Investigating Muslim minority women's difficulties getting divorced

What is it about?

This study investigates the particular troubles, which may arise when Muslim minority women want to end their marriages. The study shows how women’s abilities to do so in the face of male resistance is linked to the amount of power individual women can exert. While Muslim women of the second generation might quiet easily be able to leave unwanted marriages, women of the first generation may be unable to do so for years, even when husbands are controlling and abusive. Furthermore, when such women finally divorce according to Danish laws, (ex)husbands may resist the dissolution of the marriage, leaving the women to be stuck in ‘nikah captivity’ for years. The term covers women who are legally divorced in the country where they live, but are considered still-married from a religious and social perspective. Women may seek help from religious authorities to get a religious divorce, but are generally unable to get the desired help. Furthermore, while a court case in the country of origin may ‘free’ the women, less resourceful women cannot access this solution. Hence, some Muslim minority women end up living for years in a state where they are stigmatized by the immigrant community and abused by (ex)husbands, who refuse to let them go. The study thus reveals how local power dynamics within interpersonal relations and intra-community networks (rather than religious or cultural ‘rules of law’) centrally shape Muslim minority women’s abilities to fully leave unwanted marriages.

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Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Why is it important?

While a number of studies have investigated practices of marriage dissolution among Muslims in the United Kingdom, this study adds to the hitherto limited knowledge of such divorce practices in mainland Europe. The findings show that already vulnerable women may be caught in a kind of juridical vacuum where their options for fully ending unwanted marriages are limited indeed.

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