Understanding Socio-Economic and Political Mobility of Naturalized Kurds in Lebanon

Doctoral Thesis / Dissertation from the year 2012 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Region: Near East Near Orient Tokyo University of Foreign Studies language: English abstract: In this thesis I examine and compare the Socioeconomic Status and the Subjective Social Status of the naturalized at the time of naturalization and 15 years after in order to explore how notwithstanding other factors the naturalized perceive their situation pre and post-naturalization. I analyze the strength of the association between citizenship acquisition/naturalization and socioeconomic mobility and political participation through Socioeconomic Status (SES) and Subjective Social Status (SSS) among 164 Kurds who were naturalized Lebanese by the Presidential Decree 5247/1994 of June 20 1994. I also examine their political participation through voting and political partisanship in order to test the theory whether their political engagement at the beginning of the process shifted downward to a state of political apathy in the years since their naturalization and whether there is a significant gap between them and the native-born in voting turnout.