Rohingya Women and the Shadow Markets of Protection: A Study of Gendered Vulnerability in South and Southeast Asia

Abstract This study investigates the experiences of Rohingya women in Bangladesh, India, and Malaysia who are subjected to forced and early marriages through informal, coercive systems that operate in the absence of legal recognition and formal refugee protection. Drawing on secondary data from humanitarian reports, academic literature, and media sources, the paper introduces the concept of “shadow markets of protection”, patriarchal and often exploitative networks that offer temporary safety and social legitimacy through marriage, frequently at the expense of women’s autonomy, bodily integrity, and future opportunities. These marriages are not simply traditional or cultural phenomena but rather strategic responses to the structural violence of statelessness, institutional neglect, and gender-based discrimination. In contexts where state protection is absent and humanitarian aid is fragmented, such unions become tools of survival and social navigation. The paper examines how gendered precarity intersects with displacement, legal invisibility, poverty, and patriarchal brokerage to produce specific forms of harm that disproportionately affect Rohingya women and girls. By comparing the legal, social, and economic frameworks across the three host countries, the study underscores the urgent need for coherent regional policies and gender-sensitive interventions that confront the structural drivers of forced marriage in refugee settings.