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Male guardianship; Saudi Arabia; Mohammed bin Salman al Saud; MbS; women; women’s rights; absolute monarchy; authoritarian government; human rights abuses; silenced activists; discrimination in legal system; geopolitical dynamics; geopolitics; Middle East.
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Full-Text Articles in Law
Freedom On Paper: Reforms To Women’S Rights In Saudi Arabia Will Not Be Effective Until Male Guardianship Is Abolished, Mackenzie Kramer
Freedom On Paper: Reforms To Women’S Rights In Saudi Arabia Will Not Be Effective Until Male Guardianship Is Abolished, Mackenzie Kramer
Brooklyn Journal of International Law
Male guardianship, a societal custom derived from Islamic law, renders women in Saudi Arabia second class citizens. The country’s preservation of male guardianship has broken its agreement to adhere to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the leading international women’s rights treaty. Throughout the past decade the country’s Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman al Saud (“MbS”), has issued rulings that work to slowly dismantle the apparatus of male guardianship. These developments have been both meaningful and restrained; MbS attempts to tread lightly into human rights reforms to garner the support of western allies, …