I'm not sure about the quota system, but increasing the number of women in the government in countries like Afghanistan is a good thing.

Feminist Wire Daily Newsbriefs: U.S. and Global News Coverage: "Nearly 600 Afghan women are running for office in the country's first legislative elections since the fall of the Taliban in 2001. In an important step forward for women in Afghanistan, the constitution approved last year reserved 25 percent of the lower parliamentary seats for women, with a similar percentage of seats reserved in the 34 newly forming local councils, reports BBC News."

hat tip to Roger Simon. Good Article.

OpinionJournal - Featured Article: "In every society where family affairs are regulated according to instructions derived from the Shariah or Islamic law, women are disadvantaged. The injustices these women are exposed to in the name of Islam vary from extreme cruelty (forced marriages; imprisonment or death after rape) to grossly unfair treatment in matters of marriage, divorce and inheritance.

Muslim women across the world are caught in a terrible predicament. They aspire to live by their faith as best they can, but their faith robs them of their rights. Some women have found a way out of this dilemma in the principle of separation of organized religion and state affairs. They fight an uphill battle to achieve and hold on to their basic rights. Two cases demonstrate just how difficult that struggle can be, in the context of new as well as established democracies.

The first is the draft constitution of Iraq, now due next week. Iraqi women like Naghem Khadim, demonstrating on the streets of Najaf, are fighting to prevent an article from being put in the constitution that would establish that the legislature may make no laws that contradict Shariah edicts. The second case is the province of Ontario, in Canada. There, Muslim women led by Homa Arjomand, an activist of Iranian origin, are fighting--using the Canadian Charter of Rights--to keep Shariah from being applied as family law through a so-called Arbitration Act passed as law in Ontario in 1992."