While real seismic shifts repeatedly hit Japan , political one still shake up the Middle East . Overshadowed by recent events in Europe , the Arab Spring is rumbling on through summer. It has rekindled hope for many in the West who would like to see democracy spread east and south, across the globe. It worries many who don’t see how democracy would play with traditional regional cultures and social structures. The question becomes whether those traditional structures and memes are still relevant, still useful in the increasingly globalised 21st century, or whether they too will need to adapt (or die).
How much will really change? It’s too soon to tell, but it might advisable for any new or potential leaders in the region to watch the women, from both sides of the political specturm. Women have formed the backbone of the upheavals – among the first to take to the streets (Tunisia, Bahrain, Egypt); the ones organising the medical supplies, food and water deliveries to Tahrir Square that allowed the moment to become a vigil, a slogan, the powerful symbol of enduring anger against authority that it now is; opening their homes to treat those too scared to go to government hospitals (Bahrain) – the list goes on. In Libya , it was women who protested outside a courthosue in Benghazi Syria and Yemen
While their countries try to get back to normal, they are at risk of being sidelined and pushed back towards their familiar place. I doubt they’ll stay there, however hard they’re pushed. These women may not exactly be burning their burkhas but it would be dangerously naïve to assume they will go quietly back to the age-old pigeon-hole of silent deferential domesticity the world is used to presuming for them. They are intelligent, determined and beginning to know their power. If Westernisation isn’t a palatable option, perhaps the traditionalists could look further back, to the warrior queens of the region’s history, for the role women can play in society.
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