Educational Policy, Power, and Gender Inequality in Afghan Secondary Education under Taliban Rule
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15575/jassr.v8i1.160Keywords:
Authoritarian governance, educational exclusion, gender inequality, girls’ education, patriarchal power, secondary education, social control, TalibanAbstract
Abstract
Since the Taliban’s return to power in 2021, restrictions on girls’ secondary education in Afghanistan have intensified gender inequality and reinforced political control. Although existing studies document these restrictions, less attention has been given to how education policy operates as a mechanism of patriarchal authority and how affected communities respond. This study examines how current policies restrict girls’ access to secondary schooling, shape their experiences, and sustain wider structures of gendered power. Using a qualitative design, it draws on interviews with female students and teachers from four Afghan provinces, supported by policy documents, NGO reports, and academic literature. The findings indicate that educational exclusion is legitimized through religious and cultural narratives that strengthen male-dominated authority. Participants reported psychological distress, diminished aspirations, unequal treatment, curriculum limitations, and exclusion from decision-making. At the same time, girls, teachers, families, and reform-oriented actors pursued online learning, underground schools, female-led learning spaces, and advocacy framing girls’ education as both an Islamic and human right. The study contributes to debates on gender, education, and authoritarian power by showing how schooling can function as social control. It concludes that restoring access requires inclusive policy reform, protection for alternative learning, and women’s participation in educational governance.
References
References
Abukari, Abdulai. 2014. “Education of Women in Islam: A Critical Islamic Interpretation of the Quran.” Religious Education 109 (1): 4–23. https://doi.org/10.1080/00344087.2014.868203.
Akbari, Farkhondeh, and Jacqui True. 2022. “One Year on from the Taliban Takeover of Afghanistan: Re-Instituting Gender Apartheid.” Australian Journal of International Affairs 76 (6): 624–33. https://doi.org/10.1080/10357718.2022.2107172.
Albrecht, Clara, Britta Rude, and Tanja Stitteneder. 2022. “Women in Afghanistan: Developments over the Last 20 Years and the Return of the Taliban.” CESifo Forum 23 (1): 57–62.
Alemi, Sayed Hussain Agha, Lianyu Cai, Mingfei Jin, Yijian Hu, and Jan Qasim. 2025. “‘I Felt My Life’s Achievements Burning before My Eyes’: The Impact of the Taliban’s Ban of Female Education on Afghan Female Students in China’s Universities.” Higher Education 90: 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-024-01305-y.
Amiri, Mir Hussain. 2024. “Obstacles to Women’s Rights to Education: The Taliban Regime and Its Policies on Women’s Education in Afghanistan.” Journal of Asian Social Science Research 5 (2): 167–84. https://doi.org/10.15575/jassr.v5i2.71.
Beidollahkhani, Arash. 2026. “Regulating Female Embodiment as Disciplining Citizens: The Biopolitics of Islamic Governance in Iran and Afghanistan.” International Journal of Cultural Policy 32 (2): 151–66. https://doi.org/10.1080/10286632.2024.2444458.
Burridge, Nina, Anne Maree Payne, and Nasima Rahmani. 2016. “‘Education Is as Important for Me as Water Is to Sustaining Life’: Perspectives on the Higher Education of Women in Afghanistan.” Gender and Education 28 (1): 128–47. https://doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2015.1096922.
Cleton, Laura. 2023. “Assessing Adequate Homes and Proper Parenthood: How Gendered and Racialized Family Norms Legitimize the Deportation of Unaccompanied Minors in Belgium and The Netherlands.” Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State & Society 30 (2): 323–46. https://doi.org/10.1093/sp/jxac016.
Davids, Nuraan. 2015. “Are Muslim Women in Need of Islamic Feminism? In Consideration of a Re-Imagined Islamic Educational Discourse.” British Journal of Religious Education 37 (3): 311–25. https://doi.org/10.1080/01416200.2014.944096.
Delju, Zulaikha, and Nasima Puya Habibi. 2024. “Women’s Access to Education in a Patriarchal Society.” ASEAN Journal of Educational Research and Technology 3 (3): 223–34. https://ejournal.bumipublikasinusantara.id/index.php/ajert/article/view/477
de Silva de Alwis, Rangita. 2024. “Holding the Taliban Accountable for Gender Persecution: The Search for New Accountability Paradigms under International Human Rights Law, International Criminal Law and Women, Peace, and Security.” German Law Journal 25 (2): 289–334. https://doi.org/10.1017/glj.2023.113.
Farooq, Saadia, Victoria A. Newsom, and Lara Martin Lengel. 2026. “Diasporic Social Media Activism as Discursive Resistance: Afghan Women Contest the Taliban’s Strategic Narratives.” Online Media and Global Communication 5 (1): 44–82. https://doi.org/10.1515/omgc-2025-0073.
Friman, Sara. 2021. “What Is the ‘Problem’ with Gender in Afghanistan? A Discourse Analysis of the Women, Peace and Security National Action Plan in Afghanistan (2015–2022).” Bachelor’s thesis, Department of Political Science, Lund University. https://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9046736.
Hamidi, Abdul Basir. 2024. “Restriction Policy on Afghan Girls’ Education and Its Consequences.” Edukasiana: Jurnal Inovasi Pendidikan 3 (2): 228–43. https://doi.org/10.56916/ejip.v3i2.691.
Keshavarzi, Saeed, Julia C. Becker, Ali Ruhani, and Fateme Ebrahimi. 2025. “Responses to the Rapid Reactionary Social Change: A Social-Psychological Investigation of Young Afghan Women’s Experiences during the Second-Taliban Era.” International Journal of Intercultural Relations 108: 102250. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijintrel.2025.102250.
Khan, Muhammad Suhail, Wu Zongyou, Yao Dewei, Muhammad Ibrahim, Aman Khan, and Anastasiia Pavlova. 2024. “Gender, Culture, and Migration: A Qualitative Study of the Socioeconomic Challenges Facing Afghan Women Refugees in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.” African Journal of Reproductive Health 28 (5): 90–102. https://doi.org/10.29063/ajrh2024/v28i5.11.
Malekzai, Zulikha. 2024. “A Grounded Theory Exploration of the Educational and Societal Ramifications Resulting from School Closures among Afghan Girls Following the Taliban’s Resurgence.” Master’s thesis, Asian University for Women.
Mazankova, Jana. 2022. “Marginalized Islamic Feminism for Taliban-Approved Policies: Peacekeeping and Its Contradictions in Afghanistan.” Master’s thesis, American University of Beirut. http://hdl.handle.net/10938/23420.
Moghadam, Valentine M. 2002. “Patriarchy, the Taleban, and Politics of Public Space in Afghanistan.” Women’s Studies International Forum 25 (1): 19–31. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0277-5395(02)00224-8.
Mohammadi, Abdul Qadim, Ahmad Neyazi, Diva Habibi, Qasim Mehmood, Mehrab Neyazi, and Mark D. Griffiths. 2024. “Female Education Ban by the Taliban: A Descriptive Survey Study on Suicidal Ideation, Mental Health, and Health-Related Quality of Life among Girls in Afghanistan.” Journal of Public Health 46 (3): e439–e447. https://doi.org/10.1093/pubmed/fdae111.
Mosamim, Parwiz, and Jean-Patrick Villeneuve. 2026. “Islamic Public Administration in Practice: The Taliban’s ‘Gender Apartheid’ Governance in Afghanistan.” Public Administration and Development, 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1002/pad.70052.
Najam, Rafiuddin, Harry Anthony Patrinos, and Raja Bentaouet Kattan. 2026. “The Mis-Education of Women in Afghanistan: From Wage Premiums to Economic Losses.” Journal of Population Economics 39: Article 21. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00148-026-01148-0
Orfan, Sayeed Naqibullah, and Abdul Wahab Shams. 2026. “‘Why I Was Born a Woman’: Female Students’ Challenges in Afghanistan Higher Education under the Taliban Rule.” Higher Education 91 (3): 1023–43. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-025-01454-8.
Rahimi, Haroun, and Faiza Muhammad Din. 2024. “Female Madrasas and Islamic Agency of Afghan Girls and Women: How Religious Education Is Being Used by Afghan Women and Girls under the Taliban Regime.” Manchester Journal of Transnational Islamic Law & Practice 20 (3): 101–18.
Rezvani, M. Q., N. Chaudhary, R. Huseynov, and V. Singh. 2021. Gender Equality and Participation in Policy Making: Special Reference to India and Afghanistan. Saarbrücken: LAP LAMBERT Academic Publishing.
Safitri, N. F., A. M. Khasanah, and M. Abdullah. 2023. “Taliban Policies and International Human Rights: Legal Review of Educational Restrictions on Afghan Girls.” Journal of Human Rights and Legal Studies 8 (1): 45–59.
Sahill, Pamir H. 2023. “Dwelling in an All-Male World: A Critical Analysis of the Taliban Discourse on Afghan Women.” Women’s Studies International Forum 98: 102748. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2023.102748.
Sarwari, Abdul Qahar, and Hamedi Mohd Adnan. 2023. “Analysis of Discourses in the Islamic World about the Ban upon Women’s Education by the Taliban in Afghanistan.” Issues in Educational Research 33 (3): 1148–60. https://search.informit.org/doi/10.3316/informit.T2024050800009300600579084.
Save the Children. 2022. “Statement in Response to Further Restrictions on Girls’ Education in Afghanistan.” December 23, 2022. https://www.savethechildren.net/news/statement-response-further-restrictions-girls-education-afghanistan.
Sediqi, Fahima. 2026. “Examining the Consequences of School Bans on the Self-Esteem of Afghan Adolescent Girls in Kabul, Afghanistan.” Journal of Child & Adolescent Trauma. Published online June 4, 2026. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40653-026-00919-x.
Shahir, Shahira, Xiaoni Ren, and Shaista Noor. 2025. “Silenced Voices, Enduring Struggles: An Islamic Feminist Analysis of Afghan Female Academics under Taliban Rule.” Women’s Studies International Forum 113: 103193. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2025.103193.
Tan, Nikolas Feith, and Meltem Ineli-Ciger. 2023. “Group-Based Protection of Afghan Women and Girls under the 1951 Refugee Convention.” International & Comparative Law Quarterly 72 (3): 793–817. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0020589323000283.
Toran, Rohina. 2024. “Women’s Education under Taliban Rule in Afghanistan: A Political and Socio-Cultural Analysis.” Master’s thesis, University of British Columbia. https://open.library.ubc.ca/collections/ubctheses/24/items/1.0447745.
UNESCO. 2025. “UNESCO Gives Voice to Afghan Girls and Women and Calls for Their Rights to Be Restored.” March 6, 2025. https://www.unesco.org/en/articles/unesco-gives-voice-afghan-girls-and-women-calls-their-rights-be-restored.
UNICEF USA. 2024. “1000 Days Out of School: A Generation of Afghan Girls Left Behind.” June 6, 2024. https://www.unicefusa.org/stories/1000-days-out-school-generation-afghan-girls-left-behind/41419.
.jpg)
