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Against All Odds: The women's movement in the Islamic Republic of Iran

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Abstract

Homa Hoodfar and Fatemeh Sadeghi look at how the women's movement built their base and strength in the 2000s in the face of a highly charged and politicized post-revolutionary Iran.

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Notes

  1. The research for this paper was carried out under auspices of Women's empowerment in the Muslim Contents: gender, poverty and democratization from inside out.

  2. Hundreds of thousands of women remained in the street after the success of the revolution, and participated in various demonstrations to support the regime, particularly its confrontation with the American government. Thus, it would have been hard for the regime to introduce such laws if it had meant a change of heart and alienation on the part of women. However, most women did not understand the implications of these laws, at least for themselves.

  3. Hamid-Reza Jalaii-pour, ‘Tahilli az Pouyesh-e Zanan-e Iran’ (An Analysis of Iran's Women's Activism), Iran-emrooz, 12 Aban AH (1382/2003), Zanan.iran-emrooz.net (Farsi).

  4. See, for instance, the campaign to free Maboubeh Abbasgholizadeh in 2002 and in 2007, www.petitiononline.com/mahboube/petition.html – 16

  5. For instance, many women activists set up organizations that help other women to set up co-ops both in the city and in the rural areas. They trained them and gave them management and planning skills, as well as making them aware of laws and ministries governing their activities. Others set up income-generating activities and small micro-credit systems, and they are also engaged in a set of gender consciousness, self-reliance and encouraged group solidarity.

  6. www.meydan.org or www.womensfeild.org

  7. As the campaign progressed, the government placed more pressure on the committee to stop its work. To overcome this hurdle, the committee joined a global campaign that also protested honour killing and other punishment for supposedly sexual ‘offences’. www.stopkilling.org and www.stopstoning.org

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Authors
  1. Homa Hoodfar
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  2. Fatemeh Sadeghi
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Looks at how the Iranian women's movement built their base and strength in the 2000s

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Hoodfar, H., Sadeghi, F. Against All Odds: The women's movement in the Islamic Republic of Iran. Development 52, 215–223 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1057/dev.2009.19

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/dev.2009.19

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