ABSTRACT
Modernist and secularist pretensions notwithstanding, few 'secularist' states were willing to risk their political survival by radically interfering in matters of the family, marriage and personal laws, which were widely seen as the domain of religious authorities. Religious authorities commonly insist on regulating relationships of the private domain, including sexuality, biological and social reproduction, marriage, gender roles. This chapter explores how religion as a political force shapes and deflects the struggle for gender equality in contexts marked by different histories of nation building and challenges of ethnic diversity, different state-society relations, and different relations between state power and religion. It provides some of the dilemmas facing feminist action and alliance building in a context where conservative religious forces are assertive and where the struggle for gender equality coincides with other justice claims. The exclusionary nature of religiously buttressed nationalism often leads to violent conflict between ethno-religious groups.
