The politicisation of gender and restrictive laws about women in Muslim countries have often been explained in terms of the ubiquity of Islam in politics and culture. This paper offers an alternative explanation, one focused on the dynamics of patriarchy and the contradictions of development and social change. Patriarchy is defined here as a kinship-ordered social structure with strictly defined sex roles in which women are subordinated to men. Patriarchy persists where there is limited industrialisation, urbanisation and proletarianisation, and may be legislated by the state. At the same time, the collision of tradition and modernity and unwanted changes, particularly in the status of women, may result in a preoccupation with cultural identity on the part of some social groups. In such a context, calls may be made and measures taken to restore women to their `proper place'. This framework is used to analyse the politics of gender in Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan during the 1980s. The difference in the three cases is that the Afghan state sought to undermine patriarchal structures through land reform and changes in marriage and family law, whereas in Iran and Pakistan the states fostered patriarchal ideology and practices.
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