Female Madrasas in Pakistan: a Response to Modernity

Religions and Development Research Programme Female Madrasas in Pakistan: a Response to Modernity Masooda Bano Wolfson College, University of Oxford Working Paper 45 - 2010 Religions and Development Research Programme The Religions and Development Research Programme Consortium is an international research partnership that is exploring the relationships between several major world religions, development in low-income countries and poverty reduction. The programme is comprised of a series of comparative research projects that are addressing the following questions: z How do religious values and beliefs drive the actions and interactions of individuals and faith-based organisations? z How do religious values and beliefs and religious organisations influence the relationships between states and societies? z In what ways do faith communities interact with development actors and what are the outcomes with respect to the achievement of development goals? The research aims to provide knowledge and tools to enable dialogue between development partners and contribute to the achievement of development goals. We believe that our role as researchers is not to make judgements about the truth or desirability of particular values or beliefs, nor is it to urge a greater or lesser role for religion in achieving development objectives. Instead, our aim is to produce systematic and reliable knowledge and better understanding of the social world. The research focuses on four countries (India, Pakistan, Nigeria and Tanzania), enabling the research team to study most of the major world religions: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism and African traditional belief systems. The research projects will compare two or more of the focus countries, regions within the countries, different religious traditions and selected development activities and policies. The consortium consists of six research partner organisations, each of which is working with other researchers in the four focus countries: z University of Birmingham, UK: International Development Department, Department of Theology and Religion, Centre for West African Studies, Centre for the Study of Global Ethics. z University of Bath, UK: Centre for Development Studies. z Indian Institute of Dalit Studies, New Delhi. z Nigerian Institute of Social and Economic Research, Ibadan. z University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. z Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan. In addition to the research partners, links have been forged with non-academic and non-government bodies, including Islamic Relief. http://www.rad.bham.ac.uk Contact: [email protected] Religions and Development Working Paper 45 Female Madrasas in Pakistan: a Response to Modernity Masooda Bano Wolfson College, University of Oxford ISBN: 0 7044 2785 0 978 0 7044 2785 3 © International Development Department, University of Birmingham This document is an output from a project funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) for the benefit of developing countries. The views expressed are not necessarily those of DFID. Woring Paper 45 Female Madrasas in Pakistan: a Response to Modernity Contents Summary 1 1 Introduction 3 2 The madrasa education system in Pakistan 5 3 Methodology 7 4 Female madrasas: supply side factors 8 5 Parental demand: reducing inter-generational transaction costs 10 6 Students’ acceptance: maximizing gains within constraints 17 7 Conclusion 22 Notes 23 References 24 Key words: modernity, gender, madrasas, Pakistan, South Asia. Woring Paper 45 Female Madrasas in Pakistan: a Response to Modernity 1 Summary There has been a recent surge in demand for Islamic education for young women in Pakistan, which this paper examines and seeks to explain. It suggests that number of female madrasas has grown because they provide an education for young women from middle income families, which responds to many of the pressures resulting from economic and cultural change. The paper charts the birth, growing demand for and increasing numbers of female madrasas (Islamic schools) in Pakistan since the 1970s, noting that this reflects both demand from families and a positive response by the Islamic educational establishment. It attributes the recent surge in demand for Islamic education among girls who have already completed a secular education (mostly aged 16+) to the uncertain external environment. Globalization, development processes and wider availability of the mass media (especially cable television) are exposing young women from middle income families to western notions of gender equality and increasing their desire to access good jobs. However, the state has failed to provide educational and employment opportunities to match their aspirations. In addition, the erosive effect of cultural change on values that stress the importance of being a good Muslim, wife, mother and daughter concerns religious teachers, parents and many young women alike. Findings from individual and group interviews with principals and teachers, members of the wafaqs (Muslim education boards), parents and students in female madrasas throughout Pakistan show that the Islamic education provided by female madrasas is regarded as complementary to rather than a substitute for secular education perceived by both parents and daughters as encouraging piety and family-oriented values, thus increasing family stability and girls’ marriage prospects In addition, it provides knowledge and social contacts, especially for girls from remote areas improved social status for graduates in their communities of origin, where they can often play roles in the wider dissemination of Islamic knowledge opportunities for earning income from the establishment of independent girls’ madrasas 2 Woring Paper 45 The research concludes that religion is not a monolithic institution that is inherently supportive or obstructive of development processes; instead it can be seen as an informal institution on which people rely when formal institutions fail to provide the means to cope with day-to-day uncertainties the choice of madrasa education by parents and their daughters is partly driven by religious beliefs, but is also a rational response to the socio-economic and cultural changes that concern them. Female Madrasas in Pakistan: a Response to Modernity 3 1 Introduction1 Development institutions have engaged with religion selectively. Religious beliefs have been viewed as helpful if they inculcate attitudes supportive of planned development outcomes, and a hindrance if they promote alternative conceptions of well-being (Clarke, 2007). Religion has been particularly controversial in development discourse and planning in the arena of gender equality. Most religions are perceived to entrust men with higher authority, which has led some to argue for the adoption of a universalist position on the grounds that the preferences exercised by a particular society might not be optimal for women. Rather, social choices may be influenced by the ability of a male elite to influence collective choices, or women’s resignation to sub-optimal choices because these become dominant over time (Bliss, 1993; Harsanyi, 1982). Nussbaum (2001), for example, has argued that at times preferences are formed to fit stifling circumstances, with the result that from a normative perspective their satisfaction does not seem to contribute to well-being. She, along with Sen (1984, 1995), terms this phenomenon ‘adaptive preference’. In particular, she has used this argument to urge policy interventions to reform cultural practices in developing countries, including Muslim societies, where she believes women to have been so socialized into accepting a subordinate status that they have lost any sense of a superior alternative (Nussbaum, 2001): “Quiet acceptance of deprivation and bad fate affects the scale of dissatisfaction generated, and the utilitarian calculus gives sanctity to that distortion ... this makes utility quite inadequate as a basis of social choice.” Apart from ignoring the agency of the women — an issue for which Nussbaum’s work has already been critiqued (Baber, 2007) — such an interpretation of religious choices neglects the fact that individual choices are rarely constrained by a single institution, such as religion. Rather, choices are formed in the light of the total set of incentives resulting from the interplay of all the dominant institutions in a given context. This argument is by now well developed within the New Institutional Economics (NIE) literature. Preferences, as North (1990) argues, are influenced by a complex matrix of institutional factors, in which incentives generated by different institutions are weighed against each other to identify the optimal outcome. Against this background, this paper considers one aspect of the interface between religious beliefs and development outcomes. Specifically, it examines whether the preference for Islamic education, as manifest in the rapid spread of female madrasas in Pakistan, is shaped entirely by religious beliefs. 4 Woring Paper 45 In Section 2, the madrasa education system is situated within the socio-economic makeup of Pakistani society. The methodology adopted is explained in Section 3. In Section 4, intra-household decision-making processes regarding the choice of school for daughters are examined. The following sections consider the demand for madrasas among parents and students respectively. The paper shows that apparently religious or orthodox preferences are often the best response available to individuals

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