Khursheed Wadia

The University of Warwick · Department of Sociology

This article shows how forced marriage arrived on the French political agenda; how it has been framed as a policy issue; how forced marriage policy is implemented; and what impact, if any, it has had on gender transformation. Data are drawn from policy documents, and fifty-one semi-structured interviews held with state and civil society actors. Fie...

This article examines the political and civic participation of women from Muslim communities. First, we examine the obstacles and enablers they face in deploying certain strategies of action, whether in their communities of origin or in majority society, in France and in Britain. We also explore their life projects and action in civic and political...

This paper explores the upsurge in young people's activism across Europe by drawing on three ethnographic studies of feminist and LGBT activism. The studies include a feminist organisation, UK Feminista, in a stable liberal democracy, the Feministes Indignades in post-fascist Spain, and the LGBT movement in post-communist Estonia. The paper argues...

Over the past few years we have witnessed a sharp resurgence in feminist activism as young women have become increasingly interested in feminist ideas as a means of making sense of their lives. This resurgence in feminist practice is evidenced by the formation of myriad groups and networks across Britain and the initiation of various feminist proje...

This chapter examines the main post-1945 migrations from Muslim-majority countries, especially former colonies, to Britain and France as types of migratory flows (labour, family reunification or refugee) prefigure the demographic and socio-economic characteristics of communities which settle and evolve in any country. Focusing on women, it gives an...

This chapter investigates and explains the political participation and civic engagement of Muslim women in Britain and France. It establishes a typology of participation based on primary research findings and identifies the structures and processes through which Muslim women’s action and activism takes place; for example, formal and conventional pr...

This chapter considers issues of concern to Muslim women. Most important among these is the wearing of Islamic dress in a Western context. This issue was brought up repeatedly by respondents in both countries whether or not they adhered to Islamic dress codes. Hence both country contexts are included in our examination. Also raised frequently by th...

This chapter delineates the societal and institutional context surrounding the participation of women from Muslim communities. Two aspects influence their action in the public domain: that of Islam and Muslims and their relation with majority society women’s movements and politics. First, the evolution of policies and conceptualisation of Muslim po...

This chapter considers the question of Muslim women’s involvement in politics within a framework drawing on a critical feminist standpoint which places this population centre-stage and gives voice to their thinking and actions in order to produce knowledge which will impact their lives positively; Margaret Archer’s social realist approach to agency...

A number of conclusions are reached here. Most importantly, that Muslim women’s participation is influenced by their positioning in three spheres—the ethnic group, majority society, the religious group—and that inter- and intra-group contradictions, arising from unequal relations of gender, ‘race’/ethnicity and religion, mean that Muslim women must...

Although their immediate socialisation takes place within the family and the ethnic group, Muslim women form an integral part of the majority society in which they live and most consider themselves as such. However, their relationship with majority society reveals a kaleidoscope of features, both positive and negative and in accordance with French...

This chapter first examines the relationship between Muslim women, the ethnic group and Islam, focusing on the barriers and facilitators to their action in these two spheres. In the ethnic group, Muslim women’s role and position is governed by traditional, patriarchal norms which frequently limit their activity in the public sphere although the eth...

Various political commentators and scholars accept that an accelerated progression of ‘securitisation’ of migration has taken place since the events of 9/11 and subsequent terror attacks by Islamic groups in Europe. As we have learned from preceding chapters in this volume, scholars within both critical security studies (for example, Bigo 1998; Cey...

In the months leading up to the 2010 British General Election, pundits were claiming that women would be specifically targeted by all political parties. However, this focus never materialized and it was just more business as usual but with the added novelty of televised leaders’ debates, which meant that coverage was more male ordered than ever. Th...

L’interdiction, votee par le Parlement francais le 14 septembre 2011, du port du voile integral dans les lieux publics a suscite de nombreuses reactions outre-Manche. Comme en France, cette loi met en evidence le clivage entre les partisans et les opposants d’une intervention du legislateur dans un domaine ou se croisent choix prive, vie intime et...

En France comme en Grande-Bretagne, la participation politique des femmes de culture musulmane souffre d’un deficit d’analyse. Percues comme peu eduquees, cantonnees a leur foyer, elles sont doublement exclues, en tant que femmes et musulmanes, des discours publics essentiellement portes par des hommes. Si l’interet de ces femmes pour la politique...

"Refugee Women in Britain and France is a welcome addition to the small but growing body of literature that sees migration from a gendered perspective. The book provides an excellent account of the experiences of women in the asylum systems of the United Kingdom and France, highlighting both challenges and opportunities. Rather than seeing refugee...

One of the main aims of this book has been to place the story of refugee women and asylum seekers at the centre of accounts of refugee migration and migrants in Britain and France in order to increase our knowledge and understanding of their place and role in these two countries and to highlight their agency rather than present them as passive vict...

This chapter examines the landscape of international migration within which female refugee migrants are positioned. It first gives an overview of inward migration flows into Britain and France while bearing in mind both the general European context and processes of feminisation which have occurred over the last fifty years. It then presents the dem...

Some studies have focused on refugee women's activism in refugee community associations. There has been less interest in refugee women's participation in other political or civil society organisations. This chapter highlights refugee women's agency, countering the perception that they are passive victims, and describes their individual motivation a...

Pockets of interest in the situation of asylum seekers and refugee women in France emerged in the early 2000s. This chapter presents as full a picture as possible of asylum seeking and refugee women's experiences of and interactions within reception and integration structures and processes in France. As far as asylum procedures are concerned, asylu...

This chapter explores the question of citizenship-building processes in relation to women asylum seekers and refugees and their civic participation not only in discrete refugee women's community associations or organisations but also in (longer established) migrant women's community associations. It first discusses the relationship between the ques...

International, European, and national policies and practices on refugee status determination and settlement/integration have changed over time in response to broader economic, political and social stimuli. Refugee and asylum policy is not simply a response to a recognised need on the part of those fleeing persecution; it is intricately connected to...

This book is about the lives of refugee women in Britain and France. Who are they? Where do they come from? What happens to them when they arrive, while they wait for a decision on their claim for asylum, and after the decision, whether positive or negative? The book shows how laws and processes designed to meet the needs of men fleeing political p...

"This very well-informed book sets its detailed case studies within a wider context and brings together empirical accounts with explanations of underlying ideas and approaches. Refreshingly clearly written, it will be invaluable for those interested in comparative politics and public policy as well as in women's studies." - Anne Stevens, Emeritus P...

Controversy surrounding the wearing of the Islamic headscarf or hijab1 in French state schools dates back to September 1989.2 At the time, three schoolgirls of Maghrebi background were excluded from their local high school (Collège Gabriel Havez) in the town of Creil, by head teacher Ernest Chenière, for failing to remove their headscarves while on...

The ‘parity law’, on women and men’s representation in political institutions, was passed by the National Assembly in 2000 and has since then been applied to all the relevant election types (legislative, senatorial, European, regional, cantonal, municipal) at national and subnational levels. A significant literature on parity has developed over the...

Although women have made important advances in the labour market and the principle of equality between male and female workers has been established in the employment policies of successive French governments since 1946, gender inequalities in relation to rates and patterns of economic activity, salaries, job status, career advancement and work-time...

Domestic violence is now firmly on the French public and political agenda. It has been declared a national priority by governments of the left and the right since 2001, and was the subject of a new legislative act in 2006. This chapter aims to explain how domestic violence arrived on the French political agenda and how the problem of domestic viole...

As we stated in the Introduction, focusing on major legal reforms or parliamentary debates does not tell the whole story about policy in each of these areas. Much of this is made at the local level, is remade and remodelled in day-to-day interactions, in implementation, in struggles over funding, resources and priorities. In addition, focusing on i...

Prostitution has been high on the French political agenda since the late 1990s, but the way in which it has been framed as a policy issue has undergone a radical change since the elections of 2002. Under the Jospin (1997–2002) government, prostitution debates were polarised: abolitionists, who formed a powerful coalition with access to policy-maker...

This chapter focuses on implementation or the extent to which women in France have been able to exercise the right to abortion introduced by the Loi Veil in 1975. This law, although a compromise, was relatively liberal, allowing a woman who declared herself to be in a situation of distress to have an abortion within the first ten weeks of pregnancy...

This chapter1 explores the question of citizenship-building processes in relation to women asylum seekers2 and refugees3, and their civic participation not only in discrete refugee4 women’s community associations but also in (longer established) migrant women’s community associations.5 Its aim is fourfold: first, it discusses the relationship betwe...

This article explores the issue of women's political representation in France and India. Its aim is threefold. First, it explains how women's representation was placed on the political agenda. Second, it examines the arguments used to justify and oppose demands for better representation. Finally, it considers what conclusions can be drawn from the...

During the 1980s, the French media proclaimed the death of feminism, but although the 1970s women's movement had demobilised, feminists were still active in issue-specific groups, in academia, and within the institutions of the state. Paying careful attention to the difficulties associated with defining feminisms and national feminisms in particula...

This article examines the treatment of women's oppression in feminist theory, focusing on the engagement of second wave feminists with the concept of class and its relation to gender. This examination is carried out with reference to British and French feminisms, identifying the main trends and shifts that have developed over the last 35 years and...

"This timely book offers for the first time in English an account of gender politics in France where arguments over women's representation have been heated and in the forefront of contemporary debate. It is a must-have for anyone interested in gender politics and political studies" Joni Lovenduski, Birkbeck College, University of London. An essenti...

This chapter will look at those readings of May that view it essentially as a cultural rather than a political phenomenon — whether, to follow Bénéton and Touchard’s taxonomy, a crisis in the university or a wider ‘crisis of civilisation’. The overwhelming majority of tenth- and (a fortiori) twentieth-anniversary interpretations on the events are o...

If May lives on as image rather than narration, that is because its story is such an ambiguous and inconclusive one. The events may have been lived through by many of their participants in the epic—heroic mode resoundingly distilled in the endless singing of the Internationale;1 but that in turn has become part of the image of May, or at least of t...

Over the past two-and-a-half decades the May 1968 events in France have continued to provoke commentaries from political observers and actors, historians and scholars of French society and culture. It was not surprising that the events’ tenth and twentieth anniversaries were marked by various conferences and debates, TV and radio programmes and pub...

The diversity of expressions used to describe what happened in France in May 1968 clearly indicates how difficult it is to say precisely what the ‘events’, to use the commonest term, were. ‘Crisis’, ‘strike’, ‘revolt’, ‘revolution’, ‘(student) commune’, ‘civil war’, ‘chienlit/dog’s breakfast’ (to use the somewhat euphemistic English translation of...

More than twenty years later, Bénéton and Touchard’s article remains the standard guide to interpretations of May,1 which reflects not only the comprehensiveness of their work, but also the comparative dearth of new interpretations since. The only qualitatively new such type of interpretation is that, variously associated with Régis Debray, Gilles...

The multiple impact of the May 1968 events in France is here reviewed and analysed, initially through a narrative account of the events themselves and then through a systematic survey of the various manners in which they have been interpreted and reproduced in France. This covers successively political, social/sociological, and cultural texts - fir...

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Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Aston in Birmingham, 1986. (PCF - Parti Communiste Francais).