In June 2018, a milestone was achieved in Saudi Arabia when women were officially granted the right to drive. This reform, attributed to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, stands as a symbolic representation of his autocratic efforts towards modernizing the kingdom. A year later, a law concerning travel documents removed the option for a Saudi man to include his wife or unmarried daughters on his passport, thereby granting any Saudi woman of legal age the right to obtain her own passport. However, the Personal Status Law of March 2022 still requires married Saudi women to obey their husbands in a "reasonable manner," with the potential consequence of losing the marital allowance (nafaqah) and custody of their children if they leave the marital home.

The Saudi case illustrates how, despite noticeable advancements in women's rights, significant steps are still needed to eliminate all constraints on their mobility across the Arab world, as analyzed in "Trapped," a recent Human Rights Watch report on the situation in North Africa and the Middle East.

Tunisia has rightfully been acknowledged as a pioneer of women's emancipation since the introduction of the 1956 Personal Status Code, which deviated from Islamic law, except concerning inheritance, where a daughter's share remains half that of a son's. However, it wasn't until 1993 that women were no longer bound by marital "obedience," and they had to wait until 2000 to sign an employment contract without their husband's permission. Only in 2015 did a law permit either parent to travel with their child, with a law passed two years later requiring a court decision for any travel restrictions.

In Morocco, the 2004 Family Code removed the obligation for marital obedience, and the 2011 Constitution guaranteed freedom of movement. In Algeria, a 2005 amendment to the family code abolished the need for marital obedience. Any Algerian citizen over the age of 19 is free to obtain a passport, although a married woman must mention her husband's name on her passport – while the opposite is not the case.

Women's freedom of movement is considerably more restricted in the Middle East. Admittedly, similar to the situations in Lebanon, Syria and Libya, they can obtain a passport without male authorization. This has been the case since 2000 in Egypt, 2005 in Bahrain, 2007 in Qatar, 2010 in Oman, 2013 in Jordan, 2014 in Iraq and 2017 in the United Arab Emirates. However, the 2009 reform in Kuwait restricts free access to passports for Kuwaiti women only. Kuwaiti husbands of non-Kuwaiti women must give permission for their wives to obtain a passport, and can only do so after at least five years of marriage. What's more, some Gulf State universities still require a male "guarantee" before allowing their female students to go on field trips.

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