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The policy:

In 2004, Morocco’s parliament approved an updated version of the Moudawana, the country’s family law code, which governs areas such as marriage, divorce, inheritance, and child custody. 

Now, almost two decades later, the Moudawana is back in the spotlight after King Mohammed VI announced his intention to reassess it.

The impact:

It is common to hear the family law reforms described as a revolution for women. At the time, they were widely seen as among the most progressive in the Arab world.

It’s hard to overstate how significant they were. The changes ensured greater liberties for women, waiving the requirement of obedience in a marriage, asserting equal responsibility for the family, raising the age of marriage for girls to 18, and offering easier access to divorce.

For the first time, women could seek to end their marriage unilaterally and divorce proceedings were placed under judicial oversight.

“It was not a change of a few articles but a total reform,” Nadia Naïr, a member of activist group UAF (Union de l'Action Féministe), said. “[They were] a great progress in the rights of women, especially because it took place after an important and intense - sometimes violent - debate between feminists and conservatives”.

Since then, divorce rates have been climbing. In 2004, around 7,000 cases of divorce were registered and, by 2019, the number was 55,470. As in many countries, the COVID-19 pandemic brought a spike, and 126,000 divorces were recorded in 2021. 

Such a big increase, though, has sparked some alarmism.

In the city of Essaouira, I spoke to Mohammed who argued vehemently that women no longer respected the institution of marriage and their responsibilities within it.

“When women find marriage hard, they just look for an easy way out instead of carrying out their responsibilities,” he said, adding that he believes the divorce rate marks a decline in social integrity and morality.

On paper, the statistics do look dramatic and have easily fed into fears of social decline. Blame is often pointed at feminists. But women’s organisations and rights activists take a different view. 

“The divorce rate is only a concern for conservatives and traditionalists,” explains Nadia. “They believe that women must be in a marriage, even if it is a detriment to their wellbeing and dignity in the name of ‘family cohesion’”.

From this perspective, rising divorce rates indicate greater freedoms.

But frustrations towards the Moudawana are also common in progressive circles –  for opposite reasons. Many feminist groups believe that it did not go far enough in securing gender equality, and that progress has stalled since.

Last year, the king announced that he would investigate possible further reforms, intensifying the debate.

And, in March, eight feminist associations held a rally in the city of Casablanca to advocate for feminist legislation. They argued that while access to divorce has improved, the social and financial position of women remains a concern. 

“The way in which divorced or single women are perceived may be changing slowly, but it is changing, especially in big cities,” Nadia told me.

Progress is not universal, and inequalities persist, particularly in remote rural regions and marginalised quarters of large cities. And even if perceptions of divorced women are changing, there are more practical and pressing concerns for many of them, particularly financial. 

If a divorced women is deemed able to work, there is little financial support available to her.

Women with children can receive a small maintenance payment to feed themselves and their children from their ex-husbands or the government if he is unable to pay.

Beyond this, though, there are few provisions. 

Available statistics on the labour force participation rate of Moroccan women expose the flaws in this system. Data from the World Bank shows that in 2021 women made up just 22% of the total labour force, down from a high of 26% in 2008, all of which points to a contradiction between the legislation and reality.

The Moudawana notes that women have the capacity to work and support themselves but fails to recognise or adjust to the educational and societal barriers to salaried employment.

In Essaouira, Saïda entered the workforce after her divorce to support her family. With no father or brothers, she become the sole earner for her younger sister, mother, grandmother, and ailing uncle. Without children of her own, she had no access to financial support.

Finding work was a struggle: as a cleaner she worked long hours for below average rates. This paid work puts further pressure on her available time for caring duties in the home. For mothers, poor childcare infrastructure is a severe limitation.

“If anything, the clauses concerned with indemnity and finances work for women with salaried jobs and not for others” says Bouchra, based in Marrakech, who describes herself as a militant feminist activist. 

Existing rules fail to recognise the unpaid contributions women make in a marriage - a key area of concern for activists. ADMF is campaigning for a formal procedure to assess the division of assets that considers both the paid and unpaid contributions of a couple.

Not all women are able to seek salaried work immediately after a divorce, especially if they never anticipated undertaking such work.

Whether these concerns can be addressed in another round of reforms to the Moudawana is in doubt. Vastly different realities exist for women across Morocco, depending on wealth, education, class, and geography.

Introducing legislation that manages to assure the interests of a divorced, university-educated woman with a career in Casablanca while also ensuring greater equality, security and independence for a divorced woman with children in a remote Atlas town is a mammoth task.

The 2011 constitution asserted that men and women were equal in all matters, in keeping with international conventions and protocols signed by the country. However, juggling the Moudawana’s compatibility with Sharia law, and meeting international definitions of equality, has left gaps in provisions for women.

Some activists argue that a more radical solution is necessary.

“There was no revolution in 2004,” Bouchra said. “Nothing fundamental has changed in the position of women. There is still discrimination in inheritance, towards children of divorced, and forced child marriages continue through loopholes”. 

That the family code is the most significant piece of legislation concerning women’s rights shows that women are still viewed through the framework of their role in the family - a role seen as a responsibility rather than voluntary. 

After a divorce, children under seven must stay with the mother, who receives no compensation beyond a small food allowance for herself and her children. In essence, this demands free, or subsistence, labour from women for childrearing. 

When the king announced the possibilities of further reform, assurances were made that any changes would be in keeping with Islamic law. To many women like Bouchra, though, such assurances show that little meaningful change will occur. 

“The code itself is the problem” she said.

Any views expressed are those of the author and not of Context or the Thomson Reuters Foundation.