Foreword: Gender Equality and Multiculturalism
Many articles in the preceding sections have been concerned with the foundations of religious pluralism, tolerance and democracy as well as the political conditions that guarantee the peaceful coexistence of cultures and religions. We saw that liberal cos
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Foreword: Gender Equality and Multiculturalism Volker Kaul
Many articles in the preceding sections have been concerned with the foundations of religious pluralism, tolerance and democracy as well as the political conditions that guarantee the peaceful coexistence of cultures and religions. We saw that liberal cosmopolitans contest the multiculturalists’ claim that the ultimate sources of toleration and respect among communities are to be found in cultures and religions. Liberals, however, challenge multiculturalists on yet another front. They not only hold that multiculturalism has difficulties to ensure intercultural pluralism, but that multiculturalism is neither in a position to lay the basis for intracultural pluralism, that is to guarantee the equality of all members within a community and in particular gender equality. Susan Moller Okin argues even that multiculturalism is bad for women. She claims that there are two inherent connections between culture and gender that are harmful for women: “First, the sphere of personal, sexual, and reproductive life provides a central focus of most cultures (…). Religious or cultural groups are often particularly concerned with ‘personal law’ – the laws of marriage, divorce, child custody, division and control of family property, and inheritance.” And second,” most cultures have as one of their principal aims the control of women by men” (1999: 12–13). These connections mean that not only most cultures and religions do not promote gender equality, giving women the same opportunities and rights as men within a community. According to Okin, most cultures, through the patriarchal regulation of the private sphere, actually justify the discrimination against and subordination of women as well as the control of their freedom. Therefore any sort of recognition in the form of cultural rights is detrimental to women’s rights. The essays in this section address the question of the extent gender equality is compatible with multiculturalism head-on. Amirpur and Grami tend to side with V. Kaul (*) Center for Ethics and Global Politics, LUISS ‘Guido Carli’ University, Rome, Italy e-mail: [email protected] © Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016 S. Benhabib, V. Kaul (eds.), Toward New Democratic Imaginaries – İstanbul Seminars on Islam, Culture and Politics, Philosophy and Politics – Critical Explorations 2, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-41821-6_25
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V. Kaul
Okin against the claims of Islam in Iran and Tunisia. Guessous, Barlas and Shachar argue, on the contrary, that true gender equality is not only a matter of abstract individual rights but requires also some form of recognition of religious difference.
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Gender Equality and Individual Rights
Katajun Amirpur interrogates if the struggle for democracy in Iran can be separated from the demands for individual rights, a question which she claims to be particular crucial for Iranian women. As Amirpur shows, the Islamic Revolution of 1978– 1979 abridged heavily women’s rights introducing a sort of gender apartheid
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