Challenging Inequality: Obstacles and Opportunities Towards Women's Rights in the Middle East and North Africa

Women's rights in the Arab Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region are surveyed in this article. The author uses human rights standards contained in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) to rate the de jure and de facto status of women's rights in the areas of nondiscrimination and access to justice, autonomy, security, and freedom of the person, economic rights and equal opportunity, political rights and civic voice, and social and cultural rights. Evaluations that pertain to women's rights in marriage are found in the section entitled "Women's Inferior Status in Family Laws," where the author elucidates how women face gender-based discrimination in both the family codes of the studied countries and through Islamic law. This article ends with recommendations for reform of MENA countries' legislation and traditions in order to empower women of the region. [Descriptors: Marriage, International - Africa, International - Asia]