Contested Universal R/rights: The New Family Code in Mali

Abstract

The 1990s witnessed the transformation of women’s rights into universal women’s human rights. The dispute concerning the normativity of (universal) women’s rights in particular contexts, however, is still being had. The secular state of Mali, which has a long tradition of the parallel coexistence of religious and secular structures, is a case in point. For over 20 years, the country has been involved in the ongoing dispute over the amendments of the Family Code striving for the improvement of women’s status in society. These amendments have been deemed incompatible with the Qur’an. This case serves as a “negative” example for a dialogue that does not take place on common grounds and in which people are unable or unwilling to be self-reflexive. Moreover, it is a case in which contesting parties invoke and appropriate normative ideas about religion, secularism and human rights to strengthen their positions and monopolize their particular viewpoint as the only universally valid one.

Drawing on the documentary film “Family Code,” our contribution illustrates how different participants in this debate have appropriated particular (and often divergent) normative ideas in order to fortify their own positions, while discrediting others. We link this analysis with theoretical approaches that highlight how dialogue can be conducted on common grounds, drawing on broader feminist scholarship, since it was within transnational debates between ‘Southern’ and ‘Northern’ feminists that ideas on how to facilitate understanding despite deep differences have emerged. We, moreover, examine the relationship between secularism and religion by employing Islamic feminist approaches.