At the same time, they have considerable financial power, because of the inheritance laws that allow them to gain from the oil wealth in the country.
They have no political access or power, but then, neither do most of the men in Saudi Arabia, including many of the vast number of princes within the royal family itself. They live in a traditional, authoritarian, patriarchal society that is ruled by one family, and one that controls most of the wealth of the country. The family seeks to maintain its position by controlling politics within the country, and manipulating regional politics in order to maintain relative quiet in Saudi Arabia.
Afghanistan. On the other hand, Afghanistan's women are currently affected by one small group of radical Islamic fundamentalists who have gained power in the central region of the country. This group has gone well beyond Islamization, or even the fundamentalism of Iran under Khomeini. It has denied women the most basic of rights, including those guaranteed to them under the Qur'an.
Iran. There have been some changes in Iran since the early days of the revolution, although clearly the position of women has not returned to that of the days of the Shah of Iran. While that period was marked by advances and reversals in women's rights, the current period is one during which women are forced to work within the parameters of the personal status laws which are based strictly on shari'a and scripture within the Qur'an. Mir Hosseini (Afshar, 1993) noted that women do manage to carve out some personal freedom within these restrictions, but that this impulse comes from pre Khomeini Iran, from Westernized and feminist thought.
Egypt. Egypt is not as secularized as Turkey, as fundamentalist as Saudi Arabia, nor as erratic as Algeria has been. It has been influenced by both fundamentalism and feminism since the beginning of this century. Feminism was an early response to Western colonialism, and ...