As a result of Operation Olive Branch in early 2018, Afrin Canton became part of the Turkish occupation of northern Syria.

Throughout the course of the Syrian Civil War, Afrin Canton served as a safe haven for refugees of all ethnicities, fleeing violence and destruction from civil war factions, in particular the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the diverse more or less Islamist rebel groups of the Syrian opposition.

[7][8] According to a June 2016 estimate from the International Middle East Peace Research Center, about 316,000 displaced Syrians of Kurdish, Yazidi, Arab and Turkmen ethnicity lived in Afrin Canton at the time.

[14] In modern post-independence Syria, the Kurdish society of the canton was subject to heavy-handed Arabization policies by the Damascus government.

Tens of thousands of Kurdish refugees fled from Afrin City before its capture by the SNA in March 2018,[20][21] and the YPG vowed to retake it.

The YPG subsequently announced its intention to start a guerrilla war in Afrin Canton,[22][23] leading to the SDF insurgency in Northern Aleppo.

[33][34] Curricula are a topic of continuous debate between the canton' Boards of Education and the Syrian central government in Damascus, which partly pays the teachers.

[35][36][37] The federal, regional and local administrations in Rojava put much emphasis on promoting libraries and educational centers, to facilitate learning and social and artistic activities.