Courting women in the Gulf monarchies: State power, gender and judging

The article highlights the appointment of women as adjudicators in court in the Gulf monarchies between 2005–2020. The main question addressed is: What are the driving forces behind the inclusion of women in the judiciary in these overtly conservative societies? Two circumstances are explored: First, the rise in the number of female lawyers along with the appointment of professional women in law as deputy public prosecutors. This question responds to how Gulf women have entered positions of judicial litigation and decision-making. Secondly, the inclusion of women as adjudicators in court. This part addresses questions related to why Gulf women have obtained positions as prosecutors and judges in courts. Kuwait and Saudi Arabia provide case studies in addition to a general review of women’s access to judgeship in the six Gulf monarchies.

What Brings Female Professionals to Entrepreneurship? Exploring the Antecedents of Women’s Professional Entrepreneurship

This study explores how female professionals engage in starting their own businesses, known as professional entrepreneurship. In particular, this study specifies what factors foster the likelihood of self-employment of female professionals. Drawing upon the push and pull theories of entrepreneurship, we argue that individual capabilities (as a pull factor) make the self-employment of female professionals less likely, while discrimination experiences (as a push factor) make the self-employment of female professionals more likely. Given such bifurcated effects of these factors, we examine the combinatory effects of individual capabilities and discrimination experiences (which are specified as attribute-based and family-based discrimination experiences) on the rate of self-employment of female professionals. With a sample of 1356 female lawyers in the U.S., we test our hypotheses predicting the rate of self-employment with respect to prior salary and discrimination experiences. Our results reveal that prior salary (a pull factor) motivates female lawyers to stay at the traditional law firms, whereas attribute-based discrimination experiences (a push factor) motivate them to open their own office. Furthermore, we find that such a push effect is pronounced only among the female lawyers with lower salaries. Then, the empirical findings are discussed to elaborate the process of female professionals’ entrepreneurship.

Personal Freedom in Estonian Marriage Law between 1918 and 1940

Although Estonia started to develop its own legal system after gaining independence in 1918, many of the old laws from the Russian Empire remained in force in the interim. Soon, Estonia started to develop its own civil code. The old Baltic Private Law Code was highly patriarchal, and various aspects of family law reform were extensively discussed throughout the 1920s and 1930s. While the need for reform was widely accepted, opinions as to its extent varied considerably: female lawyers, inspired by Scandinavian laws, fought for the greatest possible degree of freedom and equality between spouses, while conservative politicians preferred more moderate changes. The article examines two main questions connected with the developments of those times – how much freedom the state gave to spouses for regulating their personal and proprietary relations and how much personal freedom the wife had in comparison to the husband. The norms regulating personal relations, the statutory matrimonial property regime, and the contract related to marital property are analysed in connection with efforts to identify the merits and reasonable limits of personal freedom in marriage. The family law in force in the 1920s and 1930s is compared with draft forms of the Estonian Civil Code, for uncovering how the compilers of the new version achieved balance between modern liberal ideas of personal freedom and traditional concerns about upholding stability of marriage.

Moving from Legislation to Implementation: Participants’ Resolve on Inheritance Property of Women

This paper attempts to develop a mechanism to overcome inequality present in the context of inheritance property of women in Pakistan. Taking a feminist research stand that focused on knowledge construction as a way to suggest alternatives for changes in oppressive situations. Data collected from thirty men, women of rural, urban settings, and ten male and female lawyers from the Pothohar region through self-exploratory semi-structured qualitative interviews. The findings revealed procedural changes at the state level such as the offices where property transfer happened as well as recommended to set up a monitoring cell to see the record of the court decisions about inheritance property of women. Moreover, the findings highlighted community-level changes to spread awareness through various means like media, social media, Friday sermons, and seminars at union council levels about the inheritance property of women. Furthermore, findings also indicated changes at the family level as a combination of state decisions to make a change in the family headship, changing mindset through awareness as well as the training of boys and girls on equal footing at home.

The Predictive Power of Psychological Needs and Self-efficacy for the Level of Marital Happiness

This study aimed at identifying the most common psychological needs among wives, identifying the degree of self-efficacy and the level of martial happiness among the study sample individuals as well as identifying the extent to which these psychological needs contribute to predicting the level of marital happiness. The study consisted of (150) married female lawyers. To succeed the study objectives, the scale of psychological needs was developed; it consisted of (20) items that measure four basic dimensions: psychological security, the need to achievement, the need to affiliation, and need to respect. The scale of self-efficacy (Schwarzer & Jerusalem, 1995) was used, and the scale of marital happiness was developed; it consisted of (40) items that measure five main dimensions: emotional adjustment, intellectual adjustment, family adjustment, social adjustment, and economic adjustment. The study results directed that the most common psychological need among wives is the need to achievement. The results revealed that the level of self-efficacy among the study sample individuals was medium. The results showed that the level of marital happiness among the married Jordanian female lawyers was medium for the total degree and each of the following dimensions (emotional adjustment, economic adjustment, intellectual adjustment, social adjustment), while the dimension of family cohesion was of a high degree. The results revealed that there is a predictive power for the psychological needs and self-efficacy concerning the level of marital happiness. In the light of the results, the study recommended the necessity of conducting further experimental researches in the domain of self-efficacy and marital happiness by developing counseling programs to improve these variables among spouses.

Complexity Faced by Legal Clinics in Afghanistan: Addressing the Challenges

This article studies the burgeoning legal clinics in Afghanistan and describes the complexity that influences their effectiveness and accessibility. This complexity arises from conflicts among statutory law, Sharia and customary laws, exacerbated by the dual legal education in law and Sharia faculties in the highly challenging environment of the country. The main objective of this qualitative research is to illustrate these challenges faced by pro bono legal aid and legal clinics, and its main claim is that unsettled conflicts between statutory law, Sharia and customs and between legal education systems negatively affect legal aid provision in the country. Legal education, provided by faculties of law and Sharia to suit the aims of the two recognized legal systems of statutory law and Sharia, is considered the internal challenge to the clinical legal service, and the highly adverse environment in which legal clinics operate is considered the external challenge. Since some of the external challenges are related to traditional dispute resolution mechanisms, they are inevitably related to legal and legal education systems, and hence, addressing them improves the effectiveness of the legal clinics. This research uses available data to support its claims. As part of a sustainable solution to the acute shortage of legal aid throughout Afghanistan, legal education should emphasize practical aspects of law, improve curricular development in both law and Sharia faculties, train more female lawyers, use more broadly accepted frameworks of human rights and social justice and highlight the values of voluntarism.

Canadian researchers advise law firms to ensure employees feel empowered to negotiate work-life balance (WLB)

Purpose The purpose was to find out how lawyers at high-profile legal firms managed WLB. Design/methodology/approach The researchers conducted interviews with 42 lawyers at two law firms in a large West Coast city. Both participating law firms focus on corporate law and employ around 100 lawyers. Interviews took place on site over a three-month period. They lasted between 20 minutes and an hour. Questions covered general experience in the profession, as well as balancing work and non-work lives. Findings The answers revealed the tensions between work and non-work experiences. Lawyers were driven to work long hours and expected to respond quickly to clients’ needs. But they had diverse attitudes to WLB. They could broadly be divided into three categories – “work-centric,” “non-work centric,” and “dual-centric.” Their life values were also strongly correlated with gender. Only dual-centric and life-centric female lawyers had actively negotiated alternative work arrangements Originality/value There has been very little qualitative research into workplace attitudes to WLB

An Empirical Study of Work-Family Field: Identifying Psychographic Predictors of WorkFamily Conflict

This study propounds to examine the dynamics of relationship among emotional intelligence, job satisfaction, and self-efficacy and work-family conflict in female lawyers. Correlational Cross-sectional research design was implicated in this research in order to test the hypothesis that emotional intelligence, self-efficacy and job satisfaction are likely to predict work-family conflict in young female lawyers. The sample comprised of n= 200 female lawyers, age ranging between 30-50 years, recruited from the civil and high court of Lahore, Pakistan. SPSS 23.0 was used to execute analyses that revealed that emotional intelligence was somehow having negative relationship with work-family conflict yet positively associated with self-efficacy. Findings of linear regression analysis divulge that emotional intelligence and self-efficacy are significant negative predictors of work-family conflict. Results from the current research provide insight for future researchers in seeking line of further inquiry on psychosocial dynamics of work-family life patterns of female lawyers.