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TERI University
Department of Policy studies
AN ESSAY ON
Gender and Development in Afghanistan
Under the subject of
Integrated Approaches to Sustainable Development Practice, MPD 101
Submitted to
(Dr. Nimisha Jha)
Submitted by
Abdul Wahab “Azad” (Role No: 1301 MPD)
Past
Current
Still struggle for
Gender equity
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Gender and Development
The situation of women in Afghanistan has been dismal for many years. Their status was
undermined during the Soviet occupation and under subsequent regimes; in fact, the violation
of Afghan women‟s human rights is considered to have been “at its worst during the civil war
when Mujahedin leaders fought for control of Kabul” in the early 1990s. However, “human
rights abuses and crimes against women failed to attract interest beyond Afghanistan”,
women‟s rights were further eroded when the Taliban came into power in 1996.Yet the plight
of Afghan women was largely ignored until the terrorist attacks on the United States on 11
September 2001 drew strategic interest toward Afghanistan. (ClaraMorgan, 10 January 2008)
After the fall of Taliban regime there has been important commitments by the democratic
government for providing gender equality in Afghanistan:
December, 2001: The “Bonn Agreement” is signed recognizing the necessity of
female participation in public life to promote women‟s rights and women‟s status in
the peace and reconstruction process.
January, 2002: President Hamid Karzai signs the “Declaration of the Essential
Rights of Afghan Women” that affirms the equality between men and women, their
equal protection under the law, their equality in terms of education, freedom of
movement, speech, political participation and the right to choose whether to wear the
“burqa” or not. ((Burqa=scarf)).
2004: The Government of Afghanistan commits itself to pursue achievement of the 9
“Millennium Development Government of Afghanistan” (MDGs) by 2020,
among which are gender-specific targets in the fields of education, economics, health
and political participation.
November, 2004: The Government of Afghanistan develops the “National Strategy
for Children at Risk” to develop a network of services and programs to protect
children and support their families.
February, 2006: “Afghanistan Compact” that contains the Government of
Afghanistan‟s vision until 2020 for gender equality is framed. Principle 5 states that
the Afghan government and the international community will “build lasting Afghan
capacity and civil society institutions, with particular emphasis on building up human
capacities of men and women alike.”
2008: The “National Action Plan for the Women of Afghanistan 2008-2018”
(NAPWA) is adopted as a 10-year policy framework to assure continuity and
consistency with Government of Afghanistan‟s efforts to protect and promote Afghan
women‟s rights.
2008: The Government of Afghanistan publishes the “Afghanistan National
Development Strategy 2008-2013”(ANDS) which is “an overarching framework that
synthesizes the critical measures to be pursued through all ANDS sectors to fulfil the
Government‟s commitment to women‟s development as embodied by the
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Constitution, Afghanistan MDGs, Afghanistan Compact, I-ANDS and international
treaties such as CEDAW and the Beijing Platform for Action”.
August, 2009: The Government of Afghanistan adopts the “Law on the Elimination
of Violence against Women” (EVAW law) which mentions 22 different forms of
violence against women.
July, 2012: “Tokyo conference” agrees to a Monitoring and Evaluation framework
wherein Government of Afghanistan/donors have agreed to keep women‟s
empowerment as a key indicator of progress in Afghanistan.
Despite some tangible achievements, Afghan women continue to face a number of problems
according to a range of sources. For instance, The Guardian cited a 2011 survey by the
Thomson Reuters Foundation which identified Afghanistan as the most dangerous place for
women. The survey found that high mortality rates, limited access to doctors and a lack of
economic rights were among the dangers faced by women, in addition to “continuing
conflict, NATO air strikes, and cultural practices”. UNIFEM says that 87% of women face
abuse and violence in Afghanistan. Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported that, in areas
under Taliban control, women are facing constant threats, intimidation and violence. Girls‟
schools - and girls themselves - have been targeted along with female political leaders and
activists, several of whom have reportedly been murdered.
The following figure shows the female vs. male participation in the public sector of
Afghanistan during 2010: (AhmadKhan, February 2012)
Still women in Afghanistan face various problems only because of being a female and these
problems relate to:
1. Leadership, civic engagement, and political participations
The efforts of women activists working towards equality for women in Afghanistan are
continuously undermined by the corruption and sexist discrimination present at every level of
the justice system. Violence against women is widespread and comes from many sources,
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including family, armed groups, community leaders and agents of the state. Women who
experience violence have little recourse. There are few shelters to turn to, and there is a lack of
will to prosecute violence against women in the justice system, where they may face further
discrimination and violence.
Since 2005, a push has been made to encourage women to take part in national politics due to
pressure from the United Nations and the Ministry of Women‟s Affairs. In the directly
elected lower house of the National Assembly, 68 of the 249 seats are reserved for women in
the House of the People (Wolesi Jirga). In the upper house the same situation is going on.
(FAO, 11 March 2011)
2. Education
Afghanistan has one of the lowest literacy rates in the world. Only 14 percent of adult women
are literate, with some literacy rates in rural areas as low as 4-5 percent. Education for girls was
severely restricted under the Taliban rule. Since then, girls‟ education has been provided
through home schools, often run by private individuals or communities or NGOs. The Afghan
Ministry of Education is currently working to increase education and raise literacy levels and
some progress has been made. 1.2 million Girls have enrolled in Afghanistan‟s primary schools
since 2002, but more than 1 million primary school age girls are still not attending classes.
(Alison Luke, Sofi Khwaja, Lina Rahman, Keely Hunter and others, NA)
But with new efforts by international organizations and foreign countries to negotiate with
the Taliban, progress might be in the works. In the beginning of 2011, the Afghanistan
Ministry of Education reported that Taliban leaders had informed elders in rural regions that
girls could now attend separate schools as long as they and the female teachers wore the hijab
and that the curriculum respected cultural and religious values. Schools have since been
reopened and Najibullah Ahmadi, the director of education for the Kandahar Province, claims
that thousands of girls have since enrolled. Even if the Taliban respects this commitment, the
country still has to face other problems: lack of funding to reopen schools, shortage of female
teachers, ensuring security and shifting traditional parental views towards educating girls.
(WikiGender, NA)
3. Health
As „The Guardian‟ stated Afghanistan as the most dangerous place for women; an important
reason behind this statement is the low level reach of clinics and hospitals by the women in
Afghanistan. Today in Afghanistan, every 29 minute one woman dies from pregnancy
related complications which means that women in Afghanistan are facing many health
related problems.
Due to international funding and supports, hundreds of hospitals and clinics have been
established all around Afghanistan which would surely decrease the health related
problem of women in Afghanistan.
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4. Gender based violence (street harassment, sexual violence, kidnappings,
severe beating, forced marriage, etc.)
According to a nationwide research in 2008, Global Rights Afghanistan concluded that 87.2
Percent of Afghan women and girls are faced with at least one form of sexual, physical,
economical, psychological abuse in Afghanistan.
Reported cases of violence against women have increased 100 % between 2008 and
2009 ranging from domestic abuse to honour killing to rape to self-immolation and
exchange of women to solve communal disputes. Up to 80 % of marriages are forced
marriages on girls and 57 percent of girls are forced into marriages without their
consent. Afghanistan‟s Supreme Court does not have a women member in its
Executive Council, with only 4 per cent of women as judges in different courts around
the country. Women‟s access to education is dire; one girl per two boys in primary, one girl up
to four boys in secondary and eventually only 1 per cent of girls make it to the higher
education.
However, another perspective will indicate that the past 8 years have been the
„golden years‟ for Afghan women, as described by a prominent Member of the
Parliament, Shukria Barakzai. As she says, Afghanistan has the region‟s progressive
women‟s quota (reserved seats) in both houses of the parliament, approximately 27
percent, for the first time in the history; the country has a Ministry of Women‟s
Affairs as part of the Bonn agreement that marked the new era for the women of
the country. 6 million children going to school, out of which 35 percent are girls.
There is a flourishing women‟s movement advocating for women‟s political and
social inclusion, the recent approval of the Elimination of Violence against Women
Law as a recent example of struggles against violence on women and girls. (AfghanWomen,
2009)
According to reports the gender related problems are still existing in Afghanistan, but it has
been decreased through strategies implemented by Afghan and international institutions after
the Taliban government collapsed, which means that development of gender equality in
Afghanistan has been adopted through strategies to educate women, provide health services
for women, give the right for political participation of women, and also fighting against the
gender based violence on women through different national and international institutions.
I strongly believe that Women are as important as men for development of a war-torn country
like Afghanistan, and I want to conclude my essay with the following statements made by
Barack Obama and Former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan:
“The best judge of whether or not a country is going to develop is how it treats its women. If
it‟s educating its girls, if women have equal rights, that country is going to move forward.
But if women are oppressed and abused and illiterate, then they‟re going to fall behind.”
(Obama, Sep. 2008)
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"Your country is now embarking on a process to create credible and accountable institutions
in which all Afghans are represented. These are decisions for Afghan men and women to
make. The role of the United Nations is to assist and encourage this process. But, I would like
to take this opportunity to say to all Afghans: there cannot be true peace and recovery in
Afghanistan without a restoration of the rights of women." (UN, 2001).
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References:
AfghanWomen. (2009). Gender – based Violence in Afghanistan. Kabul: Afghan Women’s Network.
AhmadKhan. (February 2012). Women & Gender in Afghanistan. Retrieved 11 07, 2013, from
AFGHANISTAN RESOURCE DESK:
https://www.cimicweb.org/cmo/afg/Documents/Afghanistan-
RDPs/CFC_Afghanistan_Women-and-Gender_Feb12.pdf
Alison Luke, Sofi Khwaja, Lina Rahman, Keely Hunter and others. (NA). Women’s Equality in
Afghanistan. Retrieved 11 10, 2013, from http://www.iwrp.org/pdf/afghan_paper.pdf
ClaraMorgan. (10 January 2008). Afghanistan: The Status of Women. Retrieved 11 06, 2013, from
Parliament of Canada : http://www.parl.gc.ca/content/lop/researchpublications/prb0734-
e.htm
FAO. (11 March 2011). Political Empowerment . Retrieved 11 06, 2013, from Gender Equality in
Afghanistan: http://www.wikigender.org/index.php/Gender_Equality_in_Afghanistan
Gender Equality in Afghanistan. (NA). Retrieved 11 06, 2013, from Wiki Gender:
http://www.wikigender.org/index.php/Gender_Equality_in_Afghanistan#cite_note-2
Obana. (Sep. 2008). BARACK OBAMA QUOTES. Retrieved 11 06, 2013, from BARACK OBAMA, Ladies'
Home Journal, Sep. 2008
UN. (2001). THE SITUATION OF WOMEN IN AFGHANISTAN. Retrieved 11 09, 2013, from
http://www.un.org/events/women/2002/sit.htm
Sources for the Pictures in the Cover page:
http://www.feminist.org/afghan/taliban_women.asp
http://www.feminist.org/afghan/aboutcampaign.asp
http://www.afghanwomennetwork.af/Gender%20based%20Violence%20in%20Afghanistan.pdf