AfghanistanAfghanistan is a multiethnic, tribal society with a
predominantly rural population. Islam as the foun-
dation of the value system is the common denomi-
nator that binds together diverse ethnic groups.
About 85 percent of Afghans are SunnìMuslims
and adhere to £anafìlaw; the rest are Shì≠ìs. Small
populations of Hindus and Sikhs live in urban
centers.
The Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek, Turkmen,
Baluchi, and Nuristani ethnic groups (qawm) vary
in patrilineal kinship, language, and regional cus-
toms. Kinship networks constitute the foundation
of wealth and security. Loyalty to kin and tribe
(qabìla) has historically posed a challenge to the
authority of the state. Patriarchal values dominate
the kinship-based society. In the eastern and south-
eastern regions, inhabited principally by Pashtun
tribes, the tribal code of behavior (Pashtunwali)
governs all aspect of tribal life, including kinship
and gender relations. Concepts of honor and shame
prescribe appropriate behavior for men and women.
Women symbolize family honor (nàmùs) for all
Afghans. They are protected within the extended
family system and compelled to comply to accepted
norms of behavior.
The practice of female seclusion varies with age,
regional customs, and lifestyle. Before the process
of modernization began in Afghanistan, urban
women were required by a strict interpretation of
£anafìlaw to cover their faces and wear the all-
enveloping chadari, or burqa≠, outside the home.
Covering the face was not required in the country-
side, where peasant and nomadic women were
often needed to work on farms and in pastures.
Most marriages take place between members of
the same lineage. Since tribal membership is deter-
mined by patrilineal lines, a woman who marries
outside a tribe has to leave her tribe. Therefore,
marriage between cousins and second cousins is
encouraged to secure kinship bonds and lineage
solidarity. Marriage among close relatives, as
Dupree has pointed out, keeps female family mem-
bers together in groups: “Intimate aunt-niece rela-
tionships, as well as daughter-in-law mother-in-law
closeness strengthens the already strong matri-core
in the society” (1973, 181).
Although Islam permits men to marry up to four
Kinship, Descent Systems and State
wives, the vast majority of Afghan men have only
one wife. The practice of polygamy is a sign of
wealth and power and a means of forging alliances
with other powerful families or tribes (see, for
example, Anderson 1975). At the end of the nine-
teenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries
concubinage was common among the elite. The
concubines came from Tajik, Kafari (Nuristani),
and mostly Shì≠ìHazara ethnic groups; they were
captured and sold in slave markets in Afghanistan
and Central Asia (Kakar 1979, 173–6). As in most
other parts of the Muslim world, the children born
of a slave mother had exactly the same rights as
those born of a legal wife and were integrated in
their father’s pedigree.
Local customs in some instances contradict the
Sharì≠a on gender issues. For example, although the
Sharì≠a grants women the right of inheritance,
Pashtunwali denies it. In rural areas marriages are
arranged by exchanging one girl for another or by
paying the customary bridal price, shirbaha, also
known as walwar and qailin. Unlikemahr, which is
sanctioned by the Sharì≠a and is paid to women in
the instance of divorce, shirbahamust be paid to
the bride’s family at the time of marriage. In north-
ern Afghanistan, where a woman’s skills as a carpet
weaver contribute significantly to a family’s income,
the bridal price is based on carpet weaving and
other skills. In the areas inhabited by the Pashtuns,
tribal and subtribal disputes are usually settled by
giving one or several women in marriage to the
family of the victim without having to pay the
bridal price (Tapper 1991). These practices vary
significantly between urban and rural areas.State policies on gender and
kinship
The first systematic attempt by the state to
change the social structure of the country was
undertaken in the 1920s during the reign of King
Amàn Allàh. Amàn Allàh’s social reforms were
intended to weaken kinship and undermine the
exclusive claims of family by legislating against
arranged marriages and by emancipating women.
The abolition of slavery in 1920 freed hundreds of
women from the bondage of concubinage. The
family law, issued shortly afterwards, discouraged
marriage between close relatives and the payment
of bridal money to the bride’s family. A new code,