Woman and family in the four Development Plans

With respect to the exalted status of family in Islam and woman as the essential pillar of this institution, one would expect women and family to be one of the significant axes of the four Development Plans after the Islamic revolution. This paper, after a brief study of the types of development plans in Iran, elaborates on the amount of attention of the Islamic system to removing women’s problems in development plans. The results of the study show that, in the first and second Development plans, the major issues were the promotion the level of women’s literacy and health, leisure time activities and physical education. In the Third Development Plan, a section of the plan is devoted to the development of women’s socio-cultural participation. In the Fourth Development Plan, however, in spite of understanding the necessity of paying attention to the problems of women and family and in spite of incorporating some points in the plan, some very basic issues have been neglected.