Resources: Law reform

The Islamic Sharia, in so far as it is interpreted and exploited as the principal source of legislation in Bahrain, has a negative impact on women's rights and dignity in the private sphere. With regards to the public sphere, women are entitled to participate in public affairs and enjoy political rights including the rights to vote and to stand for elections.

This article traces Algerian women's struggle for full citizenship after the national liberation struggle ended in 1962. The Algerian Family Code, which became law in 1984, defines women as minors under the law and as existing only in so far as they are daughters, mothers or wives.

Since 2004 the Afghan Constitution has provided women with equal protection before the law. However, many discriminatory practices are disguised as 'Islamic' and, therefore, lawful. These include husbands deciding whether their wives should work, and a father having the right to prohibit his daughters from attending school or forcing them into marriage, all of them based on conservative interpretations of the Quran.

Discussions covered interpretation and jurisprudence, foundational myths, the process of Muslim jurisprudence relating to women in the family and women in society, and action and strategies. According to participants, the need for women to review the process of interpretation and claim their right to interpret arises out of the realities of women’s lives and the myth that there is one way of being in the Muslim world.