Journal no.5 1994. pp15-20.

Haleh Afshar examines what Islamic fundamentalism means to women who choose to adopt it and how, if at all it could be used as a means for political struggles. The intention is to move away from the usual condemnatory approach to Islamic fundamentalism and consider it in the light of the views and activities of its adherents.

WHAT IS FUNDAMENTALISM?
Fundamentalism has for long been associated with greater or lesser degrees of oppression of women. Given the rise of fundamentalism and the decision of many women to consciously reject feminisms of various kind and adopt the creed makes it important for some of us to consider what it is and why so many have chosen it. It may be worth while to stand back and consider the reasons that many Muslim women have offered for adopting Islamic fundamentalism and "returning to the source" both in the UK and elsewhere.

Part of the problem of understanding fundamentalism has been in terms of definitions and terminology. Muslims themselves do not use the terms fundamentalist at all; the twentieth century Islamists argue that they are revivalists, and are returning to sources of Islam to regain a purified vision, long since lost in the mire of worldly governments. Shiias, who are a minority school of Islam, but form 98 per cent of the Iranian population, have for long seen themselves as the guardians of the poor, the dispossessed and those trampled on by unjust governments. (1)

For them revivalism is merely a matter of succeeding in their centuries long struggle against injustice.

Thus fundamentalism for the Muslims is a return to the roots and a recapturing of both the purity and the vitality of Islam as it was at its inception. In this pursuit of the past, the Muslims, like all those glorifying their histories, are returning to an imaginary golden episode to lighten the difficulties of their current-day existence. (2) The golden age for the Shiias is the short term rule of the Prophet about a decade long and the even shorter one of his nephew and son in law Ali who ruled for less than five years. The Sunnis who accept the first four caliphs of Islam as being pure and worthy of emulating can lay claim to about 40 years of just rule; from the hijrat, the Prophet's move to Madina in 622 to Ali's death in 661 AD. In addition all Muslims claim to adhere absolutely the Koranic laws and accept the Koran as representing the very words of God as revealed to his Prophet Mohammed.

The Koran, which is divided into 114 Suras, contains expressly or implicitly, all the divine commands. These commands are contained in about 500 verses and of these about 80 may be regarded by Western lawyers as articles of a code. (3)

Thus, in their pursuit of the golden age, the Muslim people are equipped with fifty years of history and 114 verses of a 15 holy book, perhaps as good a resource as those offered by any other ideology or utopists vision.

But like utopias the past and the holy book have difficulties adjusting to the present. It is the domain of interpretation and adjustments to history that Islam is deemed to have become degraded. Yet without such adjustments, it would find it hard to survive as a creed. Thus the notions of return and revivalism are very much anchored in the processes of interpretations and adjustments. They seek to present new interpretations, puritanical, interpretations, interpretations that wipe out the centuries of misdeed and hardship and open the way for the future.

WOMEN AND REVIVALISM
In the twentieth century domain of interpretations, women have been active in their own right. Although the bulk of Islamic theology has been adapted and interpreted by male theologians who have claimed exclusive rights to instituting the Islamic laws (sharia), women have always maintained a presence, albeit a small one, in the domains of politics and theology. (4)

They have consistently and convincingly argued that Islam as a religion has always had to accommodate women's specific needs. Since the first convert to Islam was the Prophet redoubtable and Wealthy wife Khadija, no religion which she accepted could discriminate against women. Khadija, who was nearly 20 years older than the Prophet had first employed him as her trade representative and subsequently commanded him to marry her; overcoming his reserve and reluctance by informing his uncle that she was the very best wife that he could ever have. Their marriage was a happy one and the Prophet did not take another wife till after her death.

Thus some 14 centuries ago Islam recognised women's legal and economic independence as separate from that of their fathers and or husbands and sons. Islamic marriage was conceived as a matter of contract between consenting partners (Koran 4:4, 4:24), and one that stipulated a specific price, mahre, payable to the bride before the consummation of marriage. Women must be maintained in the style to which they have been accustomed (2:238, 4:34) and paid for suckling their babes (2:223).

Besides enjoying personal and economic independence, women were also close confidants and advisors to the Prophet. Khadija supported him in the early years and undoubtedly her influence protected the Prophet against the various Meccan nobles who wishes to quench Islam at its inception. After her death, Mohammed's favourite wife Aishah, who married him as a child and grew up in his household became not only his spouse, but also his closest ally and confident. She is known as one of the most reliable interpreters of Islamic laws.

Besides being a renowned source for the interpretation and extension of Islamic laws, Aishah was also an effective politician and a remarkable warrior; like many of the Prophet's wives, she accompanied him on his campaigns. After his death she ensured that her father Abu Bakre and not Mohammed's nephew Ali succeeded to the caliphate, and led the Muslim community. Subsequently when Ali became the Caliph Aishah raised an army and went to battle against him, taking to the field herself. Although she was defeated, Ali treated her with respect, but beseeched her not to interfere in politics.

Thus, if fundamentalism is about returning to the golden age of Islam, Muslim women argue that they have much reason for optimism and much room for manoeuvre. Furthermore many highly educated and articulate Muslim women regard Western feminism as a poor example and have no wish to follow it. Not only do they dismiss Western feminism for being one of the main instruments of colonialism, but also they despise the kinds of freedoms that are offered to women in the Western patriarchy. (5) Using much of the criticism provided by Western women themselves, the Islamist women argue that by concentrating on labour market analysis and offering the experiences of a minority of white affluent middle class women as a norm, Western feminists have developed an analysis which is all but irrelevant to the lives of the majority of women the world over. They are of the view that Western style feminist struggles have only liberated women to the extent that they are prepared to become sex objects and market their sexuality as an advertising tool to benefit patriarchal capitalism. They are particularly critical of the failure of Western feminism to carve an appropriate, recognised and enumerated space for marriage and motherhood. They argue that by locating the discussion in the domain of production and attempting to gain equality for women, Western feminists have sought and failed to make women into quasi men. They have failed to alter the labour market to accommodate women's needs and at the same time have lost the benefits that women had once obtained in matrimony. Thus Western feminists have made women into permanent second class citizens. Not a model that most women, in the West as elsewhere choose to follow.

By contrast the Islamist women argue that they can benefit by returning to the sources of Islam. They are of the view that Islamic dictum bestows complementarity on women, as human beings, as partners to men and as mothers and daughters. They argue that Islam demands respect for women and offers them opportunities, to be learned, educated and trained, while at the same time providing an honoured space for them to become mothers, wives and home makers. They argue that unlike capitalism and much of feminist discourse, Islam recognises the importance of women's life cycles, they have been given different roles and responsibilities at different times of their lives and at each and every stage they are honoured and respected for that which they do. They argue that Islam at its inception has provided them with exemplary female role models and has delineated a path that can be honourably followed at each stage. Mohammed's daughter Fatima, for the Shfias in particular, provides an idealised and idolised role model as daughter to the Prophet and wife to the Iman, Ali. For all Muslims Khadija represents a powerful representative of independence as Well as being a supportive wife. The Sunnis admire Aishah for her powerful intellect as well as her political leadership. Thus, the revivalists contend, Muslim women have no need of Western examples, which are in any case alien and exploitative. They have their own path to liberation which they wish to pursue.

Islamist women are particularly defensive of the veil. The actual imposition of the veil and the form that it has taken is a contested domain. Nevertheless many Muslim women have chosen the veil as a symbol of Islamification and have accepted it as the public face of the revivalist position. For them the veil is a liberating, and not an oppressive force. They maintain that the veil enables them to become the observers and not the observed; that it liberates them from the dictates of the fashion industry and the demands of the beauty myth. in the context of the patriarchal structures that shape women's lives. The veil is a means of bypassing sexual harassment and "gaining respect".

As postmodernism takes hold and feminists deconstruct their views and allow more room for specific and differing needs, demands and priorities of women of different creeds and colours, it is no longer easy to offer pat denials of the Islamic women's positions.

IRAN AND THE PRACTICAL POLITICS OF ISLAMIST WOMEN
Like all political theories, the Islamist women's has had difficulties in standing the test of the times. Although Islam does provide a space for women, it has been as difficult for Muslim women as for their Western counterparts to obtain and maintain their rights. The throng of women who supported the Islamic revolution in Iran were no exception to this rule. On its inception the Islamic Republic embarked on a series of misogynist laws, decrees and directives which rapidly curtailed the access of women to much of the public domain. Female judges were sacked, the faculty of law closed its door to female applicants and article 163 of the Islamic constitution states that women cannot become judges.

Subsequently the Islamic laws of retribution (Qassas laws) severely eroded women's legal rights. Not only were two women's evidence equated with that of one man, as required by the Koran (2:82), but women's evidence, if uncorroborated by men, was no longer accepted by the courts. Women who insisted on giving uncorroborated evidence are judged to be lying and subject to punishment for slander (article 92 of the laws).

Murder is now punished by retribution; but the murderer can opt for the payment of daheh, blood money, to the' descendants of the murdered, in lieu of punishment (Article 1 of the Qassas laws). Whereas killing a man is a capital offense, murdering a women is a lesser crime.

Men were also entitled to kill anyone who "violates their harem", men who murdered their wives, or their sisters, or mothers on the charge of adultery, were not subject to any punishment. But women do not have such rights.

Politically too women were marginalised. Article 115 of the Islamic constitution follows Ayatollah Khomeini's instructions in insisting that the leader of the nation, Valayateh Faqih, would be a man, and so would the President. Since its inception the Islamic government has never had a female member of the cabinet and the number of female Majlis, (Parliamentary) representative had been less than five in all but the last Majlis, where they reached nine.

Thus, with the arrival of the Islamic Republic, Iranian women lost all they had struggled for over a century, with the notable exception of the vote. The situation seemed grim indeed.

THE POLITICS OF FEMINIST FUNDAMENTALISM
But to despair the plight of women is to fail to recognise the formidable resilience of Iranian women. They refused to be daunted by this onslaught of patriarchy, as they had been for the past hundred years or more. Although some bowed to the pressures of the Islamic Republic, many remained firm, both as women and as believers in the faith. It was only as devout Muslims that women could counter the demands made of them by the Islamic Republic. Given the Islamic nature of the national political discourse, the defenders of the faiths of women took the Republic to task for failing to deliver its Islamic duties. For Iranian women revivalism has almost literally been a God-sent. They have fought against their political, legal and economic marginalisation and although victory is yet to come, they have won considerable ground and are continuing to do so. Throughout their arguments have been anchored in the teachings of Islam, the Koranic laws and the traditions and practices of the Prophet of Islam.

Using the Koranic instruction that all Muslims must become learned, women have finally succeeded in removing many of the bars placed on their education. Women who gained their training and expertise in the pre-revolutionary days of equality now command high salaries and many run their own successful businesses in the private sector. Private sector schools have simply defied the laws of gender segregation and employed male science and mathematic teachers to teach girls. As a result Iranian girls regularly come top in the University entrance examinations in most subjects!

THE STRUGGLE FOR EQUAL EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY
Islamification has led to a severe cut back in female employment rates. Nevertheless neither the public nor the private sector could operate without female employees, nor for that matter could most house holds survive without the women's income. Thus despite all attempts women continue to have a presence in the work force, through in terms of percentage, this presence is much lower than before the revolution.

The government has some supporters in its attempts to curtail women's access to the labour market. A clear example is Shahla Habibi who, in 1991, was appointed to the newly created post of Presidential advisor on women's affairs. Typically her previous post had been with the national Islamic propaganda organisation, Another is the government sponsored Women's Organisation which declared:

As the imam has repeatedly said, good men are raised in the taps of good women. If we follow this example then we'd find our true station in life and recognise that motherhood is a sacred and holy duty of women.

But the women supporters of the government have been firmly and continuously opposed by women such as Azam Taleqani, daughter of the late leading ayatollah Taleqani and member of the first post-revolutionary Parliament. Azam Taleqani founded the. Women's Society of Islamic Revolution, which has been successfully defending women's rights. She told the press:

Two thirds of women in this country live and work in the rural areas and carry a major burden of agricultural activity. Nevertheless we do not allow our women to study agricultural sciences at the university.

Similarly Zahra Rahnavard, a leading Islamic feminist and the wife of the previous Iranian Prime Minister, denounced discrimination against women on religious and political grounds:

Our planners say 'we don't have the means to invest equally in men and women and must spend our limited resources on those who provide the highest return for our society. Therefore as women's natural obligations, in giving birth and raising their children, means that they work less, we cannot allocate too great a portion of our resources to them

We respond that this is wrong since all Muslims are required to Moral dilemmas for the Mullabs, Zobra pursue knowledge regardless of their gender. It is of the essence, in terms of religious requirement and social well-being, that no barriers be put between women and their quest for knowledge.

By placing the argument squarely in the Islamic domain, Rahnama Taleqani and others succeeded in gaining the support of some of the leading politicians like Hojatoleslam Nateq Nouri. The long serving, enlightened Minister of Interior declared:

Islam places no limitation whatever in the participation of women in the public, political and cultural domains.

In fact, Iranian women are entitled legally to equal rights of access to the labour market in Iran and they had been promised a less discriminatory future at the inception of the revolution. Article 43 of the Constitution undertakes to provide employment opportunities for all and states that full employment is a fundamental aim of the revolution. Thus, even after the revolution, the Constitution, Labour Laws and the State Employment Laws make no distinction between men and women. As Azam Taleqani explained:

Article 28 of our constitution declares that anyone can chose any profession that they wish, provided they do not contravene Islam and public and social interests. The government must provide equal opportunities for everyone in every job according to social needs. 7-be failure to implement this law properly has destroyed the trust of women in Islam and the government.

Of course in practice women do not benefit from equal pay for equal work provisions. Married women pay higher taxes on their incomes than do married men; and women pay higher child insurance premiums than do men. It is the men who benefit from the married man enticement whereas it is usually women who end up paying for nursery care of their children. Men get larger bonuses, because it is assumed that they are the head of household, and they are entitled to cheap goods from the civil service cooperatives; their share increases with the numbers of their children. Not so for women who do not even get a share for themselves.

Zahra Rahnavard warned the government that such discriminations eroded much of women's support for the regime. By 1990 she had to admit that at least the government, if not the revolution has failed women:

We have no strategy for including women in this country's destiny and in this respect we have fallen far short of our political aspiration... In the five years plan women are only mentioned once... despite all our protests we have remained invisible. It is essential that women's role in the development process is clearly delineated.

THE POLITICS 6F ACTIVISM, RESISTANCE AND COMPROMISE
Activists such as Rahnavard and Taleqani persevered and eventually found a foothold in the High Council of Cultural Revolution, which determines policies at a national level. There they managed to formulate an Islamic female employment policy. On the 11th of August 1992, 17 months after Zahra Rahnavard had joined the Council, it issued an official document on female employment - despite President Rafsanjani's directives to the Council "to educate women about the correct ways of dealing with their husband and children". The Council chose to educate the rulers about women's liberation it did so by making concessions and focusing on areas where it was possible to make gains.

The High Council accepted that women's first priority was to remain the home and family. But it went on to note that not all women are mothers at all times. It requested that women's life cycles be noted and "suitable jobs" be provided.

Where the Council's resolution is of interest is in its demand that the familial duties of women be formally recognised. Hence the policy demanded that in addition to equal pay for equal work, in the segment of the labour market allocated to women, the government should also allow women paid time off to enable them to fulfil their "mothering obligations". it stated that they should be entitled to shorter working hours and an earlier retirement age: measures which would recognise women's double burden of unpaid domestic work and paid employment. if, as the Council has suggested, the recognition of "mothering duties" results in some flexibility in working hours, without cutbacks in pay, the women workers would indeed fare much better.

The High Council's declaration further demanded that working women be entitled to job security, unemployment benefits and welfare provisions (article 10). In addition it stated that women who are heads of household should be entitled to special retraining programmes to enable them to return to the labour market (article 11) and the government is urged to provide co- operative type organisations to facilitate home working for women who wish to combine their paid and unpaid jobs (article 12). Thus, in return for accepting women's domestic obligations, the Council's directive sought to extract concessions which would enable women to fulfil both their paid and unpaid duties. Its declaration forms part of the slow, but sanctioned, progress of women in Iran in clawing back the rights that were summarily curtailed by the post-revolutionary state.

WOMEN IN PUBLIC AND POLITICS
Although they fought shoulder to shoulder with men, women were not given high office by the revolutionary government. It has never appointed a woman to a Ministerial post. A point made by Zahra Rahnavard in 1990 when she complained:

Women have been and continue to be present, at times in larger numbers than men, in our public demonstrations, for the revolution and its support. But when it comes to public appointment, they are pushed aside ...

Women like myself have continuously campaigned for better conditions. We have made our demands in the press and in the public domain. But no one has taken any notice and our voices are not beard.

But getting elected is only the first step. Women members are severely constrained by the ideological views that designate them as inferior, and by demands of them to be modest, silent and invisible. (21) Maryam Behrouzi, a veteran representative who had served a prison sentence before the revolution and whose 16-year-old son was "martyred", still found herself firmly discriminated against. She pointed out that women are never elected to high-powered committees. Nor did they become chair or officers of other parliamentary committees. (22) Azam Taleqani who gained a seat in the first post-revolutionary Majlis, explained that women were expected to be "naturally modest" and this prevented them from "saying too much in the Mailis. (23)

Nevertheless the women representatives have not been silent or ineffectual. In April 1991 as the country was preparing for the Parliamentary elections, Maryan Behrouzi demanded that bills allowing an earlier retirement age for women, reforming some of the more draconian divorce laws and provision of national insurance for women and children be put before the next session of the Majlis.

In the subsequent Majlis, nine women were elected. In a remarkable move, they managed to alter the divorce laws to make it more expensive for men to leave their wives at will. In fact except for a brief period, the post-revolutionary government had not succeeded in closing down the Family Court set up before the revolution to curb divorce, or defend the aggrieved party, who was usually the wife, in familial disputes. The Islamic government had restored the male prerogative to easy divorce. By using the marriage contract, and insisting on the Koranic right to fair treatment, many Iranian women had continued going to the Family Courts. Nevertheless on the whole the courts favoured the men and on divorce women were not entitled to any of their husband's property. As Azam Taleqani explained:

Unfortunately after the revolution... the government and even the clergy have not paid enough attention to women as full human beings. All their efforts has been concentrated on making women stay at home, at all cost; to make them accept self sacrifice, oppression and submissive. Even if they go to court to get their due, I am not saying that the courts are totally patriarchal; but unfortunately there are these tendencies. So the problem is presented in a way that does not illuminate the truth.

However the 1993 bill sought to curtail men's automatic right of divorce, by demanding that men who "unjustly" divorce their wives should do their Koranic duty and pay "wages" for the wife's domestic services during their married years.

Behrouzi also succeeded in pushing through a bill which allowed women to retire after 20 years of active service, while the men still had to serve 25 years. Her success was in part achieved because it permitted women to return to their proper sphere, that of domesticity, all the sooner.

For those who were actively campaigning for women, these bills mark remarkable successes. In 1991 the Women's Cultural-Social Council, despite its conservative membership still submitted 13 women's projects to the High Council of Cultural Revolution; but only one of these was considered and ratified by the Council. It was a proposal to eliminate the prejudicial treatment of women in higher education and in the selection for degree courses. This was no mean feat since there were discriminatory measures against women in 119 academic subject areas.

WOMEN'S ORGANISATIONS
It was in quangos and organisations outside the direct control of the government that women activists were most successful in struggling for better economic political opportunities. Although in the public domain success depended on espousing an Islamic stance, Islam itself is sufficiently flexible to allow a diversity of interpretation and much leeway for women. Azam Taleqani for example set up the Islamic Republic's Women's 0rganisation, a non governmental activist group, whose members have included Zahra Rahnavard, as well as more conservative women such as Monireh Gorgi, a woman representative in the Assembly of Experts, which is responsible for nominating the national leader, and Majlis representative Gohar Dastqeib.

Within the civil service it was women in the lower echelons of the governmental organisations who fought effectively for the cause. By 1992 the Minister of Interior had been prevailed upon to set up women's affairs committees to serve the social councils in all the provinces. Women working on these committees were much clearer about their aims than Mrs Habibi ever could be. Jaleh Shahrian Afshar, a member of the Western Azarbaijan's women's committee, explained that first and foremost they wished to be independent, to have better opportunities and facilities and to embark on a wide ranging family planning programme. They had taken their demands directly to the Majlis. But the only one of their suggestions to meet with approval was the family planning one.

In this they were helped by the population explosion and tragically by the out burst of self-immolation; more and more women chose to burn themselves rather than tolerate difficult marriages or rivals. Of course in this, as in all other issues concerning women the demise of Khomeini was in itself of the essence. After his death, and the return of the vanquished warriors after eight years of fruitless war, the demand for "manpower" to feed the war and labour to work in the war industries, diminished dramatically and gradually the government came to the realisation that it need to control the population explosion.

THE POPULATION DEBATE
By 1987 the Statistical Centre of Tehran was indicating that 96 per cent of the urban women of child bearing age were married and only 1 per cent had never married. The non literate women married at around 16 and literate ones at 17.5. But only 7 per cent of married women used any form of family planning. The average age for the first birth was 19, but it increased to 21 for women with secondary education. On average mothers had four live births, rather more than their stated desired average which was two in urban areas and three in rural areas. interestingly over half of the women questioned did not mind whether they had a son or a daughter; 14 per cent actually preferred to have a daughter and only 31 per cent had a marked son preference.

Thus by 1990 the Iranian population reached 59.5 million and was growing at an average annual rate of 3.9 per cent. Yet though there was some disquiet, the devout were not panicking, Nevertheless both the high birth rates and temporary marriages came under new scrutiny.

The daily newspaper warned that the country had only 12 million hectares of cultivable land which would feed 30 million people at most. Already in 1968 the Islamic government had introduced a bill for population control and a year later a five year programme was announced to curb the explosion.

By 1990 Ayatollah Yousef Saneyi was advocating birth control. He told the population control seminar in Isfahan that he had come to the conclusion that:

None of the wise and learned people has ever said that it is good and desirable to have lots of children

The population crisis posed a severe dilemma for the Islamic government. It had long since outlawed the pre-revolutionary abortion law and dismantled the family planning clinics. Suddenly it found itself with families averaging 5 or more children and no clear policy for halting the momentum. In July 1991 the government decreed that for a fourth birth, working women were not entitled to their 3 months paid maternity leave, nor could a fourth child be allowed any rations or a ration card. Any family that chose to have a fourth child would have to share out its resources and spread it more thinly, with no help from the state. At the same time the Minister of Health Dr Reza Malekzadeh suggested to husbands that they should choose to have a vasectomy. A year later the courts decided to reconsider the abortion laws:

It remains absolutely illegal to have an abortion or to carry out an abortion. Article 91 of the Criminal code imposes the death penalty, according to the Islamic laws, for anyone murdering an unborn child 'if that child possess a soul'. But 'before the soul enters the body of a being' a doctor is of the opinion that it is dangerous to continue with the pregnancy and issues a certificate to that effect; then the pregnancy can be terminated.

At the same time the newspapers published the list of 50 hospitals in the country offering free vasectomy and female sterilisation.

By 1993 the Ministry of Health had its own population control Bureaux, with a 20 million rials budget that was 300 percent higher than that of the previous year. Assisted by an additional $300 million loan from the World Bank the Bureaux was about to launch a massive population control campaign offering free services at national, provincial and rural levels. The aim was to reduce the population growth to 2.7 per cent per annum.

Azam Taleqani seized the opportunity to point out the close links between polygamy and increasing birth rates. Before the revolution Iranian woman had managed to curb men's right to polygamy, by making remarriage subject to the consent of the first wife and ratification by Family courts. Khomeini had restated men's right to permanent and temporary marriages and his successor Rafsanjani had endorsed this position during the year.

But women's opposition to polygamy continued. In this they were assisted by the Koranic dictum that no man, other than the Prophet of Islam could treat all his wives equally and therefore it was advisable for them to take only one. As Azam Taleqani stated:

There are 500,000 fewer women than men in our country... Yet we are told that we must accept that our husbands have the right to remarry. I even went to some of our religious leaders and asked them whether the , v were backing the family or planning to destroy it? Since it is obvious that the moment a second wife steps in, effectively the first wife is discarded and her life is ruined... But they are forcing women in this country to accept polygamy, if they don't then they are told that they have to quit and divorce the husband... How can you have such a policy and still claim that women are respected and valued? What is there left of such a woman? How can she become a good mother and raise a healthy family?

Although during the war the religious institutions had been largely supportive of polygamy, afterwards, with the advent of the population explosion some of their more enlightened members conceded Taleqani's point. In February 1990 Ayatollah Yousef Saneyi asked:

Who says there are no barriers to polygamy in Islam? You should study Islamic law and then see whether you can make such a claim. The only thing that some men know about the Koran is the right to polygamy.

As yet polygamy has not been outlawed. But the prospect of curbing it have improved. What has been a marked success is the decision in the summer 1993 to revise the Quassas laws and make honour killings punishable. The newly elected women members of Majlis, Azam Taleqani's Women's movement and Zahra Rahnavard, made a concerted effort to outlaw honour killings.

They documented the growing number of murder and atrocities committed by husbands, fathers and brothers on their unsuspecting womenfolk and demanded that the judiciary defends women. Finally the head of the judiciary Ayatollah Mohammed Yazdi issued a decree revising the laws and making male murders, be they kin or not subject to state prosecution. He agreed to remove the requirement that made the male "guardian" responsible for seeking justice in such cases. The decision was a landmark; it demonstrated that the Quassas laws, supposedly Islamic and eternal, were, like other aspects of the Islamic rule, responsive to pressure and subject to change.

CONCLUSION
The rule of Islam in Iran has not been easy on women. They lost much of the ground that they had won over the previous century and the way to recapturing some of those rights has been slow and barred by prejudice and patriarchal power. Undaunted Iranian women have struggled on. For the moment they have had to concede the veil and its imposition in the name of Islam, though they've done so reluctantly and have continued the discussions about its validity, relevance and the extent to which it should be imposed.

But the bargain that they have struck has enabled them to negotiate better terms. They have managed to revert the discriminatory policies on education, they are vociferously attacking the inequalities in the labour market and demanding better care and welfare provisions for working mothers. Although the road to liberty is one that is strewn with difficulties, Iranian women, as ever, have come out fighting and have proved indomitable.

NOTES
1. eg. Momen M, An Introduction to Shii Islam, Yale UP 1985,
2. e.g. Chhachhi A, 'Forced Identities: The State, Communalism, Fundamentalism and women in India' in Kandiyoti D (ed) Women, Islam and the State, Macmillan 1991
3. Afchar H 'The Muslim Concept of Law', The International Encyclopaedia of Comparative Law, JCB Mohr Tubingen, The Hague and Paris p 86
4. For detailed discussion see Abbott, Nadia Aishah The beloved of Mohammed, University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1942; Ahmed, Leila Women and Gender in Islam, Yale UP New Haven and London 1992; Keddi R and Baron B (eds) Women in Middle Eastern History.- shifting boundaries in sex and gender, Yale UP New Haven and London 1991; and Mernissi, Fatima Women and Islam: an historical and theological enquiry Blackwell, Oxford 1991
5. e.g. al-Ghazali, Zeinab Ayam min Hayati Dar alshurua, Cairo n.d. quoted by Hoffman, Valeri J An Islamic Activist.- Zienab al-Ghazali in Warnok Fernea, Elizabeth (ed) Women and the Family in the Middle East University of Texas Press, Austin 1985; and Ahemd Women and Gender in Islam Politics & Women's Studies, University of York, Heslington, York, YO1 5DD