On September 3, eight women were sworn in as judges in Kuwait amid a frenzy of media coverage. This was the first time that women had been allowed to take up roles in the judiciary in the country, and it has been a long process, not always free of controversy.

On September 13, 2012 Kuwait’s Ministry of Justice and the Supreme Judicial Council agreed to accept female law graduates as prosecutors and cemented that decision with a fatwa from the Sharia Fatwa Board at the Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs. When the next call for public prosecutors was issued, it did not specify being male as a requirement, thus opening the door for female participation. A number of young women applied and went through a selection process, including a written exam and personal interviews, and were then enrolled into the Judicial College to complete a 1-year program. The Ministry of Justice issued Decree 253 on November 2, 2014 to appoint the first cohort of female law graduates in various governorates, so they could gain work experience, and 22 of the women who completed the Judicial College program were assigned as public prosecutors.

On June 30, Dharar al Asousi, Kuwait’s attorney general, issued a decree to promote eight of those women and four men to become judges. The Higher Council for the Judiciary approved this decision on July 7 and, following further training at Kuwait’s Institute for Judicial and Legal Studies, the women were sworn into their new roles as judges. Asousi explained that this decision was within an overall context of government plans to graduate more prosecutors overall, with the ultimate goal of “nationalizing” the judiciary in Kuwait. There have been a number of demands recently, from members of parliament and civil society organizations, to remove non-Kuwaitis from the judiciary and increase the number of Kuwaitis on the bench as a “national and constitutional necessity.” Kuwaiti citizens currently comprise 70% of the judiciary, however the head of the Court of Appeals, Mohammed bin Naji, warned that Kuwait still needs non-Kuwaiti judges in the short term to address the large backlog of cases. This mounting pressure to nationalize the judiciary presents an opportunity for more women to step in.

The path for women into the judiciary had started some years ago, when a female law graduate sued the government (unsuccessfully) for issuing a call specifically for male public prosecutors in 2006, thus denying her the chance to apply. This ignited some debates within Kuwait that were similar in spirit to those that had justified denying women their full political rights prior to May 16, 2005, when the Kuwaiti Parliament granted women the right to vote. The central arguments suggesting a woman’s unsuitability to fill the role of judge were linked to the perception of emotional frailty and Islamic sharia, which some insisted did not given guardianship rights to women. This in turn deemed her unfit to rule in a court or engage in policymaking activities related to governance.

Some tribal parliamentarians, like Majed Al-Mutairi, argued that there were sharia considerations to take into account. Khalid Al-Otaibi, who was the only member of parliament to oppose a domestic violence law that passed on August 19, stated that he opposed the appointment of women as judges because they could not be their own guardians, let alone act in that role over others, and that there were hadiths by the Prophet Muhammad that stated this clearly. The Salafist Thawabet al Ummah bloc issued a statement from Member of Parliament Mohammed Hayef Al-Mutairi arguing that women’s innate nature makes them unfit for the role and that the decision violated two articles of the judicial organization law that dictates that male judges preside over some specific legal matters, warning that this will lead to many rulings being appealed and embarrass the Judicial Council. Ironically, he was one of the most vocal members of parliament on the need to nationalize the judiciary.

The appointment of women as judges will open up some legal issues that relate to guardianship beyond the sharia-based concerns that the members of parliament raised. Currently, women in Kuwait need the consent of a male guardian to marry and the approval of a “male judge” to facilitate a divorce. Such issues were brought up by the dissenting members of parliament and more liberal voices that hoped that this conflict would lead to an end to some guardianship practices and allow for a more prominent role for Kuwaiti women in policymaking in the future. They hope this could lead to more equal rights for women in terms of passing on their nationality to their children, among other issues. There are still articles in Kuwait’s penal code that justify violence against women, such as articles 29, 153, and 182, and women are frequently murdered for disobeying their male kin. Fatima al Ajmi was recently murdered by her brothers for marrying outside her tribe despite her father’s blessing. The appointment of women to the judiciary and the implementation of the recently passed domestic violence law will challenge these social and legal practices.

Kuwait has lagged behind other Gulf Arab states in putting women on the bench, perhaps due to the “political Islamization of the country over the last 30 years” according to a source quoted by the BBC. Bahrain appointed women as prosecutors in 2003 and the first female judge in the Gulf region, Mona Al-Kawari, in 2006. The United Arab Emirates was next to swear in its first female judge in 2008, and Qatar followed in 2010. Oman and Saudi Arabia have yet to appoint women to the judiciary. Though a commercial arbitrator was appointed in Saudi Arabia in 2016, a proposal to appoint women judges has been rejected twice by the Saudi Shura Council in the past two years. It seems inevitable, however, that Oman and Saudi Arabia will follow suit soon, as women continue to break through traditionally gendered roles in the region, and empowering women is a central element of these states’ economic and social “vision” plans.

The wheels of change have been turning slowly in Kuwait, especially in terms of empowering women and increasing their representation in leadership positions. Much of the resistance has come from the Parliament, where there are 49 men and only one woman. Without real political will to push through gender quotas and increase opportunities for women in positions traditionally occupied by men, such as the judiciary, leveling the playing field will happen fitfully.