Assessing Social Protection in Jordan (Gaps analysis)
Since the early 2000’s, the social protection system in Jordan was subjected to numerous mainstreaming domains. For instance, in 2012, the ILO developed a customized Social Protection Floor (SOCPRO) for Jordan’s labour sector. SOCPRO. This was then developed into the production of a National Decent Work Country Program (2018-2022). In addition, UNICEF worked with the Jordanian government to overcome the risks and vulnerabilities that children face through the implementation of a Child-Sensitive Social Protection (CSSP) system. UN Women also played a critical role in the development of a national framework for Gender-Responsive Social Protection (GRSP).
Despite the fact that SOCPRO, CSSP and GRSP frameworks were initiated in the early 2000’s and developed further till these days, yet the full picture portrayed prior to the pandemic shows a dichotomy between the social protection frameworks and the unmet needs on the ground. For instance, when exploring a few indicators of the state of child protection, there are 3.16 million children in Jordan, and one in five are multidimensionally poor. As per the 2016 National Child Labour Survey, over 75,000 children are engaged in economic activities, including nearly 45,000 children who are engaged in hazardous forms of labour. Same results are valid if a closer look is to be made on women’s lives. In fact, a recent report by the World Bank in 2019 mapped how laws affect women throughout their working lives. Jordan ranked 180 of 187 countries covered by the report. The report’s set of indicators include major components of GRSP such as the pension provisions to women, maternity leave policies, women’s ability to manage their assets, the acknowledgement of a woman as a legal “head of household” or “head of family”, etc.
These pre-pandemic facts place the effectiveness of such frameworks under critical examination. Especially that the Jordanian social protection system is placed within a complex context. While the country suffers from a financial crisis, yet living expenses in Jordan are among the highest in the MENA region. This situation should push for better social protection systems. However the pandemic intensified the hardship on the poor and the most vulnerable in Jordan. As Covid-19 forced the government to introduce new austerity measures and cut some of the social protection entitlements. , The situation is even worse with especially refugees, where data shows that 86% of registered Syrian refugees live below Jordan’s poverty line, which raises significant social protection concern. In fact, recent reports indicate that the governmental response to the pandemic in Jordan did not consider the most vulnerable as a priority when designing policy responses.
This chapter provides a situation analysis of the state of social protection in Jordan amid and after the pandemic. It examines the mismatch between social protection floors and the actual needs and people’s resilience mechanisms living with a continuous financial crisis. The targeted population is the social protection beneficiaries from the poor and vulnerable people, especially women and children. The essay focuses on the typologies of policy response to the pandemic and highlights what went well for the sake of social protection beneficiaries and what did not. The captured gaps will direct a concise set of policy recommendations to boost the social protection system in Jordan towards being effective and responsive to people’s needs.
e used to justify the action, and it is the action itself and the motivation behind it which matter. In general, deontology requires people to behave with principles and duty. Principles are the laws that people apply to themselves and cannot be broken under any circumstances, and duties are the actions motivated by the principles. As an example, an individual’s principle could be not harming others whatsoever, therefore their duties are to restrain themselves from getting into fights with others. Principles are not the same as rules, for that rules are from others, but they do often work together. Deontology indicates that it is moral when people follow their principles all the time, and the action matter much more than the consequences caused by it. Gray and Schein (2012) have set an example that in the centre of deontology, lying should be despised whether it is for a good result or not. Corresponding to principles, duties are what people “ought to do” caused by pure heart instead of benefit. The reason for setting these laws, from famous deontologist Immanuel Kant’s point of view, is humans’ ability to set “ends” and requirements for ourselves is what separates us from other animals. He explained that by resisting temptation caused by our natural instinct, humans are set free from the pressure given by nature, therefore deontology could be called Kantian Ethics. If people give up on morality, there would be no difference between humans and animals who cannot reason. In brief, deontology suggests acting on proper reason motivated by principles, and if something is wrong, it should not be done in any situation.
With utilitarianism and deontology explained, now we can apply them to fictional scenarios. One kind of scenarios is moral dilemmas. These dilemmas are full of paradoxes, most include harm to one group of characters and one action could transfer the harm to another group. The most well-known moral dilemma is probably “The trolley problem”. In this story, a trolley that cannot be stopped is going to run over five people. The good news is, if someone pulls the brake, the track under would be switched to aside. Nevertheless, another person is tied on the track as well, if the person making decision wants to save five people, the redirected trolley would kill him. In general, is one life less valuable than five? For utilitarians, killing the one person does not seem to bother them. As mentioned before, utilitarianism is about maximising the happiness. Saving five lives would be more important for increasing pleasure overall. In Crockett’s (2016) explanation, “The utilitarian perspective dictates that most appropriate action is the one that achieves the greatest good for the greatest number.” Although killing one person seems wrong, the consequence of saving 5 lives would make it moral in utilitarianism. In contrary, deontology insists for no matter what reason, performing murder is always immoral and against basic principles. Crockett (2016) stated that from deontological point of view, killing is simply wrong, even if it brings benefit.