When foreign intervention is justified women under the Taliban

"It's like having a flower, or a rose. You water it and keep it at home for yourself, to look at it and smell it. It is not supposed to be taken out of the house to be smelled."

--Syed Ghaisuddin,

Taliban Minister of Education, when asked why women need to be confined to the home.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights--except in those countries where cultural differences dictate that a human being born a female is neither free nor equal and has neither dignity nor rights. Recent world events have brought the issue of human and particularly women's rights to the forefront, necessitating all of us to reevaluate the use of foreign intervention for humanitarian causes.

The Roman philosopher Boethius, in his work The Consolation of Philosophy, argues that the fact of a person being born into a specific caste or position in society intrinsically denies justice and human rights. While this theory can be applied to many human rights, my focus is primarily on women's rights.

Being born female provides an immediate classification. In certain societies, such as in New Zealand where women's liberation movements have been very successful in achieving social equality, this classification hardly goes any further than the gender specification on a birth certificate. But in other societies--for example, fundamentalist Islamic states like pre-war Afghanistan, the classification is immediately apparent, since sixteen out of every 100 women die in childbirth there from lack of proper medical care and since strictly enforced, physical punishment, ranging from whipping to stoning, is common practice.

After taking control of Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, in 1996, the Taliban's Ministry for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice placed harsh, systematic restrictions on women's rights. They prohibited schooling for girls over the age of eight, shut down the women's university in Kabul, and forced women to leave their jobs. Women were taken out of the public sphere, forced to stay at home behind windows painted black to prevent passersby from seeing them, and allowed to venture outside only when sheathed in a chadari and accompanied by a close male relative.

The chadari, often mistakenly referred to in the West as a burqa, is a head-to-toe covering of Indian origin that has a mesh cloth over the facial area to allow the wearer to see and breathe. The burqa is a veil of Arabic design that is drawn across the face with the eyes exposed, first introduced in Afghanistan during the resistance to Soviet occupation ten to fifteen years ago. Official Taliban law required all women to wear the chadari, although not all women did, especially those who lived in areas outside of direct Taliban control. With the fall of the Taliban and the al-Qaeda, many Afghan women allowed the chadari to fall as well.

However, some women took pride in wearing the chadari; for centuries it was a traditional bridal gift from husband to wife. The chadari is very expensive; in some poorer areas an entire village would share one chadari. That meant that the women would have to take turns going to market and other public places, often waiting weeks for a chance to use the garment. This could become very serious in health-related circumstances because a woman committed to its wearing, who couldn't afford or gain access to a chadari couldn't be attended by a doctor. And those who were able to see a male doctor were required to remain fully clothed--not exactly conducive to accurate diagnosis.

Depending on where they lived, 21 percent to 64 percent of Afghan women under the Taliban had no access to health care, usually because of the high cost of the chadari or the long trip to find a female doctor. With few exceptions--such as allowing some women to continue to practice medicine, tolerating limited home schooling, and allowing widows with no other means of income to seek employment with international aid agencies--the Taliban effectively stripped women of all control over their lives.

Many have claimed that it is impossible to determine international human rights, that circumstances vary too widely among individual societies to allow for the same conceptions. Mahathi Mohammed of Malaysia believed that Europeans and Americans pressure developing countries to adhere to Western cultural values, including notions of rights, in order to create "instability, economic decline, and poverty" so the Western states "can threaten and control us."

The Taliban leaders maintained that their policy for women emanated directly from their religion and culture. "If a woman wants to work away from the home and with men, then that is not allowed by our religion and our culture," said Mullah Nooruddin Turabi, Taliban Minister of Justice. "If we force them to do this they may want to commit suicide." Contrary to Taliban propaganda, however, 94 percent to 98 percent of women in Taliban-controlled areas expressed the opinion that the Taliban had made their lives "much worse." In fact, in ironic denial of Turabi's statement, the percentage of women under Taliban authority who suffered from major depression was 76 percent compared to 28 percent in areas not directly controlled by the Taliban. And the percentage of women who contemplated suicide was 7 percent higher (16 percent) under Taliban authority.

In evaluating culture as the basis for human rights, one must consider both the historical and contemporary beliefs of a people. Prior to the civil war and Taliban control in Afghanistan, women were educated and employed. Statistics in the early 1990s showed that women accounted for approximately 50 percent of all students and 60 percent of all professors at Kabul University, 70 percent of all school teachers, 50 percent of civilian government workers, and 40 percent of all doctors in Kabul. According to a Physicians for Human Rights population-based study, more than 90 percent of Afghan women and men claimed strong support for the right of women to have equal access to education and work opportunities, freedom of expression, protection under the law, and opportunities to participate in government. The study further advised, "Policies restricting women's rights are not the systemic product of years of conflict and social and economic deprivation; they are superficial decrees that can be revoked as easily and swiftly as they came into being."

Thus, if one defines culture by a people's beliefs, then the Taliban had no right to claim that women's rights violations were a cultural phenomenon. As United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan said, human rights "belong to no government, are limited to no continent, for they are fundamental to humankind itself." The Taliban imposed its values on the people of Afghanistan. Those values don't reflect the true public opinion or the true culture and, therefore, even the weak excuse of "cultural differences" is nullified. Overall, however, the claim by specific states that there exists a unique set of cultural values and therefore a unique set of human rights in their country only serves as a device for authoritarian regimes to affirm their power by legitimizing persecution.

Arbitrary creation of human rights standards by each country makes the goal of world peace impossible. Peace can only be derived from justice, and justice only from international standards of rights and laws. Humanity, innately aware of this fact, has been creating for thousands of years treaties for the securing of human rights and law based on a single premise echoed in every major religion or system of ethics worldwide: "do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Countless documents, including the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, have been derived from this affirmation of the inherent worth of each human being.

The United Nations released its declaration on December 10, 1948, in an attempt to bring peace and justice to the global community by codifying civilized values. From their experience in World War II, UN founders knew that leaving the defining of human rights to whichever dictatorship seized power in individual states could only lead to war. A dictatorship, by definition, seeks to centralize and increase its power. The simplest way it does this is to select a specific group of people to scapegoat and blame for all of society's ills--and then to eliminate that group. If the dictator can justify his or her actions by claiming the support of the popular culture, then there are no foreign obstacles to keep the dictatorship from continuing expansion by invading other countries.

Hitler's actions in the name of Germanic "culture"--namely, the attempt through the Holocaust to rid the world of people he considered "undesirable"--were a major impetus for the delineation of an international standard of human rights. The creation of such a system would prevent any individual nation from hiding persecution behind "cultural differences" and alert other nations when foreign intervention was necessary and justified.

Because it is impossible, illogical, and ineffective to change human rights values and policies with each new government, especially when considering the highly unstable states in the Middle East and Africa, intergovernmental organizations proposed and passed several international agreements concerning human rights. The Taliban blatantly violated these agreements, despite the fact that Afghanistan had previously approved and signed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant of Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) on January 24, 1983.

The ICCPR protects women from gender-based violence, guaranteeing the right to life; the right not to be subject to torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment; the right to liberty and security; and the right to equality before the law, including definitive protection against gender-based discrimination. Reinforcing these polices, Article 2 of the ICESCR obligates signatory states to guarantee that all rights outlined within the covenant "will be exercised without discrimination of any kind." Afghanistan even signed on August 14, 1980, the Covenant on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW)--a strong document that obligates its signatory states not only to allow education and employment of women but also to actively address the problems faced by women in securing these rights.

When a nation signs international agreements, it is committing to support them not only within its own borders but also within other countries which voluntarily approve the agreements. Where morality is defined as conforming to the standards of what is right and just behavior--based on not only simple reasoning but also well-felt intent (borrowing from the philosophy of David Hume)--respect for basic human rights is necessary and intrinsic. When an atrocity occurs that violates this voluntarily approved agreement, it is morally justified for a signatory nation to intervene, either to prevent the atrocity or to remedy the situation. This derives from the contractual obligation that a nation enters into when it joins an intergovernmental organization.

We must acknowledge all these factors when we consider whether the United States--alone or in concert with the international community--should be called upon to protect human rights in other countries. As a powerful world leader, the United States has not only a domestic national responsibility but a foreign international responsibility. So if a nation's people have legitimate grievances against their government--grievances directly linked to an international treaty or covenant--but are unable to effect the change desired, then the United States has a contractual obligation to support the treaty, even on foreign soil. It isn't necessary to support the morality of interventions as an absolute in every case but, rather, as a general trend in international politics. The focus here is on human rights.

The most important factor concerning intervention is the will of the people. When a nation's government is abusing human rights against popular opinion, then one can no longer claim "cultural differences." In addition, the intervening nation's people should support the action.

"Unilateral intervention creates the largest risk of self-serving or pretextual humanitarian intervention," says Gavin Symes of the University of Michigan Law School. This, one must concede, is a great drawback to intervention, which is defined by the American Heritage Dictionary as interference by one country in the affairs of another country, usually by force. But this can often be avoided by providing multilateral intervention, projected through an intergovernmental organization.

International justice must be meted out on two levels: procedural justice (just intentions of an action) and substantive justice (just outcomes). Unfortunately, it is nearly impossible to attain both objectives in the case of unilateral intervention. Procedural justice in particular is very difficult. Even if a cause is fronted by just reasons, underlying factors are often self-serving--whether based on economic, political, or social concerns. Yet without self-serving reasons, there is little logical sense in intervening. An unprofitable venture will be the last on a country's list of priorities. For example, intervention by the United States on behalf of women's rights in Afghanistan was noticeably lacking until, after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, it became politically expedient to pour humanitarian aid money into the country and to militarily act to "liberate" its people.

In May 2001, UN Special Coordinator Dennis McNamara warned that Afghanistan was the "fastest growing displacement crisis." Within the first two months of the "War on Terrorism," the total number of Afghan refugees swelled from 2.6 million to 3.7 million--three-fourths of whom were women and children.

The millions of dollars of U.S. aid that poured into Afghanistan has been carefully monitored to ensure that this "aid is distributed fairly and with consideration for the needs of women." Secretary of State Colin Powell has stated that "the recovery of Afghanistan must entail the restoration of the rights of Afghan women." Most importantly, George W. Bush signed the Afghan Women and Children Relief Act on December 12, committing "the United States to providing education and medical assistance to Afghan women and children and to Afghan refugees in surrounding countries." At the signing ceremony Bush stated, "The overwhelming support for this legislation sends a clear message: as we drive out the Taliban and the terrorists, we are determined to lift up the people of Afghanistan. The women and children of Afghanistan have suffered enough. This great nation will work to bring them hope and help."

The United States and the United Nations must ensure that women are fully integrated into Afghan society--not just as recipients but as policymakers of the reconstruction and development plans for the country. In addition, some form of accountability for past abuses must be established to both punish the perpetrators of women's rights violations and bar them from participation in the new government.

As early as November 20, 2001, new students, including many girls, had returned to school in a suburb of Kabul. Although still desperately lacking in funds, formerly clandestine schools were reopening. In Herat, after meeting with a group of sixty women protesters, the self-proclaimed Governor General Ismail Khan established a committee of five women to be responsible for urging women's rights. At the conference of Afghan factional leaders begun on November 28 in Bonn, Germany, to discuss Afghanistan's future and to take steps toward building a post-Taliban government, the Northern Alliance was represented by Amena Afzali, a woman. This amazing leap toward female representation wouldn't have been possible without the intervention (alternatively defined by Merriam Webster's Dictionary as "an act of mediation seeking to settle, modify, or reconcile") of foreign nations--particularly the United States--which having commenced using physical force did, in the process, facilitate truly just consequences.

The United States has been justified in intervening on behalf of women's rights in Afghanistan as long as several important prerequisites have been met. Both countries must hold the same contractual obligation to the UN Declaration of Human Rights and the government of Afghanistan must have violated that contract against the will of its people. The United States must follow the rules of universal justice and avoid self-serving activities by channeling its influence through an intergovernmental organization. And once physical intervention has been successfully completed, the United States must allow Afghanistan to resume self-rule in a manner that supports and ensures that the human rights violations of the previous regime aren't repeated. As U.S. officials have agreed, "Only Afghans can determine the future government of their country. And Afghan women should have the right to choose their role in that future."

Rose V. Lindgren of Thousand Oaks, California, is nineteen years old. This essay placed second in the eighteen-to-twenty-four-year-old age category of the 2001 Humanist Essay Contest for Young Women and Men of North America.

COPYRIGHT 2002 American Humanist Association
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