This chapter deals with the Ba`th period (1968-2003), and analyzes the relationship between gender issues, patrimonial-authoritarianism, state rentierism, tribalism and Islamism. I analyze the impact of different state ideologies and politics, wars and sanctions on the Iraqi social and cultural fabric, as well as on women’s conditions of life. First, I show the impact of Ba`th authoritarian-patrimonial regime on the very definition of citizenship. I explore its gender politics during the 1970s characterized by economic, social and cultural growth incited by oil wealth that helped to enhance women’s life conditions and legal rights. Then, I explore its shifting politics in the 1980s corresponding to the war with Iran and the militarization of Iraqi society that impact greatly on women’s lives and gender relations. I also explore the regime’s communal, anti-Kurd and anti-Shi`a, politics and their gender dimensions. Then, I analyse the profound changes provoked by the 1991 invasion of Kuwait, the US-led coalition bombings, and the terrible sanctions that represented the final blow to the Iraq state and society. I explore how post-1991 Iraq corresponded to a period of social, political and economic brutalization of Iraqi society that impacted deeply on its functioning and cultural fabric. I show how this period of generalized impoverishment, social and political conservatisms redefined women’s lives and gender norms and practices.