It wasn’t clear why Ahmadi-nejad only intervened now; the plan to separate the sexes was first announced months ago and developments had been periodically announced ever since then.
Ahmadi-nejad also ordered a halt to forced retirements of university faculty deemed too liberal—a process that has been underway for three years without previous opposition from the president.
The segregation program has been advanced by Ahmadi-nejad’s own science minister, Kamran Daneshju. The Science Ministry is in charge of higher education in Iran. Medical education is overseen by the Health Ministry.
Last Wednesday, Ahmadi-nejad’s website carried the text of a letter the president had sent to the science and health ministers. “We are hearing that some of he classes at universities are being segregated with no regard for the consequences,” Ahmadi-nejad wrote. “It is essential that this shallow move be halted immediately.”
Males and females have always been segregated in mosques. Soon after the revolution, gender segregation was instituted in primary and secondary education. A few years ago, buses were segregated, with women told to sit at the back of the bus. More recently segregated subway cars were instituted on the Tehran Metro.
Segregation at universities has long been urged by many clerics, but nothing happened until February, when Science Minister Daneshju announced the decision had been made to fully segregate the sexes on campus. The plan called for separate male and female classes. It said nothing about segregation outside the classroom and did not propose separate male and female schools. There are completely separate elementary and secondary schools for the sexes.
“This is not called segregation,” Daneshju said. “It is Islam.”
But in his letter Ahmadi-nejad said such talk was “unscientific, superficial and unwise.” He also referred to it as “segregation,” not as Islam.
Although Ahmadi-nejad is often described as a misogynist in the West, he has actually displayed a very liberal bent on gender issues even before he became president—and that has gotten him in trouble many times.
At his first press conference after being elected president in 2005, he was asked if he would intensify the enforcement of the dress code in the streets. He replied, “I have better things to do.”
Shortly after taking office, he ordered that women soccer fans be allowed into stadiums to watch games. This caused an eruption among the clergy. Within days, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenehi issued a decree overturning Ahmadi-nejad’s order—the first of many occasions in which the president has been reversed by the Supreme Leader.
On another occasion, Ahmadi-nejad was photographed holding the hand of an elderly woman who was his first-grade teacher. That prompted another uproar.
Enforcement of the dress code has tightened dramatically during Ahmadi-nejad’s presidency. But the police are commanded by the Supreme Leader.
Ahmadi-nejad’s letter last week went beyond the issue of gender segregation. He also ordered that universities cease forcibly retiring faculty until a new retirement policy has been published by the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, which the president chairs.
Such forced retirements have been underway for three years. Critics say they are being used to cleanse the campuses of professors deemed as deviating from the Islamic principles laid down by the clergy.
Hundreds of professors and lecturers have been forced into retirement, chiefly in the humanities where regime ideologues believe that Western thought prevails and must be expunged.
Science Minister Daneshju did not flinch when he received the letter from Ahmadi-nejad. The very next day he issued an order canceling everything he had ordered over the previous five months about segregating classes. He also halted forced retirements.
But Daneshju did not bury gender segregation. His announced new policy claimed the president didn’t oppose the separation of the sexes—which flew in the face of the president’s letter—but that Ahmadi-nejad was simply concerned about creating a double standard in the universities by separating only some classes. Several campuses have announced plans to segregate only freshman classes this fall and to phase in total segregation over four years.
Daneshju said his ministry is now working on a more comprehensive approach to the issue. He said that might provide for the creation of single-sex campuses, as elementary and secondary schools are segregated.
Daneshju’s original endeavor to segregate classes was called the Hejab and Chastity Plan.
On Friday, two days after Ahmadi-nejad’s ordered canceling the plan was issued, worshippers at Friday prayers in many cities reportedly rallied after noon prayers to denounce the president’s order and demand full segregation.
Ayatollah Nasser Makarem-Shirazi, one of the country’s more outspoken and conservative clergymen, said he “deplored” Ahmadi-nejad’s order. He insisted that the educational system must continue to retire staff “who question the principles of religion” and must move forward to “gradually and fully separate boys and girls in the universities.”
Ayatollah Reza Ostadi, Qom’s Friday prayer leader, expressed concern that the president was contributing to “corruption” with his opposition to gender segregation.
In some clerical circles there have been calls to go beyond gender segregation on the campuses. Some clergymen are now insisting that female athletes must not be sent abroad to international competitions, calling that a “disgrace” to Islam.
A week has now passed since Ahmadi-nejad’s letter was released. There has as yet been no reaction from Khamenehi.
