In this book the author takes a gendered approach to labor conflicts, anticolonial struggles, and citizenship in modern Lebanon. The author looks at the conditions and experiences of women workers at the French Tobacco industry. Looking at culturally inscribed roles for Middle Eastern women, the book highlights traditions of public activism and militancy among rural women that are in turn adapted to the spaces of the factory. Women employed distinct strategies involving kinship, sectarian, gender, and class ties to enhance their work conditions and social benefits. The author argues that the condition of women can only be explained by exploring the shifting relationship between culture, societal arrangements, and economic settings.