Are we really lucky to be women in Syria?
Do women really influence the political life of our country?

By: Hind Aboud Kabawat. Attorney/ Legal Consul for Gender Issues in Syria/ World Bank.
Forward Magazine, August, 2007

I hear such comments every time I attend a conference or, a school reunion or work function. How many times do you hear that we, as Syrian women, are fortunate to be living in a secular society with laws that do not discriminate between men and women--to be living in an “Arab” society where men and women are, ostensibly, equal. But is this indeed the case? Or is it just a convenient political “fiction” masking a much more perverse reality.

So let’s examine the real facts of the matter.

Women do enjoy equality under the law; we can own property, start our own businesses, apply for a business registration number, have a bank account in our known name. We even can travel at home and abroad without a brother, father or husband as a chaperone. Of course, in any other part of the developed world, such rights are a matter of course. More or less like saying women have the right to breathe.

Let’s delve a bit further into just how equal we are in this society.

Women comprise 12% of the Syrian parliament—not much by western standards but still not too bad. But the more important question is, how relevant, effective and powerful are they as legislators compared to their male colleagues. Or are they just attractive window dressing?

There are two female member in the cabinet. But, again, do these women really wield influence around the cabinet table. Do they really represent the interests of Syrian women in the corridors of political power? And if they don’t, can they really function as successful role models for other Syrian women? These are important questions and not easy to answer definitively. But there is no question what their mandate “should” be. Politically powerful and influential women must actively support and encourage their “sisters” in all dimensions of Syrian society—in the workplace, at universities, inside the home. Most importantly, they should actively support the development of civil society—and civic non-governmental political institutions—in our country. If they do not they are failing in their roles as both political leaders and advocates for women’s rights. Is this the case? Sadly, NO. In the last few months, two women’s organizations has been shut down—close, the doors, padlocked—because of decisions made by a female minister in this government. So, just how lucky are Syrian women, politically? On that evidence, not very.

But let’s try to be positive here. Overseas, there are numerous ambassadors who represent our country’s interests at Syrian embassies around the world. Like their male diplomatic colleagues, Syrian women can make the case to foreigners that Syria is not a member of the so-called “Axis of Evil,” that we are not a backward country, that we are a proud people with historic past and a promising future. But do our female ambassadors exercise the same authority and enjoy the same autonomy from their political masters in Damascus as their male colleagues?

Again, to be positive, Syria has numerous female business organizations, which represent us overseas. And this is not a recent development. My own

Mother and before she get married, she attended an international women’s conference back in 1957 , which represented women from all walks of professional life: teachers, university \students, nurses, doctors—all of them also mothers, sisters and wives. But do such eminently successful women really exercise real influence in our society? I don’t think they did in my mother’s generation. And because Syrian remains fundamentally a male-dominated—dare, I say it, a chauvinistic—society, I don’t think women exercise much real power in my generation as well.

Still, compared to the condition of women in most parts of the Arab world, I do consider myself fortunate to be a Syrian woman. Compared to many of them, we enjoy tremendous freedom. Perhaps not equality with men, but we do enjoy freedoms which many our sisters in the Arab world envy. And, again, those freedoms were not granted, yesterday. My grandmother had driving license back in the early 1950s and freely drove around the streets of Damascus as my daughter does today. This simple right—the ability to drive a car—is still denied women in many parts of the Arab world. It is a social injustice—and a political travesty.

Other fundamental rights have long been granted to Syrian women. Among them, the right to work and earn an income. My mother taught at university, And all the girls she grew up with received a good education, got jobs, opened shops, clinics, pharmacies as well as becoming wonderful mothers and wives. One even became a vice-president of Syria.

As many of you know, in many other countries in this region, women do not even have the right to wear clothes of their own choice. In Syria, women wear what they want, go where they want, take public transportation. We have enjoyed those rights for decades. To anyone in the West, these would seem relatively basic human rights. But in the Middle East, such rights cannot be taken for granted. So, yes, in many ways, we are lucky to be women in Syria.

But is this enough. Have we really moved beyond the basic human rights granted to my grandmother’s generation over sixty years ago? Have we really made any significant political progress over the last six decades? As women, do we exercise any “real” leadership in this society?

Sure, women are equal citizens under Syrian law. But are we really equal in how this society operates on a daily basis. I think not. Frankly, I believe Syrian women have been “resting on their laurels,” to use an old saying. Still, reveling in the advances we made decades ago. Not moving the political yardstick further along.

Back in 1910, the great Syrian Author and Leader, Mary Ajani, said, “The spirit of women has the strength to kill the germs of corruption, and that in her hand is the weapon to rend the gloom of oppression, and in her mouth the solace to lighten human misery.” But more than a hundred years after Mary Ajami uttered those words, are we living by her “code.” Are we really leaders in this society? Are we really involved in making public policy? I am afraid the answer is, “No.” Historically, Syria has been way ahead of other Arab countries in women’s participation in politics. But in many Arab countries are catching up. And we are lagging behind. Today, Syria has just two ministers and a vice president. Why not a female prime minister? More importantly, why not female ministers who have “real” power in the upper reaches of government. That is certainly not the case today.

Why not a female citizen can grant the Syrian Citizenship to her children like her equal so called male Citizen?

When that happens, then I think we can truly and honestly say, “It is lucky to be a woman in Syria.”