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This article focuses on the refugees' labor market integration in the immediate host countries. Drawing from the experience of Syrian refugees in Jordan, it describes how the integration in labor market depends on the alignment of four perspectives: (1) host state perspective, materialized through legal regulations about refugee employment; (2) refugee perspective that refers to refugees' access to labor market and challenges they face; (3) host community perspective that implies to the recognition, approval, or reactions of host communities to the refugee employment; and (4) donor perspective that appears with the intervention of international actors through development aid or general support to refugees' working rights. To explore these diverging perspectives and their implications about the labor market integration of Syrian refugees in Jordan, the data is gathered from ethnographic policy analysis and stakeholder interviews in urban areas and camps. We argue that the refugees' legal right to work is one of the most contentious policy issues not only for Jordanian state but also for its relations with Jordanian citizens, refugees, and donors. From the perspective of donors, ensuring Syrians' legal access to labor market in the immediate host countries, like Jordan, is a policy tool for keeping refugees in the origin region. At the host community level, the issue appears as a source of dilemma; because refugee employment is a critical domain for refugees' self-reliance and local integration on the one hand, it is perceived as the source of competition for already scarce job opportunities on the other hand. For refugees themselves, an access to labor market and getting support are ways of gaining sustainable livelihood opportunities, self-reliance, and dignity. However, this access is marked by severe conditions of exploitation, vulnerability, and discrimination in working places as well as the anti-refugee rhetoric of local host communities. Programming in refugee employment necessitates taking all these four perspectives into account.

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This article shows how extant theories on women's representation in parties can only partially explain the Kurdish ethno-nationalist party's exceptional level of women's descriptive representation vis-à-vis the Turkish average. It demonstrates that women's very high level of representation in the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) can be better understood by examining the interaction between party-related and movement-related factors. Drawing on extensive empirical research, the study demonstrates that the party's leftist ideology, along with the mobilisation strategies and needs of the movement, have had a decisive impact in creating the conditions for women's self-assertion and their taking positions of power within the party, including the adoption and scrupulous implementation of a voluntary party gender quota. The study suggests that, in the case of parties closely tied to broader social movements, it is the relationship between the two organisations (party and movement), rather than just the former, that should be analysed. This is particularly evident in the case of ethno-nationalist parties that emanate from highly mobilised or even armed movements.Women continue to be under-represented as voters, elected officials and political leaders in many countries in spite of a rising global trend in the last two decades. Studying the various factors and mechanisms that affect women's representation in political institutions remains crucial for understanding and perhaps for improving contemporary democracies. The growing scholarship on gender and politics demonstrates that women's political representation varies dramatically across countries and often in parties within the same country. This article aims to contribute to the debate on women and politics, with particular reference to the role of political parties regarding intra-country variations in women's descriptive representation. Focusing on the case of the Kurdish ethno-nationalist party in Turkey, currently called the 'Peace and Democracy Party' (BDP, Barış ve Demokrasi Partisi), 1 this article shows how extant theories can only partially explain this party's exceptional level of women's descriptive representation vis-à-vis the Turkish average. This case is particularly puzzling for two reasons. First, scholars working on gender and nationalism have largely regarded the latter to be an ideology at odds with gender balance and women's emancipation in the political sphere (EnloeArticle Sahin-Mencutek 471 representation in the BDP can be fully understood by examining the interaction between party ideology and the mobilisation strategies of the ethno-nationalist movement. Combining with the fertile ground provided by the party's leftist ideology, the mobilisation strategies and needs of the broader ethno-nationalist Kurdish movement have had a decisive impact in creating the conditions for women's self-assertiveness and their taking positions of power within the party, including the adoption and scrupulous implementation of a voluntary party gender quota.This case ...

Voting from abroad (VFA) is a complex norm and practice due to the multilevel processes, structures and actors involved. This article explores the reasons behind the eventual adoption of this practice within the context of a long and well-known history of emigration in Turkey. During the 2014 Turkish presidential election, emigrants from Turkey were finally allowed to participate from abroad even though legislation giving them this right has been in place since 1995. Based on archival research and fieldwork in Germany and the United States, this article discusses the varying relevance of three central explanatory factors to the implementation of VFA: emigrant lobbying, the electoral expectations of potential benefit by the governing party, and the presence of broader, state-led diaspora engagement policies. The first of these is important but insufficient, whereas the second factor is necessary. Moreover, the presence of broader, state-led diaspora engagement policies is a mediating factor. This article finds that specific actors like political parties may play the crucial role, highlighting the need for critical examination of their role in the implementation process.