issued in the following year, imposed restrictions
on polygamy and outlawed the Pashtun practices
of bartering women as retribution for crime and
forcing a widow to marry the closest male relative
of her deceased husband. Both of these practices
were declared to be contrary to Sharì≠a law.
The state’s efforts to regulate and monitor family
matters provoked widespread hostility and resist-
ance. Opposition to these and other social reforms
resulted in general revolts in 1928, the abdication
of King Amàn Allàh, and the repeal of his social
reforms. Kinship and tribal loyalties remained
prevalent despite modernization attempts and eco-
nomic development during the 1950s, 1960s, and
1970s. Although urban women, a small segment of
the total population, benefited from development
projects in the areas of education, employment, and
political representation, the situation of women in
rural areas remained essentially unchanged. Uneven
development actually widened the gap between
urban and rural populations.
In 1978, the pro-Soviet People’s Democratic Party
of Afghanistan (PDPA) gained power in a military
coup referred to as the Saur (April) Revolution. The
new regime targeted first the structure of “tribal-
feudalism” and pushed for radical changes. In
1979, the Revolutionary Council of the Marxist
regime issued several decrees to transform the tra-
ditional bases of economic and social exchange
that held extended families together and “knitted
them into a qawmor tribe” (Rubin 1995, 116).
Women’s emancipation was integral to this policy.
Decree No. 7 issued in October declared the equal
rights of women and men and the regime’s goal “to
free the toiling women of Afghanistan from humil-
iating feudalistic relations and provide opportuni-
ties for their advancement at all levels.” The land
reform act (Decree No. 8), issued a month later,
awarded each family about 15 acres of first quality
land and defined family to include a husband, wife,
and unmarried children under 18 years of age. In
conformity with other reforms, land reform was
intended to replace the extended family system and
larger kinship units with nuclear families depend-
ent on the state. As Rubin points out, the reforms
undertaken by the Marxist government would
have changed the social fabric of Afghanistan,
had they been implemented (Rubin 116–17). As it
turned out, the government’s revolutionary ap-
proach stirred up resentment in the countryside
that impeded the implementation of social reforms,
even those of previous regimes, particularly those
relating to the rights of women.336 kinship, descent systems and state
Effects of war
Islam became the rallying point in uniting various
ethnic groups in a jihad (holy war) against the
regime and its Soviet backer. The war of resistance
(1978–92) and the ensuing civil war that lasted
until United States military operations in 2001, had
disastrous social consequences. About two million
Afghans were killed or wounded and about six mil-
lion more, mostly women and children, were dislo-
cated internally or fled into Pakistan and Iran as
refugees. A systematic study of the impact of dis-
placement on kinship and extended family in
Afghanistan has not been yet undertaken. Reports
prepared by various international relief societies,
however, confirm that thousands of women lost
their homes and their husbands, fathers, and sons
and were left with no means of support. The major-
ity of these women were forced to assume new
responsibilities as the head and breadwinner of
their household.Bibliography
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Pashtuns. Preliminary notes on ethnographic distribu-
tion and variation in eastern Afghanistan, in Anthropos
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ethnic politics. Afghanistan, Iran, and Pakistan, Syra-
cuse, N.Y. 1986.
H. Bradsher, Afghan communism and Soviet intervention,
Karachi 1999.
L. Dupree, Afghanistan, Princeton, N.J. 1973.
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ization, Working Paper 4, Geneva 31 December 2001.Senzil NawidThe CaucasusKinship in the Caucasus is discussed in this entry
in light of the general debate in anthropology on