Arab Emirates state federation, established in 1971,
was able during the 1990s to make impressive in-
roads in women’s education on a global scale
(UNDP 1995). This led, in all oil-producing Gulf
States, to uneven development and a situation
where women are highly educated yet still denied
political rights in the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait,
and Saudi Arabia.
Until 1998, with the exception of Kuwait and
Yemen, no Gulf state provided any of its citizens
with electoral rights. Male members of legislative
councils were appointed by the ruling families and
acted only as consultative bodies. Bahrain has,
since the turn of the millennium, led the Gulf states
in terms of political rights, followed by Qatar and
Oman. These states have modified their constitu-
tions, and legislated equal gender rights. Women in
these countries are making daily advancements in
administrative and political offices. The United
Arab Emirates grants more socioeconomic rights,
but falls behind on the political, while Saudi Arabia
continues to fall behind on all counts. A woman in
Saudi Arabia may hold a Ph.D., or even be a global
figure, yet she is still unable to drive or travel with-
out prior male guardian approval and the escort of
a ma™rammale (kin whom she cannot marry).
Despite their uneasiness, living in such contra-
diction in comparison with each other across state
regional borders and with women globally, women
in the Gulf region believe in their relative bargain-
ing power in the very structure of the family and
tribe. In a system where rules are broken on the
basis of personal contacts and direct relationships,
exceptions to stated rules are sometimes available.
Bibliography
A. Abdulla (ed.), Gulf strategic report 2002–2003, Sharja
2003.
S. Adams, The basic right of citizenship. A comparative
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southeast asia 25R. Sabban, al-Mar±a wa-al-qànùn fìal-Imàràt al-≠Ara-
biyya al-Mutta™ida. Ru±ya ijtimà≠iyya, inal-Tashrì≠àt
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development report 1995, Gender and human develop-
ment, <http://www.undp.org/hdro/hdrs/1995/english/
95.htm>.Rima SabbanSoutheast AsiaThe Southeast Asian cultural
matrix
Islam reached Southeast Asia many centuries
later after it had reached China.^1 The exact time of
its arrival in Southeast Asia is still debated, with
dates ranging from 1100 to the 1300s (Reid 1993a,
Ricklefs 1981). Despite its relatively late arrival, as
compared with China, it was in Southeast Asia that
Islamic sultanates emerged – for example, Pasai in
north Sumatra (ca. 1297), Melaka on the west
coast of Malaya (ca. 1400), Demak in west Java
(ca. 1478), and many others (Milligan 2003,
Federspiel 2002). Islam was thus a political force
in the region long before modern nation-states
emerged there.
Islam came into a region dominated by bilateral
kinship patterns, in which both sexes have relative
equality.^2 This indigenous egalitarianism was al-
tered by the arrival of Hinduism and Buddhism,
which inspired the formation of states ruled by
god-kings who mediated between heaven and
earth. The political hierarchy was believed to mir-
ror a hierarchy of unequal souls – an idea legiti-
mated by the concept of karma (Wolters 1982).
The Southeast Asian sultanates that subsequently
emerged were transformations of these earlier
“Indianized” kingdoms. Consequently, the Islamic
rulers needed to reconcile the implicit egalitarian-
ism of Islam with the Indic hierarchical conception
of the god-king (Milner 1988). Islam thus came as
an equalizing force which impacted on an earlier
Indic hierarchy but resonated with an even earlier
indigenous egalitarianism between the sexes.
The implicit egalitarianism of Islam is shared
with other monotheisms in that all believers are
supposedly equal before God. With this as a point
of departure, Islam has been variously adapted and
adopted, particularly in relation to the different
schools of thought that came to the region, including