“Only for Women:” Women, the State, and Reform in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

The strict segregation of women in cities cannot be understood as a mere consequence of tradition or conservatism: it has been increasingly implemented as urbanization has progressed and as the modern state's authority has spread over the territory. Segregation led to the development of a of activities. This separation is not only spatial; state institutions have designated women as a distinct category for which a particular discourse has been developed. The government's discourse of reform, while putting forward elite women and publicizing the debates about various problems that women confront, contributes to the strengthening of the categorization of Saudi Women have appropriated this segregated organization and reproduce it daily, and on their own terms, by developing their own activities and discourses that are by women, and for women. In Arabia, women have constituted a separate category, legally discriminated against and spatially segregated. This segregation often has been perceived as traditional. However, reference to the traditional or conservative character of society does not help us understand the persistence and consolidation of sex segregation. It is not at all evident that the strict frontier separating men and women, inscribed in the law as necessary and compulsory, has been weakened following the development of the state, even if practices have varied according to regions and changing political contexts in the Kingdom. Both women's educational level and (daily) activities have completely changed over the last 50 years; at the same time, most of these activities have developed inside a female sphere consisting of a mosaic1 of new spaces where entry is forbidden to men. Indeed, a large majority of women do not - at least officially - frequent male spaces except to visit their male relatives (mahram, plur. maharim).2 Thus, in this article I show how contemporary sex segregation is inseparable from the state's development and enrichment. Moreover, segregation often has been approached in terms of bans and repression. In contrast, and without denying the limits of women's activities and mobility and more generally the relationships of power between men and women,3 I will show what spatial segregation as a public policy has produced in terms of social categories, spaces, norms, and identifications.4 Governmental discourses, including laws, measures, and policies, have served to perpetuate and consolidate the principle of sex segregation. The economic, political, and social context of Arabia must be taken into account in the analysis of sex segregation. This article will expose first how this specific spatial and ideological categorization of women has emerged together with discourses of national development, then how it has been both transformed and reinforced through the more recent discourse of reform. Sex segregation will be studied on different levels, as this organization is daily produced and reproduced by women. This is why it is important to highlight the ways in which women, targeted by this categorization, are practicing this category daily, justifying it, and using it to arrange an autonomous space for themselves - an increasingly widened and diversified space for socialization. The following observations are based on fieldwork in Arabia. My first field study, in April-May 2005, focused on elites (university professors, journalists, businesswomen, and intellectuals with different orientations) who graduated in the 1980s and live in Riyadh or Jeddah. Some of them had been invited by the government to participate in national events and conferences organized under the slogan of reform and told me about their experiences. Then, in 2006 and 2007, I spent eight months in Riyadh studying young women's lifestyles, daily activities, aspirations, and the constraints they are subjected to in the city. …