Summary

This study was made during the 55th Postgraduate Training Programme of the German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS) (formerly German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE)) in the “Growth, Environment, Inequality, Governance: Implementation of the 2030 Agenda” research project funded by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

We thank our Jordanian local field guides, translators and transcribers who made this research possible.

Dr Annabelle Houdret, Dr Waltina Scheumann, Dr Tina Zintl, Dr Anita Breuer, Dr Markus Loewe and Dr Srinivasa Srigiri at the DIE have provided valuable ideas and suggestions for our research. We would like to express our tremendous appreciation to the last three colleagues named for critically reviewing the manuscript and suggesting substantial improvements. Special thanks also go to Anita Breuer for her ongoing help in setting up and interpreting the social network analysis.

We thank Dr Regine Mehl and Andrea Herder for their logistical and moral support throughout the research. We are additionally grateful for the support from Prof. Dr Anna-Katharina Hornidge, Prof. Dr Imme Scholz and Margret Heyen of the DIE Directorate during the COVID- 19 pandemic.

Finally, we specially thank our interview partners who wholeheartedly welcomed us and contributed their time and indispensable insights to this study.