Suchergebnisse

The United States' foreign policy in Afghanistan has a long history of misguided plans and misplaced trust—a fact that has contributed to the destruction of the social and physical infrastructure of Afghan society. Afghans contend that after having fought as U.S. allies against the Soviet Union—with the price of more than two million dead—the United States swiftly walked away at the end of that bloody, twenty-three-year conflict. The toll of the war on Afghan society reflected in current statistics is so staggering as to be practically unimaginable: 12 million women living in abject poverty, 1 million people handicapped from land mine explosions, an average life expectancy of forty years (lower for women), a mortality rate of 25.7 percent for children under five years old, and an illiteracy rate of 64 percent. These horrific indicators place Afghanistan among the most destitute countries in the world in terms of human development.

Wali looks at US foreign policy in Afghanistan, focusing on the status of women. An accurate analysis of gender equality is called for. Based on a review of relevant data, Wali sees that women must be integrated into all sectors of Afghan society, including public life as paid government employees. She then analyzes the war on terrorism & its aftermath. It is also important that nongovernmental organizations pressure national governments to place conditions on reconstruction aid that are predicated on gender sensitivity. J. Backman