Marieme Helie Lucas is an Algerian sociologist, activist, founder of ‘Secularism is a Women’s Issue,’ and founder and former International Coordinator of ‘Women Living Under Muslim Laws.’ We discuss religious fundamentalism and women’s rights. Part 2.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: As an Algerian sociologist, i.e. as an individual with an expert opinion in sociology, what is the situation for women living under Muslim laws throughout the world?
Marieme Helie Lucas: As varied as one can imagine in one’s wildest guess. It ranges from being able to become an elected head of state, to being closeted between four walls with no education and no rights, and all the intermediary shades in between these extremes. There exists absolutely no homogeneous ‘Muslim world.’
However, I must add a few caveat:
- Although very progressive provisions for women existed in different periods of history and in different locations around the world, in predominantly Muslim contexts, we witness everywhere today the rise of fundamentalism, i. e. a political extreme-right which camouflages its power greed behind religion.
- Everywhere and at all times (3), women in Muslim contexts fought for their rights, using different strategies, just as we do today: demanding right to education, political rights, freedom of movement, financial autonomy, equal rights in marriage, etc…Religious interpretation was only one of the many strategies they used. The struggle still goes on now, in these very difficult times.
- An important new dimension of the struggle now takes place in the countries of immigration. Every right we lose in Europe or North America to the mermaids of cultural relativism heavily impacts the situation in our countries of origin. Conversely, being able to bypass the smokescreen of the ‘main enemy’ to convey to our comrades and sisters back home the reality of Muslim fundamentalism having opened a new front in Europe and North America is part and parcel of building our common struggle beyond national borders. (4)
Jacobsen: What is the general status for international women’s rights, empowerment, and advocacy in these contexts?
Lucas: One cannot look at it in terms of ‘countries’ or cultures. For instance, one can find places where the promotion of economic rights improves women’s autonomy, while FGM is tolerated or repudiation legal, or countries where women enjoyed a notable degree of legal autonomy which is suddenly reduced in practice by the coming to power of extreme right fundamentalists.
One must abandon the idea that there exists a homogeneous ‘Muslim world’ where everything would function under the banner of religion. I believe this idea of a Muslim world, highly promoted by fundamentalists, is derived from that of ‘Umma,’ i.e. the assembly of believers, which exists also in the Catholic Church as ‘Ecclesia.’ In reality, we all know that countries are the location of various political forces and classes which fight for political representation or domination. This is in no way different in Muslim contexts, and religion per se has little to do there – except, as a generally right-wing form of political organisation.
Jacobsen: You are the founder and former international coordinator for ‘Women Living Under Muslim Laws.’ What tasks and responsibilities came with this position?
Lucas: It has been a very inspiring and rewarding time in my life, even if one had to work around the clock while raising small kids and living in poverty – a formative time, too. I came to realise that women’s struggles already existed everywhere in Muslim contexts but that they fought in isolation.Women needed to know about each other’s projects and be inspired by each other’s strategies, and eventually that they could come together on specific actions and/or support collectively the local struggles or initiatives.
The idea was timely and everyone grabbed it across Africa and Asia, quickly gathering together the very best of smart committed women activists.
This network was not a pyramidal organisation, it had no membership, it was a fluid network in which women and groups could step in and take responsibility for specific projects depending on their local needs.
It gathered together in mutual solidarity women who were religious believers, human rights advocates, secularists and atheists.
The tasks of the coordination office were that of a clearing house of information, of a publishing house, of a coordination secretariat for research programmes and for collective projects, of an urgent response/ emergency rescue organisation, of a board – lodging – therapeutic safe place for endangered or burnt out activists, etc… Now that most revolutionary women’s networks of the nineties have been tamed and ‘professionalised,’ my heart goes out to the Women In Black–Belgrade, whose humble coordination still performs so many of these exhausting and exhilarating tasks, under very difficult political circumstances. I salute these great resisters to NGOs normalisation!
Needless to say that, with the growing success of our network, funders were eager to ‘own’ it. There were growing pressures on me to come to my senses and conform to the corporate sector’s norms of organisation, believed – despite the evidence provided by the enormous success and achievements of our very network – to be the only efficient ones. A membership organisation with a classic top to bottom pyramidal structure, ‘professionalised’ activists appointed to specific tasks and responsibilities with afferent titles and fat salaries, and a well-paid ‘director’ (myself), with a clear religious identification, etc…
If you look at funding organisations’ NGOs normalisation plans during the nineties, you will see clearly exposed what I am talking about… I managed to keep them at bay and to protect the revolutionary spirit of the network for 18 years, till I left it.
As an organisation, the network WLUML circulated information on a regular basis; published a very good journal that mixed together sophisticated academic analysis and on the ground information on struggles and strategies of local women’s groups; produced knowledge that was needed to enhance women’s struggles through coordination of collective research; organised cross-cultural exchange of women from one predominantly Muslim area to another, culturally different Muslim areas so that participants could deconstruct the idea of a homogeneous Muslim world by living a very different reality; organised collective support for local actions; organised rescue; etc…
References
1. Knowing Our Rights: Women, family, laws and customs in the Muslim …
www.wluml.org/node/588
2 Dossier 23-24: What is your tribe? Women’s struggles and the …
www.wluml.org/fr/node/343
3 Great Ancestors: Women Claiming Rights in Muslim Contexts | Women …
www.wluml.org/…/great-ancestors-women-claiming-rights-muslim…
4 Dossier 30-31 The struggle for secularism in europe and North America
https://law.ucdavis.edu/faculty/bennoune/files/WLUML-dossier-30-31-v2.pdf
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Original publication in www.conatusnews.com.
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