1.

Changes in Afghanistan social structure include:

- Rural to urban migration:
+ Urbanization encourages people in rural areas to move to the big cities
+ Pressures created by such migration, like accommodation, health services
- Increases in demands for education, employment, better living conditions and greater
buying power.
+ Young generations desire high living standards
+ Exposure to media causes them to be more dissatisfied with their lives in the past,
leading them to seek for better living conditions.
- Women’s roles in society have been enhanced
+ Women are more educated
+ Female employment increases between the ages of 14-24 has risen rapidly from
approximately 6% in 2012, to 43% in 2014
- Reduction in birth rates:
+ Women are more educated => the situation of overcrowding is avoided
+ Women get married at latter age => tend to have fewer children
Continuities in Afghanistan
- Family and its reputation are the most significant to Afghan culture
+ A patriarchal society so men are at the head, and mainly rule over the family
+ Women’s roles in society are still restricted
+ Women’s marriages, especially in rural areas are usually arranged
+ Children’s lives are quite restricted
- Rate of unemployment remained:
+ Youth unemployment continues to remain high, at around 19% in 2014
Impacts on power and authority
- The rural to urban migrations reduces authority of ruling groups in the rural areas
+ Fewer people mean that ruling groups have authority on fewer people
- Wealthy people in urban areas increase their power and authority, especially land owners
+ People move to big cities => they hire lands/accommodations for their livings =>
wealthy people with land ownership have power to impose their own regulations on tenants
- Mullahs’ power is more strengthened
 + There are few young people with literacy/education degree in the rural areas =>
Mullahs are more adored by old people/children who have low literacy since Mullahs are
considered to be linked with God.
Q2
- Impacts on social:
+ Changes on the population distributed in the rural and urban areas: In the big cities,
population is increasing while it is decreasing in the rural area
+ Poverty in big cities increases due to rural to urban migration which encourages
poor people from rural areas to big cities.
+ Gap between poor and rich people rises
+ Women increase their rights on society compared to the past (access to education,
family planning; however, they are still restricted to a certain extent.
+ Women’s unemployment is improved
+ Birth rate decreases
+ People are more aware of education and living standards => they pursue a better
life.
- Impacts on culture
+ Ruling groups reduce their authority and power on rural people since people move
to urban areas, decreasing the number of people on which authority of ruling groups is
imposed.
+ The culture of having a large number of children has also decreased
+ Mullahs’ culture is more worshiped