Polygamy in Mali is legal and frequently practiced.
Mali is part of the "polygamy belt", a region in West and Central Africa where polygamy is widely practiced. In a 2019 study, Mali had the second-highest prevalence of polygamy in the world, behind only Burkina Faso, with 34% of Malians living in polygamous families (35% of Muslims, 30% of folk religion followers, and 14% of Christians). The prevalance of polygamy varies by region. In the capital, Bamako, one in four married women had at least one co-wife in 2018. In rural Mali, it was one of every two.
Even though polygamy is decreasing in Mali overall, it is not decreasing at the expected rate given the increased urbanisation and expansion of women's opportunities. According to anthropologist Bruce Whitehouse, in his ethnographic study Enduring Polygamy, polygamous relationships have still prevailed in Bamako, adapting to urban conditions.
As Mali is a majority-Muslim country, the laws on polygamy follow traditional Islamic practices, limiting a man to marrying a maximum of four women.
According to Whitehouse, a woman's marital career may begin in a monogamous union that develops into a polygamous union. He states in Enduring Polygamy that in urban Mali, survey data showed that while about 25% of women in their first marriages, 38% of divorcees, and 69% of widows had co-wives, with divorce and widowhood being major drivers of polygamy.
Polygamous marriage, particularly in the West African context Bruce Whitehouse studies, is often reduced to personal choice or male desire. However, Enduring Polygamy shows that polygyny is shaped by larger social systems, including family pressure, cultural expectations, and economic realities. His framework of the âÂÂseven DâÂÂsâ highlights this complexity, and desire, discipline, divine will, and demography are especially revealing in understanding why polygyny persists.
Domestic Factors
Anthropologist Bruce Whitehouse defines domestic factors including household management, production and reproduction as a first reason for why men take additional wives. He explains in reference to Bamako, Mali where having children was a primary rationale for marriage, and if the couple was unable to conceive, the husband would look for another wife. The interviews conducted by Whitehouse conclude some other reasons including viewing wives as female domestic laborers, childless and infertility in women, and activities involving women such as childbirth, menstruation, illness, travel or nursing a child.
Duty to Elders
Another reason Whitehouse includes is the duty to parents because of the lack of market-run social safety net, and the risk posed to men of social isolation and possibility of parental curse, making for him difficult to refuse. Since domestic chores are defined as womenâÂÂs work and MaliâÂÂs elderly parents rely on children for support, a migrant son finds himself two wives and trade places between the city and his parentsâ house.
Distinction
Whitehouse adds that having multiple wives brings status and prestige to men, signifying his socioeconomic status, virility and guaranteed descendants. Based on the interviews Whitehouse conducted, men were involved in polygamy because their friends were and because they had the financial means to afford multiple wives. Women on the other hand viewed this motivation as widespread and harmful, and did not always accept menâÂÂs personal justification for polygamy, using Islam to challenge it.
Desire
In the Malian context, desire is rarely openly cited as a reason for polygyny, yet it clearly underlies many second and higher-order marriages. Whitehouse shows that men often frame polygyny as a way to avoid extramarital âÂÂfooling around,â even though many marriages actually emerge from prior sexual relationships that become formalized, especially in cases of pregnancy. This reflects how desire, including what is described as âÂÂcompensatory sexualityâ during periods of marital tension, is present but strategically reframed to align with social expectations of respectability and responsibility.
Discipline
In terms of discipline it highlights how polygyny can be used to reinforce control within marriage. Whitehouse shows that some men take additional wives to regulate the behavior of their first wife, creating competition for time, resources, and affection that pressures women to conform to expected roles . Even the mere possibility of a co-wife can act as a disciplinary tool, limiting womenâÂÂs bargaining power and revealing how polygyny sustains broader gender hierarchies rather than simply reflecting personal choice.
Divine Will
n the Malian context, religion supports polygyny but is not the primary force driving it. Whitehouse explains that many Bamakois frame polygyny as a God-given right based on Islamic teachings, particularly interpretations of QurâÂÂan 4:3 that allow men to take up to four wives . However, he ultimately shows that while Islam legitimizes polygyny, its widespread practice in Mali is more strongly shaped by cultural norms and social structures than by religion alone .
Demography
Demography plays a key role in sustaining polygyny through what Whitehouse describes as a âÂÂmarriage squeeze.â Even when there are roughly equal numbers of men and women, age gaps in marriage create an imbalance, where older men marry younger women, leaving fewer available partners for younger or similarly aged men This structural imbalance helps normalize polygyny, as it redistributes marriage opportunities in a way that reflects existing gender and age hierarchies rather than equal access to partners.
Men and women in Mali often hold completely different views on polygamy. In Whitehouse's ethnographic research from Enduring Polygamy, one notable point he found was the stark difference between the attitudes of men and women regarding polygamy. The specific question asked was, âÂÂWhen you have children of marriageable age, would you accept that they go into polygamous unions?â The overwhelming response was that the majority of women said no, while men deferred it to the decision of the child.
While many men view the practice positively because it offers them social status, religious fulfillment, and practical domestic help, very few women actively desire to share their husbands. Instead, most women view polygamy as an unavoidable reality forced upon them by strict social expectations, rather than a free choice.
For example, an interviewee named Aisha explained that she had mentally prepared herself for the possibility of polygamy since childhood because she realized that "nobody is immune" to it in Malian society. Like many other women, she ultimately accepted becoming a second wife to avoid the intense social stigma of remaining single as she got older.
In Mali, people often view plural marriages as justified for practical and social reasons rather than just wealth or romance. Men frequently justify taking another wife to fulfill a duty to their parents, to get help with heavy household chores, to deal with a first wife's infertility, or even to discipline a rebellious first wife. For women, becoming a co-wife is rarely a free choice, but some accept it to share the burden of daily chores or simply to avoid the harsh social stigma of remaining unmarried. To survive the emotional toll and conflict that naturally arise from sharing a husband, many women now prefer "decohabitation," an arrangement where co-wives live in entirely separate houses, to protect their peace. This physical separation helps women avoid daily drama, keep their independence, and maintain a comforting "fantasy of monogamy" while their husband is away.
Malian family code preserved the recognition of polygamy from the 1951 French colonial decree, which allowed husbands to marry an additional wife. The 1962 code, which established laws relating to marriage in Mali, formally recognized and protected polygamous marriages. Article 43 of the 1962 code requires grooms to choose an option matrimoniale and select between a monogamous or polygamous marriage. The husband's selection of a polygamous marriage does not bind him to a polygamous marriage necessarily, but protects his legal right to enter into a polygamous marriage when he chooses; likewise, a husband may choose to select a monogamous marriage but may change his selection later with his wife's consent. Article 8 of the 1962 code "limited the husband to four wives [and] forbade him from spending one wife's revenue for the benefit of others." According to Article 35 of the 1962 code, each wife is recognized as a distinct household. Furthermore, the 1962 code does not criminalize a husband who treats his wives inequitably. The 1962 code made civil marriages the sole legal form of marriage in Mali, and did not recognize religious marriages or weddings.
This lack of recognition, as well as language in the 1962 code requiring women's obedience to their husbands, led to many calls for reform from Islamic groups and women's rights in Mali throughout the 20th century. Particularly, following Mali's transition from military rule to democratic governance in the early 1990s, many political organizations mobilized to advocate for a revised family law code and women's rights. In 1985, Mali signed and ratified the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW); while CEDAW did not mention polygamy, it has since been used to advocate for the banning of polygamy. In 1994, the UN deemed polygamy as a harmful cultural practice in a CEDAW follow-up session, declaring that polygamy "contravenes a woman's right to equality with men, and can have serious emotional and financial consequences for her and her dependents that such marriages ought to be discouraged and prohibited" (CEDAW Committee 1994). In 2005, Mali also signed and ratified the Maputo Protocol put forth by the African Union. In Article 6c of the Protocol, monogamy is explicitly referred to as "the preferred form of marriage." Reforms to the 1962 code, such as the 2009 code and 2011 code, did not explicitly mention polygamy or restrict it any further, despite the calls of women's rights groups and feminist organizations. The 2011 code legally recognized religious marriages, including Islamic marriages; however, the 2011 code was not formally put into practice into bureaucratic marriage institutions and generally holds little bureaucratic legality. According to ethnographer Bruce Whitehouse, "many feared the legalization of religious marriage would make it impossible to enforce monogamous civil marriage contracts."