The role of local governments in migration policies towards Syrian refugees: A comporative policy analysis in Gaziantep and Tripoli

This study aims to present a comparative policy analysis on the role of local governments in the implementation of migration policies towards Syrian refugees. The main observation of the study is that, although the uncertainty of their position and lack of authority, local governments are the most affected management mechanisms by the migration process and they are low influence, limited and indirectly authorized actors in migration policies. Based on this observation, it has been comparatively presented how migration policies towards Syrian refugees are shaped in Gaziantep, Turkey and Tripoli, Lebanon which host a large Syrian refugee population. The research examines migration policies towards Syrian refugees in the context of "migration governance", Paul Sabatier's and Daniel Mazmanian's "implementation theory", and Michael Lipsky's "street level bureaucracy" and "discretion" in a comparative perspective. A qualitative research method was used within the scope of the study. In this regard, semi structured interviews were conducted with 32 Syrian refugees in Gaziantep, 34 Syrian refugees in Tripoli and 3 Syrian refugees in Beirut. In addition, semi structured interviews were held with local and central governments representatives and non governmental organizations in Gaziantep and Tripoli. For the analysis of the interviews Miles and Huberman "flow model" was used. At the end of the study, it was concluded that the policy was transformed from the bottom up, with the influence of the street level bureaucrats in Gaziantep while in Tripoli, the policy was implemented in parallel with central government policy and shaped from the top down.