scholarly journals Women's Organizations in Egypt: Emerging Women's Movements or Social Clubs?

1970 ◽  
pp. 10-14
Author(s):  
Nadje S. Al-Ali

A close look at the content and context of women's organizations in contemporary Egypt sheds light on the ambiguities and contradictions existent in contemporary Egypt. On the one hand, women's organizations began to flourish since the 1985 UN women's conference in Nairobi, and particularly during the preparations for the International Conference on Population and Development (lCPD) held in Cairo in 1994. During this time there was increasing pressure on the Egyptian government by international organizations and western governments to adhere to UN conventions concerning women's rights. At the same time, a huge number of international donor organizations, NGOs and government bodies provided funds and resources for specific projects and campaigns related to women's issues. However, the increased confrontation with Islamists has pressured the Mubarak regime to legislate and implement more conservative laws and policies towards women and to diminish its support for women's political representation. It is no surprise then that women's organizations have been caught in the midst of contradictory state policies towards women and towards Egypt's growing NGO sector.

Author(s):  
Marie Saiget

The history of women is characterized by nonlinear and gendered social, political and economic processes. In particular, the history of Burundian women’s collective actions has been embedded in the contested and violent trajectory of the Burundian state. Burundian women’s collective actions refer to a broad range of interactions: from protest, and social mobilizations to institutionalized actions. These interactions have been shaped by both global and local social structures, and by complex conflictive and cooperative relations between the Burundian state, political parties, women’s organizations and movements, and external actors (colonial powers, international organizations, non-governmental organizations). Women’s experiences in Burundi’s pre-colonial patriarchal society are little known, with the exception of the glorified Queen-mothers. German and Belgian colonial policies (1886–1962) reinforced and rigidified pre-colonial social constructions of ethnic and gendered social identities and roles, assigning ordinary women to the domestic sphere and sanctioning their social inferior status along with ethnic lines (Tutsi, Hutu, and Twa). After Burundi’s independence, the one-party military regime organized and supervised the first forms of women’s political participation through the Union des femmes burundaises (1962–1980s). The democratic transition of the early 1990s led to the creation of autonomous women’s organizations and networks, which were extended during the civil war (1993–2005). Burundian women actively contributed to national and grassroots peace processes. In particular, a delegation of seven Burundian women participated in the negotiations held in Arusha (1998–2000), with observer status. Post-conflict struggles for women’s rights posed the central issue of women’s political representation, with the adoption of gender quotas from 2005, but left aside other issues after 2010, such as women’s right to inherit land. In Spring 2015, Burundian women were present in protests against the president’s third mandate; with the women’s march being the first to reach the city center in March 2015. Women’s organizations kept mobilizing towards women’s rights after the electoral crisis, in exile or within Burundi, though facing important financial constraints and political repression.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 149-157
Author(s):  
Nisa Göksel

Abstract This essay begins with the formation of solidarities among women's movements in Turkey during the period of the peace process. It focuses on events that took place between March 8, 2013, the beginning of the peace process, and March 8, 2017, when women activists in Turkey joined the International Women's Strike. Despite the collapse of the peace process and the resumption of war in the summer of 2015, women activists continued to struggle under the Turkish government's emergency regime. This essay addresses the ways in which the peace process and its termination affected relations among activist women, both Kurdish and non-Kurdish, as they have sought to confront Turkey's “new” emergency regime. Many women's groups lost their institutional footing due to the emergency regime's forced closure of women's organizations and its arrest of numerous activists, parliamentarians, and co-mayors. In this context, the essay demonstrates, women are left with no choice but to strengthen their alliances and to radicalize their movements against the state's authoritarian regime.


2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter A. Ferguson

This paper explores the failure of women’s organizations to effect the improvement of the status of Jordanian women during the Arab Spring. Through an examination of the regime’s political liberalization strategy, leadership failures within women’s organizations, and international donor influence on programmatic focus, the underlying explanation for this failure is found to be rooted in the historical depoliticization of women in Jordan. This is tested in the context of the Arab Spring through an analysis of the results of popular protests, proposed electoral law reforms, and efforts to amend the Jordanian constitution. The paper draws in part on a large collection of interviews and a focus group conducted in Jordan during the spring/summer of 2012, as well as analysis of primary documents from the government and a variety of women’s organizations in Jordan.


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