아프리카ㆍ중동

This paper is a field work study on Qataris’ awareness and practice of divorce through questionnaires which have been distributed among 141 married Qatari women and 108 Qatari men who live in Doha, the capital of Qatar, during 6th -20th February. I have tried to show Qataris’ awareness and practice of divorce through analysis of questionnaires by SPSS program. And I have found that ‘mahr mu'akkar’, which was traditionally utilized for regulating men’s unlimited divorce right, is loosing its real meaning to be paid in symbolic amount of money. Meanwhile, although men and women showed negative attitudes toward women’s divorce right or ‘ismat, there is a possibility especially among young women that they may ask for their divorce right in the future. As for the right of children’s rearing, women still insist on their right of it, otherwise men also showed their desire for having the right of children’s rearing. With the increase of women’s economic activities, women showed changed attitudes that they are also responsible for children’s rearing expenses but men still stick to the traditional position that men only are responsible for that. Women also wanted to share children’s custody with their father after divorce, and to have children’s custody after their father’s death. I can say that Qatari women showed more advanced attitude than Qatari men in divorce issues. These changes of Qatati people's attitudes are reflected in the new personal status law of Qatar. In spite of some elements of women’s discrimination, the new Qatri personal status law includes positive provisions for regulating men’s divorce right, and enlarging women’s right for dissolution of marriage. It is expected that the new Qatari personal status law would play a positive role in improving Qtatari women’s position and participation in public areas.