A Conspicuous Silence: American Foreign Policy, Women, and Saudi Arabia

Hillary Rodham Clinton was the first to clearly state that: "the subjugation of women is a direct threat to the security of the United States." This declaration has come to be known as the Hillary Doctrine, and it was formally incorporated into the first Quadrennial Diplomatic and Development Review of U.S. foreign policy in 2010. If the Hillary Doctrine is justified, then how is it that Secretary of State Clinton never addressed issues of extreme gender inequality in Saudi Arabia? And how has Saudi Arabia sought to export that inequality to other states, such as Yemen? This chapter explores the complexities of the Hillary Doctrine in practice, the realities of pursuing gender equality on the national stage, the strategies Clinton and those working under her innovated to introduce gender issues diplomatically into a resistant country, and other key developments from this encounter and its reverberations across international channels.