control and sexuality

Control and Sexuality: The Revival of Zina Laws in Muslim Contextsconsent to divorce, and upon the establishment of certain grounds, the court would issuea certificate referred to as ‘Impossibility of Reconciliation’. Grounds available to men wereparallel to those available to women; both could petition the court to appoint arbiters totry to bring about reconciliation, although the final decision on divorce and child custodyarrangements rested with the court (Articles 6–13). It was illegal to register a divorcewithout a court certificate, the penalty being six months to a year’s imprisonment for allparties involved, including the registrar (Articles 14, 16). 5The initiative for these reforms came from the nascent women’s movement; however, by thetime they became law, they had already been co-opted by the official Women’s Organizationof Iran under the patronage of Princess Ashraf, the Shah’s twin sister. This compromisedtheir legitimacy and significance. The left and the secular opposition identified the FPL withthe despotic Pahlavi regime, which had already appropriated the women’s movement. Theulama, for their part, were united and vocal in denouncing the reforms. 6The 1978–79 Revolution and the Creation of the Islamic RepublicIn 1962, in an effort to gain popular support, the Shah instituted his ‘White Revolution’ or‘Revolution of the Shah and People’, which included land reform and women’s suffrage.Soon after, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini came to prominence, publicly denouncingthe Shah for his attacks on the clergy and his increasing dependence on foreigners. On5 June 1963, Khomeini was arrested. The authorities violently put down large protestdemonstrations in Tehran, Qom and other cities. Khomeini was released in April 1964, butwas rearrested in October after giving a fiery sermon against the Shah. This time, he wasexiled to Turkey. In October 1965, Khomeini was allowed to relocate to Najaf, Iraq, wherehe stayed until 1978.In the 1970s, opposition to the Shah gained momentum and came from many directions.Among leftist groups, the Tudeh – discredited by their links to the USSR – lost supportto the Marxist Fedayin-e Khalq and the Islamist-socialist Mojahedin-e Khalq, whoseguerrilla activities against the regime escalated as the Shah’s excesses further alienatedthe intellectuals and the people. The opposition forces soon united under the leadership ofAyatollah Khomeini from his exile in Iraq and later (in 1978) in Paris. They shared their mainaim: to reject the autocratic, unjust and unaccountable Pahlavi monarchy, the inequalitiesin society, and the overwhelming influence of the USA. But the alternatives they soughtwere as multiple and varied (and often contradictory) as they were themselves: a populardemocracy; a classless society; a socialist state; national autonomy; an Islamic government,with rulers guided by the ulama and the shari’a.5 In 1975, the FPL was replaced by another law with the same title, which extended the reforms andformally repealed any prior laws conflicting with its mandate; see Mir-Hosseini (1999)6 For analysis of the politics of the women’s movement in pre-revolutionary Iran, see Paidar (1995)and Sanasarian (1982).88