and child care is undermined as not real labor that women do, and when migrant domestic workers are hired, they are then expected to fulfill it. The workers are left in charge of the employer’s children in cases when they were not contracted to do so. A third area that intersects with the gender and labor issues is the underlying racism found in Lebanon. Not only does the slave aspect of kafala take on a historical backround globally due to the Transatlantic slave trade but regionally and locally as well. Historically, the Lebanese have always attempted to distance themselves from people of color, especially those of African origins, to better appeal to western states. The hierarchical divide created by the need to orient oneself with imperialist entities has only deepened the kafala system’s construction of migrant domestic workers as “not real workers” while increasing social biases and racism towards these women. Due to this, those of East Asian origins, such as Filipinos, are seen as closer to the Lebanese because they walk between the color line of black and white. They are not completely white while also not being black resulting in them having less social biases but not omitting them for the legal kafala framework.
It is sadly the norm to hear of migrant domestic workers whom are sexually assaulted, exploited, unpaid, and even pushed to suicide. Cases such as Aminata who went to work in Lebanon to raise money for her sick mother and left without 9 months worth of salary. Abeba who was sexually assaulted by Mazen, her employer, and his brother, Assaad, while locked in their home, being monitored. There is an average of two migrant domestic workers per week dying in Lebanon from unnatural causes, such as suicides or attempts of escape, with little to no investigation; videos of extreme events of these escapes being shared on news channels such as 961 on May 5th. Reports of migrant domestic workers facing mental health issues were at an all time high reaching 60% of workers considered to be in severe psychological distress. A lot of these issues go unseen or blatantly ignored and swept away because the workers are not seen as proper workers legally or socially, leaving it to be seen as an individual issue when research suggests otherwise.
Due to the increase of atrocities faced by the workers, multiple NGOs and human rights groups have started initiatives to fight for the rights of migrant domestic workers, showcasing and tackling workers’ issues, and calling to end the kafala system. This is Lebanon is an NGO that showcases different issues that migrant domestic workers face while calling out their abusers and giving them their justice in different forms, whether it be a way home, their unpaid salaries, or the ability to speak out. It is an important NGO because not only does it give the workers justice but it exposes and calls out the abusers forcing them to confront and own up to their abuse. Kafa is another NGO that tackles violence against women and has a history of helping migrant domestic workers from abusive households by providing supportive services, advocacy, and awareness.
There are a variety of different NGOs and campaigns that have been gaining support and awareness towards aiding and abolishing the Kafala system. In 2019 Amnesty international called on the Lebanese authority to extend labor protections to migrant domestic workers and to end the kafala system. The Anti-Racism Movement has multiple studies, research,initiatives, and even a page detailing how to help in alleviating abuses and discrimination, as well as steps in advocation of abolishment. Other legal steps focused on are the lobbying for the parliament to abolish Labor Law Article 7 because of its exclusion of domestic workers; the legalization of freelance domestic work that would help regularize the domestic worker’s work by removing agencies, address corruption in networks, and institutionalize care work. Till today, the kafala system is still standing despite the traction gained due to advocacy, the large social biases and profits from exploitation are deeply rooted in Lebanese society. With the current geopolitical status of Lebanon, we cannot ignore the amplified severity of the kafala system, as we rebuild Lebanon we need to think of the rights of migrant domestic workers and the abolishment of the kafala system.
Edited by Amin Kharrat and Edna-Carla Rashid