Predicament of Lebanese Women Married to Non-Lebanese: Field Analytical Study

The Lebanese Women’s Rights and the Nationality Law project is a joint project between civil society and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). It is implemented by the National Committee for the Follow up on Women’s Issues (CFUWI) and funded by UNDP. It aims at achieving equality between men and women in the field of citizenship. The project is not the first of its kind in Lebanon with respect to gender equality and citizenship, but it does present a new methodology to deal with this issue. This methodology has three pillars: the first pillar is a socio-legal study of the situation lived by the families of Lebanese women married to non-Lebanese men. This is done on two main levels. The first is quantitative, to show the magnitude of the problem and how widespread it is in a country known for its cultural and human diversity and openness. The second is qualitative, and involves analyzing the repercussions of the current citizenship law on families, i.e. the problems pertaining to residency, employment, and access to State aid