Women under the Monarchy: A Backdrop for Post-Saddam Events

Abstract

The U.S.-led coalition occupation of Iraq and its attempt to build a liberal state has invited comparisons with the British endeavor in the wake of World War I. Scholars, however, in revisiting the period of the British Mandate (1920–1932) or the British-backed monarchy (1921–1958), have almost totally ignored gender issues. This, despite the fact that women’s rights have been a high profile issue. The Bush administration proclaimed women’s rights to be an integral part of its vision of a free and democratic Iraq, while the media has rung with fears expressed by Iraqi women’s activists and supporters that under the U.S.-led coalition, women would be dragged back to the days of the monarchy.¹ In this article, I attempt to place the post-Saddam conflict over Iraq’s Personal Status Law on the historical backdrop of the monarchy period, and offer insights that a gender perspective may yield. Its aim will be to deepen our understanding of the conflict and the position held by the three sides involved: women’s activists, Shi’i clerics and U.S. officials.