The Politics of Women's Rights in Iran

CHAPTER FIVE: Practice and Effect: Writing/Righting the Law

C H A P T E R F I V E Practice and Effect: Writing/Righting the Law MS. TABRIZI'S LAW OFFICES looked like any other: waiting clients cast their eyes down, seemingly contemplating the shoes on their feet. Others anxiously scanned the room and tapped their heels as they waited in the small reception area of the ground floor office located in north central Tehran. Several young women in short overcoats, small scarves, and painted nails ran to and fro calling clients, serving tea, and answering phones. Here I, too, waited. I was seeking a meeting with a well-known attorney, a woman in her early forties, who had been active in working to fashion new legal claims where she and other advocates were facing major difficulties during and after divorce due to a lack of legal framework . The problem was not solely that the laws were discriminatory, but that there was a lack of legal apparatus to address issues that were arising as a result of increased divorce. In this chapter I consider some of the ways that women’s rights advocates were attempting to bridge certain gaps in law, especially as they affected women’s rights in marriage and divorce. In exploring the conversations in this law office, I show how some lawyers attempt to put the new corrective laws into operation as well as educate their clients about the importance of contracts. I also consider the broader context in which the discriminatory laws are situated, addressing lawyers’ and advocates’ attempts to seek remedies. In doing so, I consider some social consequences women face for going after their rights. A few people were ahead of me: an older man stroked his worry beads while a stylish young woman stole a look at herself in the adjacent mirror. As clients were called in one by one, an assistant led them through the long narrow corridor to Tabrizi’s office. The mirror in the entrance of the small waiting room gave the room an illusion of expansiveness. Below the mirror, a small calligraphic sign displayed the cost of a thirty-minute consultation. After a short time, I was called in to meet with Ms. Tabrizi. Her jovial receptionist led me down the hall to the room at the very end where four green paisley chairs faced a large, dark green wooden desk. From the angle of my low-sitting chair, Tabrizi appeared larger than life, sitting regally behind the elegant mahogany desk. Over her chador, beneath which not a sliver of hair was revealed, she sported a sleek black leather Practice and Effect • 139 jacket. Beyond pondering the logistics of putting on such attire, I mused at how multifaceted Tabrizi looked in this outfit: at once the symbol of Muslim traditionalism and yet the modern lawyer zealously campaigning for the legal rights of her down-and-out clients. Even before going to Iran, I had heard of Tabrizi, whose name was prevalent among Iranian women’s rights advocates. Once I arrived in Iran, her name continued to come up.1 Tabrizi’s well-known advocacy on behalf of women attracted clients of various backgrounds. Women ranging from the deeply religious to the secular as well as those who shunned the Islamic republic spoke of her as a leading advocate of women’s rights in Iran.2 The primary purpose of my visit with Tabrizi was to ask her about the intellectual and legislative history of the law that permits wives to obtain postdivorce maintenance (ojrat al-mesl) in the form of the economic value of the services they rendered during a marriage, in the event their husbands seek dissolution. This ojrat al-mesl was, at that time, a new way in which women were obtaining something akin to alimony. Tabrizi was not only an advocate of this bill, but also one of a handful of women who construed this legal right from scriptural texts. According to Tehran’s Bar Association, there are more than 700 women licensed to practice law in the city and over 2,500 in the country. Some lawyers, like Tabrizi, train in the university system, while others, mostly men, are able to obtain the requisite training through the Islamic seminary system. Tabrizi had moved to Tehran as an adolescent. She attended law school in the early years of the revolution, when the universities had reopened after having been closed for retooling by the new government. Her father was an...