Changing the World, One Haircut at a Time

How is opening a hair salon and beauty school related to social change? Hair cutters are not found in large percentages in social change movements crowded with professional organizers, academics, writers, school teachers, and the like.

Which makes the best-selling memoir by Deborah Rodriguez (with Kristin Ohlson, published by Random House), Kabul Beauty School: An American Woman Goes Behind the Veil a unique and remarkable book.

Fleeing a series of oppressive and sometimes abusive marriages, Rodriguez goes to Kabul, Afghanistan, in 2002, while the war is raging and the Taliban have just been kicked out–and stays for five years. Originally, she comes as part of a humanitarian agency relief crew. She’s just beginning to assist with trauma counseling and the like when word gets out that she’s a hairdresser. And she’s mobbed first by desperate women in the relief community, and then in the military, and then among the locals; the Taliban had shut down all the beauty parlors, and the few that opened up after their departure were typically using primitive equipment in less-than-sanitary conditions.

Very quickly, Rodriguez realizes that she cannot meet the demand on her own and sets up a school for beauticians, carefully selecting the women she think can be successful. The result is a city with dozens of western-trained professional hair salons owned by local women.

In an Afghanistan just emerging from Taliban control, women have essentially no rights. Vigilantes inflict their own “justice” on women violating the ultra-strict interpretations of Islamic law. Few work outside the home; fewer still run a business. While it isn’t what brought her to this work, Rodriguez realizes the transformative effect of what she’s doing; she comes to social change by making it happen.

This is a route to social change not often explored. Yet, exporting an existing career into new sectors and markets–not just cosmetology but all sorts of other possibilities–may be one of the easiest ways to get people involved in peace-building.

Bravo, Ms. Rodriguez!