Stately ambiguities: explaining inconsistent gender policies as authoritarian regime survival in Jordan

This article analyses the inconsistencies and contradictions that exist across policies and state institutions in Jordan with regard to women’s political empowerment. It explains these ambiguities within the framework of authoritarian regime survival. Drawing on qualitative research in the international development sector in Jordan with special reference to women’s political empowerment, it becomes clear that state institutions are simultaneously involved in attempts to further and to hinder gender equality, particularly in the political realm. There are no efforts to streamline these gender policies and initiatives because they allow the Jordanian regime to cater to a number of constituencies and actors domestically and internationally. Allowing for a multiplicity of state policies and processes vis-à-vis its female citizens therefore secures its endurance. Authoritarian regime survival must consequently be understood not just in terms of coherent strategies and distinctive attempts at policing, but also by way of a more mundane refusal to streamline inconsistencies across state institutions.