Advancement of Women in Kuwait

The parliamentary elections in Kuwait last Thursday marked the first time that women were able to stand for office and vote at the national level. Kuwait is among the last of the Gulf States to allow women to participate in national elections.

A BBC article cites international pressure as being one of the prime catalysts in bringing about this development but states that it "also stems from other 21st Century factors, not the least the opening up of the media--and hence the debate--through satellite television."

Although none of the female candidates won a seat in the legislature in Thursday's election, women voters turned out in significant numbers, "[m]any queu[ing up] for hours at segregated polling stations in the suffocating heat." This development, along with others noted in an earlier post, seem to be steps towards the fulfillment of the following promise, articulated by 'Abdu'l-Bahá in 1913:

In this Revelation of Bahá'u'lláh, the women go neck and neck with the men. In no movement will they be left behind. Their rights with men are equal in degree. They will enter all the administrative branches of politics. They will attain in all such a degree as will be considered the very highest station of the world of humanity and will take part in all affairs. Rest ye assured. Do ye not look upon the present conditions; in the not far distant future the world of women will become all-refulgent and all-glorious, for His Holiness Bahá'u'lláh hath willed it so! At the time of elections the right to vote is the inalienable right of women, and the entrance of women into all human departments is an irrefutable and incontrovertible question. No soul can retard or prevent it.