POLITICAL FACTIONS, IDEOLOGICAL FICTIONS: THE CONTROVERSY OVER FAMILY LAW REFORM IN DEMOCRATIC MALI

2003 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 132-164 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dorothea Schulz
Keyword(s):  
Women's Rights ◽  
Family Law ◽  
Law Reform ◽  
Women’S Rights ◽  
State Administration ◽  
International Donor ◽  
Political Factions ◽  
Ultimate Outcome ◽  
Main Components ◽  
Specific Interests

AbstractThe article examines debates surrounding the current family law reform in Mali to account for the way in which broader processes of social change, an international and national context of women's rights activism, as well as various interest groups will shape the ultimate outcome of legislative reform. The article focuses on the five main components of the proposed reform and analyzes the positions of the most important groups participating in the debate: women's rights activists supported by the international women's movement and international donor organizations, protagonists of the two influential wings of the national Muslim organization, and representatives of the state administration. It is argued that although state officials and protagonists of an "Islamic" position hold divergent ideological and normative orientations, they form temporary and shifting alliances around certain issues, often on the basis of pragmatic considerations. Also, while women's rights activists and "Muslim women" claim to represent women tout court, the positions and arguments of the former can be seen as representing particularistic, class-specific interests.

The Attempt to Reform Family Law in Mali

2009 ◽  
Vol 49 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 398-428 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin F. Soares
Keyword(s):  
Women's Rights ◽  
Family Law ◽  
Law Reform ◽  
Women’S Rights ◽  
Political Liberalization ◽  
Social Reforms ◽  
The Family ◽  
Ultimate Outcome ◽  
Family Code ◽  
Alternative Reading

AbstractIn this paper, I am concerned with understanding the recent efforts to reform the laws governing marriage and inheritance, the code de la famille or the Family Code in Mali. Since the advent of multiparty elections in the 1990s, prominent members of the Malian government and civil servants, Malian women's rights activists, secular NGOs, and international and bilateral donors have made efforts to promote various social reforms, including the advancement of women's rights and the promotion of gender equality, particularly through changes in the Family Code. While some observers have attributed the lack of reform to the increased influence of “Islamists” and/or to religiously conservative Muslims, I draw on historical research and ethnography to propose an alternative reading of the lack of institutional law reform. As I argue, the gap between Malian civil law relating to the family and the lived experiences and social practices of many Malians, who are overwhelmingly Muslim, has become even more apparent in this era of political liberalization and promotion of global human rights discourses. This has helped to make such proposed social reforms as the promotion of women's rights and family law reform more contentious and the ultimate outcome even more uncertain.

Divorce on grounds of discord: Did the Moroccan family law reform bring the guarantee of divorce for women? An ethnographic perspective on the changing landscape of divorce. The Mudawwana a decade on

2020 ◽  
Vol 74 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-65
Author(s):  
Elisabeth Nössing
Keyword(s):  
Women's Rights ◽  
Family Law ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Family Court ◽  
Law Reform ◽  
Women’S Rights ◽  
Mena Region ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
Moroccan Family

AbstractThis article discusses the new divorce on grounds of discord procedure (taṭlīq li-š-šiqāq) within the context of the Moroccan family law reform of 2004. Literature available in English and French has, so far, focused primarily on the improvements the Moroccan family law reform has brought in regard to women’s rights. The reform is considered one of the most progressive legislative projects in the MENA region and a milestone for gender equality, notably the reform of divorce law. Divorce on grounds of discord was seen as the long-awaited divorce guarantee for women. However, legal scholars maintained that case law jeopardised the divorce guarantee. This legal-anthropological study is informed by fieldwork at the family court in Rabat, as well as official statistics, case law and the standard legal commentary. It aims to scrutinise how divorce on grounds of divorce is put into practice by the judiciary, how Moroccan men and women make use of it and how changes on a procedural and institutional level affect the implementation of the new divorce procedure. My empirical findings show that divorce on grounds of discord effectively guarantees Moroccan women’s right to divorce. Well beyond the discussion on women’s rights in divorce, I will demonstrate that, within a decade, divorce on grounds of discord developed into a standard divorce procedure for both men and women across socio-economical milieus and age groups.

Divorce Reform in the Sharia Court of Appeals in Israel (1992-2003)

2006 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 242-274 ◽  
Author(s):  
Moussa Abou Ramadan
Keyword(s):  
Women's Rights ◽  
Family Law ◽  
Burden Of Proof ◽  
Women’S Rights ◽  
Religious Minorities ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
Muslim Society ◽  
Court Of Appeals ◽  
Main Components ◽  
And Control

In this article, I study Article 130 of the Ottoman Family Law, which is still applied in Israel, with special attention to developments within the Sharia Court of Appeals between the years 1992 and 2003. I argue that this Court has encouraged reform regarding the issue of niza wa-shiqāq (quarrel and disagreement). This reform has four main components. First, it entails a weakening of the patriarchal concept that limits a woman's role within Muslim society, her authority over her body, and her movements. Second, it eases the burden of proof by lowering evidentiary requirements. Third, it improves the procedure of arbitration by better defining the suitability of the arbitrators and supervising the methods of their work. Fourth, it enables the Sharia Court to nominate arbitrators and control their decisions. This reform has improved women's rights to divorce and has made divorce a relatively easy option. The reform also makes it easier for both men and women to obtain divorce, particularly as compared to other religious minorities in Israel.

LEGAL RIGHTS AND WOMEN'S AUTONOMY: CAN FAMILY LAW REFORM IN MUSLIM COUNTRIES AVOID THE CONTRADICTIONS OF VICTORIAN DOMESTICITY?

Hawwa ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-54
Author(s):  
Danaya Wright
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Women's Rights ◽  
Family Law ◽  
Law Reform ◽  
Women’S Rights ◽  
Legal Change ◽  
Women’S Autonomy ◽  
Women's Autonomy ◽  
Muslim Countries ◽  
The Law

AbstractIn early- and mid-nineteenth century England, numerous law reformers targeted the law of coverture. Under this law married women lost custody of children, lost any property they brought, could not make a will or enter into a contract once they married, and they could not seek a divorce if their marriage broke down under the doctrine that husband and wife were a single unit before the law. The discourse of the reform debates, however, presented women as either violent and intemperate, and thus requiring the chains of coverture to keep them from bringing down the pillars of civil society. Or, they were seen as victims in sore need of the law's protection from violent and intemperate men. At no time were they viewed as legal agents, capable of exercising rights responsibly or as rational actors, who could be entrusted with the care and control of raising children single-handedly. But as the law changed to accommodate demands for women's rights, it is clear that women did not destroy civil society, nor have they attained equal power and autonomy with men. Thus, in looking at the reforms, and the forces that inhibited the reforms in Victorian England, we can begin to think more critically about how law reforms occur, how men and women are situated, and how barriers to equality frustrate legal change. With that history, I believe we are better situated to understand the demands for change in family law and women's rights in Muslim countries. Much of the rhetoric is ironically familiar. And I argue that knowledge of the pitfalls that threatened legal change in the Anglo-American west can help us avoid them in law reform arenas across the Muslim world. Of course, it is not simply that by learning our history we can hope not to repeat it. Rather, by understanding the complex interplay of reformist arguments and conservative pressures, we are better able to see beneath the rhetoric to the power structures inhibiting women's autonomy that lurk beneath the surface.

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