AfghanistanMuch of the documented information in English
about women’s rights in early twentieth-century
Afghanistan emphasizes state-imposed changes to
women’s legal and social status in Afghan society.
Most of these reforms were initiated between 1919
and 1929, during the reign of King Amàn Allàh:
the constitution was changed to guarantee equal
rights for women and men; female students were
sent to pursue higher education in Turkey; and the
Anjuman-i £imàyat-i-Niswàn (Association for the
protection of women’s rights) was established.
Most shocking, perhaps, for the clergy was the
public unveiling of Queen Íurayyà and other
female members of the royal family. King Amàn
Allàh was overthrown in 1929.
It took approximately another 30 years for the
ruling government to address women’s rights in
Afghanistan. In 1959, under Mu™ammad æahìr
Shàh, policies were put in place to enable women to
unveil voluntarily, to attend university, and to find
employment outside the home. By 1964, women
gained the right to vote, and became increasingly
vocal, forming organizations that actively worked
to redress gender inequality in Afghanistan.
The Democratic Organization of Afghan Women
(DOAW) was formed in 1965; its main objectives
were promoting women’s literacy and banning forced
marriages for women. In 1986, however, the DOAW
was renamed the All-Afghan Women’s Council,
and became less forceful in its demands for gender
equality, providing instead legal and social assistance
to poor Afghan women. In 1977, Mìna Kishwàr
Kamàl (Meena) founded the Revolutionary Asso-
ciation of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), an
independent political organization of Afghan women
fighting for women’s rights and social justice in
Afghanistan. In 1981, RAWA launched a bilingual
magazine, Payàm-i-Zan (Woman’s message) in
Persian (Dari) and Pashto. After the Soviet occupa-
tion of Afghanistan in December 1979, RAWA
became directly involved in resistance movements.
Meena was assassinated in Quetta, Pakistan in
February 1987 by Islamists supported by the KGB.
RAWA’s original objective was to gain equal rights
for Afghan women, and continues its work today,
establishing schools and orphanages in Pakistan’s
Political-Social Movements: Feminist
refugee camps, and providing health services for
women.
Recent Afghan feminist organizations include:
Shuhada, a non-governmental organization which
worked against the Taliban to provide Afghan
women access to health care and education; Shirkat
Gah, an organization operating out of Pakistan that
works with refugee Afghan women to teach them
about the Islamic laws under which they are living;
Women for Afghan Women, established in spring
2001, a diasporic group whose target membership
is Afghan women in New York and Afghanistan;
and Negar-SAFA (Soutien aux femmes d’Afghan-
istan), based in Paris and founded by Afghan and
French women, which works for the betterment of
Afghan women’s lives, promoting women’s educa-
tion and employment. The organization describes
its conception as a response to Afghan women’s call
of distress under the Taliban. During Taliban rule
in Afghanistan, Negar enabled Afghan women’s
groups to make contact with each other and with
diasporic Afghan women’s organizations.Bibliography
A. E. Brodsky, With all our strength. The Revolutionary
Association of the Women of Afghanistan, New York
1998.
S. Mehta (ed.), Women for Afghan women. Shattering
myths and claiming the future, New York 2002.
V. Moghadam, Reform, revolution, and reaction. The
trajectory of the “Woman Question” in Afghanistan,
in V. Moghadam (ed.), Gender and national identity.
Women and politics in Muslim societies, London 1994,
81–109.
——, Revolution, religion, and gender politics. Iran and
Afghanistan, in Journal of Women’s History10:4
(Winter 1999), 172–96.Nima NaghibiArab StatesThe 22 Arab states, with a population of over
280 million, range from Morocco in North Africa
to Iraq in West Asia. These states share many simi-
larities in terms of culture, religion, and historical
evolution, while also differing widely in their
respective socioeconomic dynamics and political
experiences. All states share particular regional
challenges, themselves a function of international