Since returning to power in August 2021, the Taliban has steadily transformed Afghanistan into a system where political authority, religious interpretation and public life are concentrated in the hands of the group’s leadership, leaving little space for dissent, institutional independence or competing political and religious views.
What began as a Taliban promise of a transitional administration was never followed by the broad-based political process that had been anticipated. Instead, authority increasingly centred on Taliban supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada, whose directives from Kandahar have come to shape political, administrative and social affairs across the country.
The concentration of authority has raised questions about the basis on which the Taliban describes itself as a government. Critics argue that the system lacks meaningful mechanisms through which citizens can challenge decisions, question those in power or participate in determining the country’s political direction.
The restrictions are particularly visible in the education sector. Since the Taliban takeover, girls have been excluded from secondary schools and women from universities, effectively cutting millions of Afghan women and girls off from formal education beyond the primary level.
The consequences are not confined to classrooms. The restrictions have also affected the country’s future workforce, particularly in medicine, education and other professions in which women previously played an important role.
The Taliban’s approach to education has also involved greater control over what students are taught and how educational institutions operate. Textbooks and academic material viewed as inconsistent with Taliban ideology have faced restrictions, while universities and other institutions have been brought under tighter ideological and administrative control.
The result is an education system increasingly shaped not simply by academic requirements but by the ideological preferences of the ruling authorities.
The same pattern has extended into religious life.
Afghanistan is home to different Islamic schools of thought and religious communities, but the Taliban’s increasingly restrictive interpretation of religion has created pressure on institutions and communities that fall outside its preferred framework.
The reported September 2026 action against Khatam al-Nabieen Seminary in Kabul, a major Shia educational institution, brought that issue into sharp focus. Reports said Taliban authorities surrounded the institution, ordered students and teachers to leave and subsequently took control of the premises.
The episode added to concerns among Afghanistan’s Shia community about the shrinking space for independent religious education and institutions.
The question of authority also extends beyond political and religious control to private property.
A January 2026 decree signed by Akhundzada reportedly expanded the state’s authority to review property belonging to absent owners. While presented as a mechanism for protecting the rights of absent property owners, critics have raised concerns over the potential for such powers to facilitate state seizure of private property, particularly where owners lack the ability to challenge official decisions.
Such developments have generated concerns among minority communities whose properties have previously been the subject of disputes and seizures.
For Afghan women, restrictions have reached even further into everyday life. Rules governing dress, employment, education and access to public spaces have created an environment in which personal choices are increasingly subject to Taliban enforcement.
Reports of women being detained for failing to comply with specific Taliban interpretations of dress requirements have illustrated how religious regulation has moved beyond broad principles of modesty into detailed control over individual behaviour.
Yet the question remains: if the Taliban has consolidated so much power, why has there not been a larger public uprising against its rule?
The answer lies partly in the environment in which Afghans are expected to express dissent.
Open opposition carries substantial risks. Arrest, detention and other forms of punishment have made public criticism difficult, while economic hardship has left millions dependent on humanitarian assistance.
For a family struggling to secure food, employment and basic services, challenging the authorities can carry consequences that extend beyond political disagreement.
This has created a difficult cycle. Fear limits public opposition, economic dependence reduces the ability to resist, and the absence of a strong political alternative makes organised mobilisation even harder.
Resistance has nevertheless not disappeared. Opposition to Taliban rule has emerged through armed groups, local protests and political activity outside the country. In northern Afghanistan, anti-Taliban groups have continued to challenge Taliban forces, while reports of protests in several areas indicate that dissatisfaction has not simply vanished with the Taliban’s consolidation of power.
But fragmented resistance faces the same structural problem: the Taliban controls the state apparatus, security institutions and much of the country’s administrative machinery.
Five years into Taliban rule, therefore, the central issue is not whether the group controls Afghanistan. It does.
The more consequential question is what kind of political order that control has produced.
A government normally derives legitimacy not only from its ability to exercise power but also from institutions, accountability and some mechanism through which citizens can question those exercising authority. The Taliban’s model has instead placed increasing emphasis on obedience to its leadership and conformity with its interpretation of religion and governance.
For ordinary Afghans, this means that the boundaries of political participation, education, religious expression, property ownership and personal freedom are increasingly determined from the top down.
The Taliban may have secured control of Afghanistan, but control and consent are not the same thing. The continuing restrictions on education, religious institutions, dissent and private life suggest that the country’s political order remains defined less by broad public participation than by the authority of a movement that has concentrated power in its own hands.
And for millions of Afghans, the price of that system is being paid not only in political freedoms, but in classrooms, workplaces, religious institutions and homes.
