vallierojas: Can Afghan women count on Hillary Clinton?

The US secretary of state promised to protect women's rights ? she must be held to her pledge as talks with the Taliban begin

The US is negotiating with the Taliban! What will happen to Afghan women? They have enough problems already, since the Karzai government is easily as misogynist as the Taliban.

But not to worry. Hillary Clinton is US secretary of state. A feminist will determine US policy in the "reconciliation, reintegration and transition process". Surely the women of Afghanistan can rely on Hillary?

She told them so in London in February 2010, when Hamid Karzai and Afghan ministers met with western and regional diplomats, who agreed to set up a fund to reintegrate "disaffected Taliban back into society", as long as they swore to uphold the constitution. The London conference was planned by the British government and the UN, which seemed to have no problem overlooking its own security council resolution (SCR)1325, mandating that all peace and post-conflict negotiations include a gender perspective. Only one Afghan woman was even invited ? not their minister of women's affairs ? and she was there to represent civil society in general, not voice the demands of women.

But the Afghan Women's Network, a 15-year-old coalition with 84 member groups and 5,000 individual members, could teach the rest of us a thing or two about organising. Despite the fact that they were not invited to London, four of them showed up, demanding "that the proposed reintegration process is not undertaken at the expense of women's hard-won human rights." They did intensive lobbying, worked with the press, and did their best to convince those present that "women are central to bringing peace and stability." In recognition of their work, Clinton invited them to her press conference and made a commitment to involve women in every stage of the peace process.

But that was last year. Now, Osama bin Laden is dead and the American people are sick of the war. They want out and so does the Obama administration. Last year, Clinton made protection of Afghan women's rights a principle; today, the principle appears to be negotiable.

In March, the Washington Post revealed that USAID was backtracking on a $140m project to help Afghan women own land. Though most Afghans live by farming, only men are landowners. The original USAID request for bids called for specific measures to increase women's access to land ownership, including legal aid, public education on women's rights and incentives to register land in the name of both spouses. But after intervention by the state department, USAID put out new guidelines with no teeth, requiring merely that the project study inheritance laws to see if they could be amended to include women, and then only if the Afghan government supported the initiative.

When questioned, a "senior official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity" said, "gender issues are going to have to take a back seat to other priorities ? There's no way we can be successful if we maintain every special interest and pet project. All those pet rocks in our rucksack were taking us down."

Of course, USAID contradicted the story, saying how much money it was spending on Afghan women and, when put on the spot in Congress by Nita Lowey, Clinton told the House that US commitment to Afghan women was undiminished. But she didn't say the old USAID regulations would be restored. That's a pretty clear indication of which way the wind blows.

Women in the Afghan Women's Network made a lobbying trip to Washington this June to try to convince officials that the only way to get stability in Afghanistan is support women's human rights. They brought specific recommendations on how to reintegrate the Taliban fighters, while at the same time protecting women and civil society. (Their programme can be downloaded here.)

The AWN recommendations are brilliant. According to Gita Saghal, former head of Amnesty International's gender unit, they "are an example for all UN agencies dealing with post-conflict situations because they are family-oriented rather than fighter-oriented" and "deal with inclusion of women in monitoring and many different processes rather than just in peace negotiations".

Ann Jones, an American writer who has spent years working in Afghanistan, says the US calls the shots there and could put such measures in place to protect women's rights if it insisted, but people in Washington don't get it. "They regard women's rights as an add-on that's unimportant, and won't face the implications of backing the same old warlords they have been backing since 1979. These guys are a disaster for both Afghanistan and us, because you can't establish a stable country with leaders who have no regard for the welfare of their own people."

The choice is clear: the US can either keep on with the same old policy of making deals with warlords, or try something new ? empowering women and civil society. Official Washington apparently thinks the only realistic thing to do is what we have done before, even if it doesn't work. This is not really a choice between pragmatism and idealism. We have tried the warlords option for many years, and it has not brought stability or prosperity or peace.

Half the population of Afghanistan is female, with many households headed by women. These women are capable of farming, doing business, promoting education, safeguarding local people, stabilising their communities. They have lived with war, and they know what works and what doesn't. The AWL programme proposes concrete measures to strengthen the position of women; such measures, embedded into local and national political processes, are a better foundation for security and peace than anything the US has tried so far. Why not support them?

Is Clinton willing to fight for the principle of including women? She understands that it is a principle; as secretary of state, she is in a strong position. And she has enough political skills and support to do so effectively ? if she is willing to stand up to the guys and take the risk of being branded a feminist rather than a "realist".