How the Taliban’s Vice and Virtue Law Is Reshaping Women’s Everyday Lives in Afghanistan?

Contributed by FTD-N Team

For many Afghan women, leaving home has become an increasingly difficult decision. Going to work, visiting a doctor, meeting friends or simply spending time outside can bring concerns about dress, the requirement for a male guardian, encounters with morality enforcers, or possible punishment.

New field research by the Forward Together Development Network (FTD-N) shows how these restrictions are reshaping women’s everyday lives.

The research examines the social, economic and legal impacts of the Taliban’s Law on the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice. Signed by Taliban leader Hibatullah Akhundzada in April 2024, the 35-article law gives broad powers to morality enforcers, or muhtasibs, and regulates women’s dress, movement, voice, interactions and participation in public life.

Its impact, however, goes beyond the law itself. The findings suggest that fear of enforcement is increasingly influencing family decisions, economic life and everyday social behavior, further limiting women’s freedom and participation in society.

Women are disappearing from public life

One of the clearest findings is the decline in women’s mobility.

Among respondents, the proportion reporting regular daily outings, excluding holidays, fell from 52 percent under the former Republic to 23 percent under Taliban rule. The share reporting unrestricted movement dropped even more sharply, from 56 percent to 12 percent.

Meanwhile, 64 percent said they had not gone out for recreation during the previous year.

These numbers describe more than reduced movement. They point to the shrinking of women’s ordinary social lives.

A woman who cannot freely leave her home is also less able to work, study, seek healthcare, build professional relationships or participate in her community. Restricting movement therefore becomes a gateway to restricting many other rights.

Perhaps one of the most important findings concerns what is happening inside families. The proportion of women reporting that their families prohibited them from leaving home unaccompanied increased from 10 percent under the former Republic to 36 percent.

This does not necessarily mean that Afghan families have suddenly become more opposed to women’s freedom. The findings suggest something more complicated: fear of Taliban enforcement is pushing some families to impose restrictions themselves in an attempt to protect women from harassment, punishment or detention.

In this way, state restrictions can extend far beyond direct encounters with Taliban officials. Fear begins to enforce the rules even when a morality officer is not physically present.

Fear itself has become a form of control

The psychological findings make this pattern even clearer.

Among women surveyed, 96 percent reported some level of fear about leaving home without a male guardian, and 58 percent described that fear as very high. Only four percent said they felt no fear. At the same time, 85 percent reported high levels of loneliness and despair.

These findings matter because a system of restriction does not depend only on arrests or physical punishment. It can also work by changing people’s expectations and behavior.

When a woman expects that leaving home could lead to questioning, confrontation or punishment, she may decide not to leave. Her family may reach the same conclusion. Over time, the boundary between an officially imposed restriction and self-imposed caution becomes increasingly difficult to see.

The result is a system in which fear itself becomes an enforcement mechanism.

Exclusion also carries an economic cost

The consequences extend directly into household finances.

Sixty-eight percent of respondents reported losing employment as a result of the law and related restrictions. The same percentage reported significant negative effects on their future employment opportunities. Most strikingly, 92 percent reported a decline in household income, with 47 percent describing the impact as very severe.

This challenges the idea that restrictions on women affect women alone.

When women are prevented from working, entire households lose income. Families that may already be struggling economically become more vulnerable, while women become increasingly financially dependent on male relatives.

The long-term effects may be even more serious. Women who are prevented from gaining education, employment and professional experience today may find it much harder to re-enter the workforce later. Afghanistan is therefore not simply losing women’s current economic contribution; it risks losing years of skills, experience and human potential.

Even healthcare is becoming harder to reach

The research also points to serious barriers to healthcare.

Eighty-eight percent of women surveyed reported experiencing restrictions or denial of healthcare connected to male-guardian requirements, while 42 percent said they had been completely denied healthcare in such circumstances.

For women who do not have an available male relative, restrictions on movement can therefore become a direct threat to health.

This illustrates why the Vice and Virtue Law cannot be understood simply as a set of rules about public morality. Its implementation reaches into some of the most basic aspects of life: whether a woman can earn an income, visit a doctor, move through her community or make decisions independently.

Enforcement without effective accountability

The research also documents direct encounters with morality enforcers.

Sixty-one percent of respondents reported warnings, confrontations or other interventions by morality officials. Eleven percent reported physical violence, and eight percent reported detention.

At the same time, 75 percent said effective mechanisms for complaining about abuses by morality enforcers either do not exist or do not work.

This combination is particularly concerning: officials have broad authority to intervene in people’s lives, while those affected have few meaningful ways to challenge abuse.

The result is not only the possibility of arbitrary enforcement but also greater uncertainty. Women and families may not know what action could lead to confrontation, how individual officials will interpret the rules, or where they can safely turn if mistreatment occurs.

A system that may outlast the law

Perhaps the most troubling implication of the research is what these restrictions may mean for Afghanistan’s future.

The Taliban have imposed many restrictions on women and girls since returning to power in August 2021. The Vice and Virtue Law represents an important development because it brings many restrictions into a more formal legal and institutional structure.

But institutionalization is only part of the story. When women stop leaving home, families begin restricting their movement, employers adjust to workplaces without women, and communities become accustomed to women’s absence from public spaces, discrimination can gradually become normalized.

Laws can eventually be repealed. Institutions can be reformed. But social norms, lost educational opportunities, economic dependence and years of exclusion can be much harder to reverse.

The FTD-N study surveyed 770 respondents in four provinces including Kabul, Herat, Bamyan and Daikundi, 91 percent of whom were women and 9% men. However, they should be taken seriously as evidence of the experiences of hundreds of Afghans living under these restrictions.

Their experiences point to a broader reality: the Vice and Virtue Law is not only determining what women may wear or where they may go. Its enforcement is affecting employment, healthcare, family decisions, psychological well-being and women’s ability to participate in society.

This is why international responses should not focus only on individual Taliban decrees. Women’s rights need to remain central to international engagement with the Taliban, alongside continued documentation, support for Afghan women and women-led initiatives, and accountability for serious violations.