Writer Aslı Sancar and academic Pınar Yazıcı delivered lectures on women's rights in modern Turkey and the Ottoman period and evaluated the subject from historical and legal perspectives.
Aslı Sancar discussed the loss of rights from Ottoman times to the present day in her lecture about women's rights and marriage in the Ottoman Empire.
Contrary to stereotypical ideas about marriage during Ottoman times, Ms. Sancar remarked, “Despite popular belief that only men had rights to divorce, women also had the right to divorce their husbands, though theirs were initiated in a different way.” If a woman was not happy in a marriage and believed that her husband was not fulfilling his duties, she to could apply to the court for divorce. Sancar also added that husbands had the responsibility of maintaining his wife’s standards and social status after the divorce, and had no rights over the women’s financial assets.
As for the economic rights of the Ottoman women, Aslı Sancar stated that women had the right to inherit, own and control their properties during the Ottoman period, underlining that women at the time had enjoyed strong economic freedoms. Recalling that women in Europe did not have rights to own and control properties, or have access to finances until 1882, Sancar pointed out that Ottoman women had such rights long before they had been granted to European women. During that time, Sancar said, “English women did not have the right to inherit except through their husbands.
Sancar said it was shocking for her to have found that Ottoman women had enjoyed such rights for centuries, and she added that records in the archives show that Ottoman women were not shy about using and claiming their rights to the fullest.
Following Aslı Sancar, Ms. Pınar Yazıcı, Faculty Member of Istanbul Bilgi University Law School, made a presentation titled, “Recent Amendments on the Rights of Women and Children”. Yazıcı discussed the recent amendments made on Civil Code and Criminal Code for the European Union process and gave examples on how these changes are applied in real life.
Recalling that Turkey was among the very first countries that granted women suffrage in 1934, Yazıcı stated that Turkey has given importance to gender equality with the recent amendment in 2010.
Regarding the changes to better protect children against violence and children rights with the amendments made in the “Family Protection Law” that year, Ms. Yazici stated that in order to prevent female juvenile marriages, marriage ages were equalized to 18 years of age.
Upon question of how frequently these changes are actually applied, Yazici stated that before the recent amendments, gender inequality was very noticeable and present within the laws, but has now greatly improved. Yazici continued, “However, I don’t think we could talk about fully recovered system yet. Furthermore, at this point pressure from non-governmental organizations’ is crucial if we are to reach ideal standards.”
Published on Women's Platform, 30 July 2012, Monday
