LOW-INCOME ISLAMIST WOMEN AND SOCIAL ECONOMY IN IRAN Roksana Bahramitash, Atena Sadegh and Negin Sattari Low-Income Islamist Women and Social Economy in Iran Roksana Bahramitash • Atena Sadegh Negin Sattari Low-Income Islamist Women and Social Economy in Iran Roksana Bahramitash Montreal-based Scholar and Consultant Montreal, QC, Canada Atena Sadegh Étude Économique Conseil Montreal, QC, Canada Negin Sattari University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Urbana, IL, USA ISBN 978-1-137-52538-3    ISBN 978-1-137-52539-0 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52539-0 Library of Congress Control Number: 2018933530 © The Author(s) 2018 This work is subject to copyright All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations Cover illustration: Pattern adapted from an Indian cotton print produced in the 19th century Printed on acid-free paper This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Nature America, Inc part of Springer Nature The registered company address is: New York Plaza, New York, NY 10004, U.S.A Contents 1 Introduction   2 Social Economy and Women in Iran   3 Women’s Role in the Political Economy: An Overview  17 4 Islamist, Islamic and Muslim Women  35 5 Informal Networks of Religious Women and Social Economy  49 6 Conclusion 65 Index  75 v CHAPTER Introduction Abstract  This chapter starts with a review of literature on the topic of the social solidarity economy (sometimes referred to as the third sector), the pros and cons of this safety net—particularly in the case of Iran—as well as the importance of recognizing its existence despite challenges In this book the topic of the social economy focuses on women of low-income households and examines the role of religion With a trend towards the decline of the welfare state and rise in economic hardship, partly due to government mismanagement of the economy, partly due to sanctions on Iran, the social economy among those from low-income households plays a significant role in the economic survival of the poor This book is focused on Islamic women only, but this is not to overlook or undermine non-­ religious women’s efforts to reduce poverty Keywords  Community mobilization • Safety net • Social solidarity economy • Islamist women • Market economy The research idea for this book started back in the year 2003 when the US government under the Bush administration assumed that the invasion of Baghdad and the pulling down of the statue of Saddam Hussein would result in parades of joy by Iraqis This was to be a relatively simple US mission that would be welcomed by the people There has been nothing © The Author(s) 2018 R Bahramitash et al., Low-Income Islamist Women and Social Economy in Iran, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52539-0_1 2   R BAHRAMITASH ET AL s­imple or pleasant about this invasion, in fact it brought about great devastation and complications that have lasted to this day It was then that I became determined to document what I had observed over the course of more than a decade of fieldwork in Iran and other Middle Eastern and North African countries—that invasion of Iran and a US military operation will bring similar surprises and another disaster for the region Just as in the case of Iraq, there is support for those in power in Iran and some of that comes from women, many of them from low-income households who, for the most part, remain invisible in the eyes of those who support military solutions to US-Iranian relations After eight years of President Obama, who moved away from military solution and signed a deal, in 2016 President Trump came to office Since then the administration has leaned more towards military action and has been imposing more sanctions on Iran even though Iran has, according to the US state department, been in compliance with the nuclear deal, and some suspect an invasion of the country is looming in the background While conducting research in Iran, I came across a great deal of community mobilization and mutual help, partly rooted in the traditional social fabric of the country and partly energized and sprouting because of the 1979 Revolution and war in the 1980s Effectively, both the revolution and the war were crises that sent major shock waves throughout the society, creating an invisible safety net, which enabled the economy to deal with them These types of safety net mechanisms are by no means limited to Iran nor specifically to situation of war and revolution However, what is perhaps unique in the case of Iran is that many women, who from an outside perspective appear passive, religious, obedient citizens, are actually highly engaged in community care Travelling inside Iran, this was the case throughout the country in many different ways These seemingly quiet women, when holding religious gatherings, make an important contribution to the country through their informal networks and have in effect spread an invisible safety net In every low-income neighborhood, in every town, this type of safety net has spread widely and quietly Since these safety nets are created predominantly through religious practices, they are in accordance with Islamic tradition In other words, the assistance provided via these safety nets are treated as acts of God and therefore must be kept in confidence Those who give and those who receive so for their faith and must withhold the identity of both parties Yet, the importance of this stream of cash and in-kind assistance running throughout the country, arguably holding it together in dealing with  INTRODUCTION   economic problems, remains hidden from the eyes of most academics, researchers and other observes; many of whom not travel beyond North Tehran and perhaps almost exclusively meet with middle-class secular women This book is a snapshot of how the vast majority of women who tend to remain observant of their religion and who deal with poverty and unemployment in their own community, by and large come from lowand lower-middle income households This by no means suggests that non-religious women of middle- and higher-income groups are inactive in the battle against poverty but they tend to engage in more formal organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), a shortlist of which is included in Chap Yet, since religious women are rarely the subject of fieldwork research, getting access and trust building to share information has been far from easy I have had to spend a great deal of time with university students who come from low-income households in order to get access to focus groups While I was able to break that barrier, fieldwork without having a broader context remains incoherent for academic analysis, and for this reason I have used a broader theoretical frame—that of social or solidarity economy Ironically, social economy is more commonly used by the secular left yet it seemed a perfect way of contextualizing the highly complex and multi-faceted findings of this research In Chap 2, there is a discussion of the solidarity economy, its definition and how it is applied to the fieldwork included in the book The solidarity economy (otherwise also known as the third sector), separate from the public and the private economies, has been growing and there has been an increasing interest by academics and policy makers about its benefits This sector includes a wide range of institutions comprised of foundations and non-profit organizations, which tend to be more formal and regulated than the informal, community-based networks which deliver assistance, and some of them work on the basis of mutual help and are outside of the market economy In this book, the focus is on the most informal, community-­based types run by women and rooted in low-income neighborhoods The creation of the solidarity economy (or this third sector) has both pros and cons On the one hand, critics argue that it undermines the responsibility of the government and the welfare state to provide for its citizen On the other hand, it is viewed as complementary to the welfare state, filling the gaps in the welfare state which is subject to a global trend in its declining role of catering to issues relating to poverty in particular 4   R BAHRAMITASH ET AL In Chap a literature review of women as related to socio-economic issues is included It provides a background to current events in the past 50 years with the emphasis on post-revolutionary Iran (1979) It examines how the literature on Iran, similar to most of the countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, tends to pay less attention to issues pertaining to the economic status of women But more importantly, the literature on low-income women, many of them observant Muslims, tends to overlook their views and their voices are often not heard as they are regarded as victims As the data suggests, these women take an active role in community care and community well-being and in some cases through religious institutions Chapter includes a discussion which invites the reader to develop a more complex understanding of Islamist women as they are not a homogenous group and differ in the degree to which they are supportive or critical of the established power Chapter presents the data resulting from several focus groups comprised of 47 participants as well as 12 individual interviews conducted based on the findings of the focus groups The timing of the interviews is interesting: they were conducted during the Presidency of Ahmadinejad when Iran was politically highly polarized and after what became known as the green revolution and mass protests which took place in 2009 It was a difficult time for data gathering for Western-­ based academics Perhaps the importance of the data is that it gives a window to the rest of the world on the majority of women in Iran who come from low- and lower-middle income households and the degree to which they are committed to the well-being of their communities This is where those who support a military option for Iran need to think very carefully: invasion of the country will not be welcome even by those who are viewed as the most oppressed segment of the society, women of low-income status In conclusion (Chap 6), two long interviews are presented to wrap up the data In the first interview, a woman in her fifties, who has spent much of her active life in post-revolutionary Iran and has worked as a volunteer for the Red Crescent, elaborates on how she collects charity funds and delivers aid especially to children in poverty stricken areas of rural Iran A second interview, with a young woman from a shantytown in Ahvaz a South-Western city, reveals her life and her commitment towards girls and young women She explains how hard she herself has had to fight against poverty and prejudices to attend higher education and to become a technician in an operations room Earning a decent salary, she has no intention  INTRODUCTION   of marriage or moving out of the notorious shanty town She chooses to stay and instead of buying or renting a place outside of the shanty town, rents a place within it, turning it into a community house for the girls and young women of her community Her dream is to change the attitude of her community towards higher education for girls and to give girls opportunities to strive high and achieve their dreams She continues to be highly religious nonetheless, for her the community is her life and the well-being of her community is not separate from her pursuit of individual happiness This is an interesting case since part of the discussion over the solidarity economy revolves around how it creates an opportunity for people to transform their community   INFORMAL NETWORKS OF RELIGIOUS WOMEN AND SOCIAL ECONOMY    61 Some of the participants contributed to several organizations through voluntary labor, cash and in-kind services Women’s engagement in such foundations and networks was particularly significant in low-income neighborhoods where the original structure of communities has remained in place in spite of rapid urbanization, and where communal ties are strong through women’s networks As this chapter is coming to its end, it is important to emphasize that women’s informal role in community care and safety nets is not limited to religious woman Below there is a list of NGOs (secular and religious) to give a glimpse of the range of activities they are engaged in These NGOs either have a website or have public exposure through the media and, in some cases, there is literature about them They are part of the health care and poverty reduction efforts made throughout the country Furthermore, in many instances and especially during participant observation, the author has come across a whole range of collaboration and ties between religious and non-religious women who come together to spread the safety net critical to the well-being of their communities Collaboration between formal religious and non-religious NGOs and informal religious and non-religious efforts remain unexplored, but below are a couple of anecdotes To give an example, a woman who owns an art gallery networks with those of middle- and high-income levels but she also hires a nanny for her children, and a cook and a nurse (who are from lower income levels) for her elderly parents The links between two types of women through the informal sector establishes a well-rounded social network This network then is mobilized to assist those in need and during times of crisis During one of the field observations, a high-income woman had joined a low-­ income, interest-free, rotating credit saving club in order to assist the flow of cash to the group and was not interested in getting her turn to access cash As a result of the economic crisis and the downsizing of the welfare state, the “solidarity economy” serves as the main resource for women of low- and lower-middle-income households To conclude, informal social protection is widespread and goes far beyond those who are religious and those who belong to low-income households Women come together to hold the safety net, building alliances and solidarity beyond what can be imagined Some may suggest that gender rights advocacy could be far more powerful if the alliance building finds common mutual ground for mobilization and poverty reduction, and social justice seems to be a fertile ground and a catalyst for change 62   R BAHRAMITASH ET AL Active NGOs in Iran There are different NGOs, charities and other formal institutions which are a part of Iran’s social economy, many of which focus on health and environment Here we include some of those working towards reduction of social harm including poverty and economic hardship It should be noted that some NGOs, charities, associations and foundations receive some funding from the government and religious authorities while others are independent In any event, any formal entity has to have permission from the police and national security offices This may be why it is important to examine informal, grassroots- and network-based efforts Iran against Hunger Society Seyedoshohada Charity Addiction Consultants and Social Workers Society House of NGOs East Azarbaijan Province International Society Human, Nature and Wildlife Imam Hasan Mojtaba Meraj Charity Safirane Ensan doosti Society Nik Andish Charity Reyhanatonabi Charity 10 Sedeghin Charity 11 Guilan Association of Non-Governmental Organizations 12 House of NGOs, Guilan Province 13 Assistance center for veteran’s wives with mental disorder 14 Tapesh: Association for protection  of  orphan  & sick Women  & Children Notes The City Council was an idea which was born during Khatami’s era, it was an attempt to bring grass root support for the government and to move toward a more democratic society These local institutions had people direct participation in the running of the city and its members would be elected The first City Council was an extremely successful institution and had a major representation of women By the second round, the optimism had dissipated since the power of the councils was curtailed to some extent   INFORMAL NETWORKS OF RELIGIOUS WOMEN AND SOCIAL ECONOMY    63 Western values, they called it, even though the films were mainly Latin American and Asian Sadagheh cannot be given to Saddat descedants of the Prophet Mohammad The Bazaar is located in the heart of Old Tehran, which is now regarded as a low-income neighborhood, and the merchants not live there, they live uptown The Bazaar to some extent has its own community (see Arang Keshavarzian, Bazaar and State in Iran: Politics of the Tehran Marketplace: Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007) and its own network CHAPTER Conclusion Abstract  There is a growing literature on the development of the solidarity economy around the world, but the Middle East is an exception In the case of Iran, this is unfortunately because of the immense female power embedded in community networks and its potential in providing communal care In addition, an interesting contribution of this book is that it brings to light how Islamic women and secular women, divided as they are politically so often unable to build solidarity, and in conflict over issues such as the hijab, can and come together in the solidarity economy Poverty reduction and community care has the potential to be the most effective way to build feminist solidarity over and above the human rights discourse which tends to dominate Western feminism Keywords  Social economy • Solidarity economy • Islamist women • Safety net • Market economy • Community mobilization This book started with a discussion of the social economy as a theoretical and contextual frame for fieldwork Various themes within the social economy were highlighted, such as the concept of social justice and how it is tied to the Catholic Church in the case of some Latin American countries, as well as in Quebec, Canada prior to the 1960s It was also mentioned that there are those who argue against the social economy as it may be a way of © The Author(s) 2018 R Bahramitash et al., Low-Income Islamist Women and Social Economy in Iran, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52539-0_6 65 66   R BAHRAMITASH ET AL withdrawing services which should be provided by the state and thereby facilitates the further withdrawal of state welfare While undermining the welfare state is undoubtedly to the determinant of the poor, the social economy, especially in the form of community care and in its informality, should be viewed as a complement to what the state cannot provide In this book, in line with the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development’s position on the social and solidarity economy, there has been documentation on the involvement of women from low-income households in the social economy As stated before, Islamist women are not the only group of people engaged in the solidarity economy but were chosen for this research since they tend to fall on the margins of social science research This is partly due to the fact that any outreach to them requires a great deal of work, building trust and finding community members who can facilitate and assist with data gathering In the case of Iran, this research was especially difficult since it took place at the time of Ahmadinejad’s presidency when Western-based academics were closely watched in Iran and research without permission for a institute was viewed as breaking the law The book presents the results of many interviews with Islamist women who, as we saw before, are not a homogenous groups For the purpose of this book, three categories are defined; Muslim, Islamic and Islamist Despite their differences, they are all engaged in poverty reduction and welfare activities and come together for community welfare What is interesting is that they can also come together with non-religious women and mobilize together This is an interesting issue in itself: how community care builds cross alliances between religious and non-religious women and paves the way for greater solidarity This is a point not to be dismissed easily as the literature on the social economy argues that it provides space for individual citizens to exercise their citizenship rights And for our purposes, this book ends with two cases The first one is an interview with an older women who concentrates on charity relief and bringing help to those in need based on a highly Islamic charity model which may be typical of older generation women in the solidarity economy This case is followed by that of a young woman from a shanty town in a Southern city living in an ethnic community While she remains highly pious and is a practicing Muslim, she is out to transform her community and make a difference to the lives of its girls and women She is an example of how the solidarity economy can become a space where social transformation occurs While the bulk of interviews for this book were carried out during Ahmadinejad’s presidency, the two cases were based on fieldwork carried out in spring 2017 and just before the presidential elections in May 2017  CONCLUSION   67 Case Studies Working with, Through and Alongside the Red Crescent Our first case concerns Shahin Lorzehi Arbaby from Mashahad who has been engaged in community work for the past 14 years She was asked to explain her work in her own words (interview in Tehran April 2017) I am a housewife and work as a community volunteer I have not completed my secondary degree education and my volunteer work started after [the] Bam earthquake and in collaboration with my husband who has been working for the Red Crescent I started my work with other women who prepared food and basic necessities for Bam earthquake victims in 2003 Although that is how I started, since then I have extended my work to places beyond [the] Red Crescent domain, not just geographically but also focusing on harm reduction in addition to disaster relief She had begun her work assisting her husband in filling applications for social assistance recipients following the Bam earthquake in 2003 Aid and assistance was distributed based on filling out forms and establishing needs assessment processes These forms were then followed up by visits from Red Crescent staff and volunteers who would be able to verify the given information Working as a volunteer Arbaby said: I became witness to the suffering and injustices that had befallen victims of the earthquake but soon I realized that poverty is rampant in other parts of the country and especially in border cities as well as rural places where there are infrastructural problems I am unable to lead an ordinary life when there is so much deprivation and need for assistance A woman of devoted faith, she felt her responsibility as a member of human race, an Iranian national as well as a Muslim, to help and extend her hand to whoever was in need, following her volunteer work in Bam Since Bam she has worked in different parts of the country She was put in touch with us through Dr Bahramitash whose work in Sistan and Baluchistan, where drought, internal migration and displacement due to environmental factors, and the war in Afghanistan have brought poverty to many Being a devoted Muslim one would assume that she would try to get aid from the government or semi-government and other relief or aid 68   R BAHRAMITASH ET AL organizations inside the country, but this was not the case The question was asked straightforwardly and her response was simple I raise support through my personal network This came as no surprise to the interviewer who has come across many cases where women of faith keep their distance from official support and rely on personal networking for their charity work: I have not sought any official support, nor have I tried to register myself as an organized charity Her social network was formed through outreach to people close to her, especially her family members who have been her main funding channel Originally, she started with her sister, an operating theater nurse, and her first campaign was a shelter for homeless people: My husband became the head of [the] Red Crescent in Esfarayen, a city capital of North of Khorsan province [located in the North-East of Iran, bordering Turkmenistan] At the time I was a housewife and was able to work as a volunteer for [the] Red Crescent I worked as part of the aid application assessment team for those in need of shelter It was then that I realized [that] what is distributed is not enough and started to document my findings I came across many heart-breaking cases and took every opportunity to disseminate stories about [the] suffering of people in need Soon enough I earned a reputation as a disaster story teller—Shahin, and one thousand and one night stories of poverty—was what everyone said about me I took every social gathering opportunity, every party, every religious gathering to explain and raise awareness about some of the difficult conditions people are facing especially in locations where it is difficult for ordinary people to travel For more than a decade Shahin has been able to carry out different projects From providing food to school supplies and the reason for this, in her own words: I’‘ve not sought to register as a defined charity or not-for-­profit because I find that restricting, especially when poverty reduction and relief are intertwined Two years ago I was gathering school supplies when I received mail in my social media [telegram is widely used in Iran] from someone I did not know It was a  CONCLUSION   69 woman from Kerman, close to a district called Rikan I had no idea where this place was but the woman kept sending me pictures of their housing and the state of their schooling, which was far worse than Sarakhs, a border city where I was working alongside the Red Crescent The pictures and descriptions were horrific, and lack of proper housing was highly disturbing I let myself be led by Imam Reza [a Shi’a saint who is buried in Mashhad, the city where Shahin lives], and I thought this is where I need to go and see with my own eyes The place was highly isolated and for a woman to travel by herself almost impossible I did what I often for travel to such places—ask assistance from the local authorities via Red Crescent to be accompanied In Rikan I met the woman who had contacted me and saw the gravity of the problem with regard to housing—most inhabitants live in tents which can be blown away in high-powered winds I raised 10 million toman [more than $3000] for housing relief These efforts have been documented in photos and film, and have been reported in daily papers or through word of mouth Shahin concludes: There was a time when I wished I could have one million toman (slightly more than $300), now I can raise 30 million My funders are growing and my name carries weight It is obvious that she has managed to build enough social capital to provide her with various projects In addition to funds, Shahin now has volunteers who work for and with her, starting with her two sons, and has a small group of aid workers who follow and assist her Her case is interesting because she works with, through and alongside the Red Crescent as well as independently Additionally, she has been able to raise charity funds based on Sadagheh—alms It has become a standard practice now at my sister’s hospital, when someone is sick, some of the other patients tell her/him, make an alma to Arbabi’s children; give to her children and ask for your health, they say People support her not just in cash but in kind as well Shahin worked with many volunteers who devoted their time to her, delivering assistance As an example she mentioned Os Mahmoud, a shopkeeper who sold school uniforms She asked him to give discounted school uniforms for children in Kerman and for the New Year I only asked Os Mahmoud to give a discount but he offered to come with me I accepted and he joined, bringing his van to deliver uniforms and other supplies 70   R BAHRAMITASH ET AL At five in the afternoon he was ready to close his store before the New Year and at the height of sales to come with me to rural Kerman to distribute school supplies and uniforms to children She had many examples of her work, which nearly all sounded very similar to Red Crescent relief work except one project where she had brought three young women to Mashhad to learn sewing Her plan was to send the three young women back to their own village to pass on their training so women could sell their work in the city market A review of her work indicated that she covered a large geographical area; in one sense this was important because such relief is necessary, but on the downside, relief alone is a short-term remedy for a large, long-term problem With the help of a journalist she was focusing on school building in Sistan and Baluchistan Her work is a typical example of informal charity work; spontaneous, based on good will, but not necessarily sustainable or with a vision for long-term improvement Shilangabad Slum Brigade Leila Panam, a pious, young Muslim woman, is founder of a small brigade in the heart of Ahwaz Leila, in her twenties, has many followers in Shilangabad, where she was born and raised, and in Ahwaz in the South-­ western part of Iran, a city which was at the heart of the bloodiest battle during the Iran-Iraq war It is a neighborhood where gunshots are common and part of everyday life.1 She says: Here men shoot as they wish It is a place where gangs of different kinds engage in illegal activities, live and hang out My brigade was born in this neighborhood and right at the heart of darkness of this place Leila was born in an Arab-Iranian family and, in her own words, her family and extended family have very traditional and conservative attitudes towards women’s education As a girl she had to struggle to attend school not only because of her conservative family but because of poverty  CONCLUSION   71 My father had many children, he had many mouth to feed and my education was the least of his problems My father was a daily laborer; if he had work we could eat, if he could not find work we did not Many Arab families living in the slum were and still are eager to marry their daughters as soon as they reach puberty In this community, marrying a daughter, usually and ideally to a cousin, means one less mouth to feed God forbid if a girl wants to continue her schooling, she would have to refuse marrying her cousin, and if she does refuse then she is at fault, the whole community finds things that are wrong with her and she becomes a major family liability Leila herself of course was one of them; refusing to marry her cousin, she had to continue to fight her family, something she had learned at a very early stage of her life and first of all with her schooling: I started to get tough from the time I started school Going to school was a daily battle and every time I won I became more determined to fight harder and not just by myself and for myself but to mobilize other girls and wage a revolution Something had to change and change fundamentally and we had to it right here and in this neighborhood Leila explained how poverty had affected her in different ways: it was not just the cost of school but school supplies as well She had to beg and cry her way through to get school supplies from her father: I would write in a small script to make my workbook last a long time and as long as possible and this would get me into trouble with my teachers They would say “Why are you writing so small; it’s difficult to read, you will ruin your eye sight child.” And I was not about to tell them that this was because it would be difficult for my father to pay for a workbook I was trying to save money and myself from crying and begging All this time I was plotting in my head to wage a war, a revolution, one which … would create something important, something meaningful for my community This was how I came up with the idea of an army right here in our very own neighborhood Attending high school proved to be a much bigger battle for Leila A battle which forced her not just to cry and beg her father but also the headmistress of a high school far away from the slum, in the heart of a middle-class neighborhood I would travel as often as possible by bus all the way to stand outside the high school waiting for the headmistress to pass by so that I could beg, cry and ask and appeal to her compassion to get a scholarship This went on and on 72   R BAHRAMITASH ET AL The headmistress finally gave in and told Leila that if she earned an 18/20 average in her finals she would take her in with a scholarship Leila brought her 20/20 results and it was then that headmistress started to seriously warn her about the other major problems, such as travelling every day to the high school from the slum, and how she would have to work to remain accepted by the slum community as well gain acceptance from her student peers These were indeed serious issues, but did not stop Leila from insisting that she would overcome them all When the headmistress gave her final acceptance, Leila’s next task was to beg her family to allow her to attend the high school, not an easy job But by then Leila knew that she would succeed and she did The community spread much gossip about her trying to be a snob and mixing with the middle class in the city And similar problems started with her student peers as she was dressed in a black chador of cheap material, had scant school supplies and could not participate in after-school activities such as English classes She was clearly an outcast, a girl from the slum, while all along Leila repeated to herself: Let this not be the last time a girl from Shilangabad attends a proper high school At the new high school, Leila soon learned what it means to be a girl from the slum: it means being poor and on the margin, but worse, no after-school training such as English language classes She finished high school with top grades but her attempt to enter medical school meant that she would have to be able to attend some of the training programs and courses that she was unable to afford All the while these events were taking place, “the dark cloud of a marriage” (in her words) was looming over her Finally, she ended up in a technical school and became an operations room technician It was not her ideal but still it was close enough and would allow her to start her rebellion initiative It is only after many years of work can Leila funnel funds into her dream—a slum brigade And for that she has made many sacrifices such as refusing a well-paid job in the Gulf (she speaks Arabic); a job paid in US dollars with all expenses included I am born and raised in Shilangabad and that is where I belong, these are my people and this is where I want to make a difference, she said in her interview  CONCLUSION   73 She has been working long hours and saved her money, and instead of moving to a better neighborhood and starting a new life, she has continued to live as before in order to have funds for her brigade Since she knows all the families in the slum the outreach aspect is easy for her, and every household has at least two or three girls or female teenagers I worked from dusk to dawn to earn money to start a small scholarship for girls with high achievements at school, those who get 20/20 I give them money as aid I want to reach out to those who are determined to change their lives Leila still wears the chador, as all her volunteers, and they are religiously observant She has reached out for help from various ­governmental and religious organizations to provide her with support and funds but so far her work and those of her volunteers is self-reliant: this is a completely self-reliant network In response to the question about marriage and if she wanted to, or in fact could, get married, she said: Actually people don’t want me to get married now, they see me and my work for the community and they don’t want that to stop But if I meet a man who is supportive of me, sure A few years ago, Leila rented a low-cost home and turned it into a Center for Girls: Anvar Alzahra The house did not have running water and was mostly in ruins but, with the help of volunteers, has now transformed into a drop-in center with a small library where girls and young women come together and organize their volunteering work There are now 50 volunteers who reach out to between five and 15 other girls in their neighborhood to give them support and sometimes supplies and aid The volunteers are now delivering small amounts of aid to 300 households in need Leila has brunched out to Mandaly, Koi Sadat, Koi Serah and Khorramshahr Although her emphasis is on girl’s education, together with other volunteers she is engaged in different programs such as food, health and shelter The interviewer’s last question to Leila was about her most important passion and it turned out that in spite of the fact that she was highly involved in delivering aid her passion was to change attitudes towards girls’ education 74   R BAHRAMITASH ET AL The last response epitomizes how Leila’s engagement in the social economy seeks to expand beyond relief, community care and poverty reduction to empower girls, teens and young women in the slums Furthermore, she was very enthusiastic about sharing her work and passion with a Western-based academic and was inspired to voice herself beyond the borders of her community and her county and into another part of the world; in this case, North America Note Much of the interview took place online For clips of some of her work go to Baluchi Douzi on Facebook Index C Charity, 4, 10, 14, 44, 46, 54–60, 66, 68–70 Collective responsibility, 10 Community-based networks, 3, 57–60 Community mobilization, E Economic alternatives, 11 G Gender segregation, 18, 21, 24 I Informal community network, Informal networks, 2, 13, 49 Islamic, 2, 14, 18–23, 25, 35–47, 51, 53–57, 59, 66 Islamic charity, 54, 55, 66 Islamist, 4, 19, 21, 23, 25, 26, 31, 35–47, 56, 66 Islamist women, 4, 21, 23, 31, 35–47, 56, 66 M Market and non-market oriented production, Market economy, Muslim women, 35–47 N Non-governmental organization (NGO), 3, 14, 25–27, 45, 46, 61 O Opportunistic advantage, 12 P Political reform, 18, 26–28 Post-reform, 18, 29 Post-war reconstruction, 18, 24–26 © The Author(s) 2018 R Bahramitash et al., Low-Income Islamist Women and Social Economy in Iran, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52539-0 75 76   INDEX R Revolution, 2, 4, 13, 18–26, 46, 51, 58, 59, 71 S Safety net, 2, 9, 13, 19, 31, 39, 44, 51, 54 Social economy, 3, 7–14, 17–19, 24–26, 31, 36–39, 49, 65, 66, 74 Social justice, 7, 8, 20, 23–25, 37, 43, 51, 55, 61, 65 Social Solidarity economy, 7–12 Social welfare assistance, 52 Socio-economic justice, T Third sector, 3, 8, .. .Low-Income Islamist Women and Social Economy in Iran Roksana Bahramitash • Atena Sadegh Negin Sattari Low-Income Islamist Women and Social Economy in Iran Roksana Bahramitash... U.S.A Contents 1 Introduction   2 Social Economy and Women in Iran    3 Women s Role in the Political Economy: An Overview  17 4 Islamist, Islamic and Muslim Women   35 5 Informal Networks... the informal labor markets where women continue to have a growing impact In fact, women s work in the informal economy is increasingly becoming central to the economic survival and well-being