Women in War and Peace Movements
Women’s participation in war and peace movements has long challenged the conventional assumption in International Relations (IR) that war-making and peace-building are primarily male domains. Feminist scholars argue that women are not merely passive victims of conflict but active political agents whose experiences, labor, and activism have shaped both warfare and movements for peace. Examining women in war and peace movements reveals how gender structures participation, recognition, and legitimacy in global politics.
This unit explores women’s roles in armed conflict and peace activism, highlighting how their engagement exposes the gendered nature of war, security, and political change.
Women and War: Beyond the Victim Narrative
Traditional IR often portrays women in war primarily as victims—of displacement, sexual violence, and loss. While these experiences are real and significant, feminist scholars caution against reducing women’s wartime roles to victimhood alone.
Women have participated in wars as combatants, support workers, organizers, and sustainers of communities. In anti-colonial struggles, revolutionary movements, and civil wars, women have taken up arms, gathered intelligence, provided logistics, and mobilized popular support. However, their contributions are frequently erased in post-conflict narratives that restore male-centered political authority.
Feminist analysis insists on recognizing women’s diverse wartime roles without romanticizing violence or ignoring structural constraints.
Gendered Division of Labor in War
War produces a distinctly gendered division of labor. Men are constructed as fighters and protectors, while women are assigned roles associated with care, reproduction, and support. These roles are often framed as “natural,” masking their political significance.
Cynthia Enloe demonstrates that women’s labor—maintaining households, caring for the wounded, working in factories, or sustaining morale—is essential to war efforts. Yet this labor is rarely recognized as political or strategic.
This invisibility reinforces the idea that war is fought only on battlefields, ignoring the everyday work that makes warfare possible.
Women Combatants and Post-War Marginalization
In many conflicts, women have participated directly as fighters. Despite their involvement, post-war transitions often marginalize women combatants. Disarmament and reintegration programs are frequently designed around male fighters, rendering women invisible.
Women who take up arms also face social stigma for violating gender norms. Their return to civilian life is marked by exclusion and silence, as nationalist narratives reassert traditional femininity.
These patterns reveal how war temporarily disrupts gender roles but peace often restores patriarchal normalcy.
Women as Peace Activists
Women have played a central role in peace movements across the world. Peace activism has provided a space where women could engage politically even when formal institutions excluded them.
Women’s peace movements often emphasize dialogue, reconciliation, and social justice rather than military victory. Groups such as mothers of the disappeared, anti-nuclear activists, and grassroots peace networks have challenged militarism by highlighting the human costs of war.
Cynthia Cockburn argues that women’s peace activism exposes the connection between patriarchy, nationalism, and militarism, offering alternative visions of security rooted in everyday life.
Maternal Politics and Moral Authority
Many peace movements mobilize women’s identities as mothers and caregivers. This maternal politics provides moral authority, allowing women to speak against violence in contexts where overt political dissent is dangerous.
While maternal framing can be empowering, feminist scholars note its limitations. It risks reinforcing traditional gender roles and excluding women who do not conform to maternal identities.
Thus, women’s peace activism navigates a tension between using gendered roles strategically and challenging the structures that produce them.
Feminist Critiques of Peace Processes
Feminist scholars critique formal peace processes for marginalizing women’s voices. Peace negotiations are often dominated by male political and military elites, even when women played key roles during conflict.
This exclusion has concrete consequences. Peace agreements that ignore gendered experiences may fail to address sexual violence, displacement, and economic insecurity, undermining long-term stability.
Feminist IR argues that inclusive peace processes are not only more just but also more sustainable.
Global Feminist Peace Movements
Transnational feminist networks have linked local struggles to global campaigns against war, militarization, and nuclear weapons. These movements challenge the state-centric logic of IR by emphasizing solidarity across borders.
Women’s international peace activism demonstrates that political agency operates beyond states and formal institutions, reshaping how we understand power and resistance in global politics.
Rethinking War and Peace through a Gender Lens
Studying women in war and peace movements forces a rethinking of core IR concepts. War is not only about strategy and combat; it is embedded in social relations and gendered labor. Peace is not merely the absence of war but a process involving justice, recognition, and social transformation.
J. Ann Tickner emphasizes that sustainable peace requires addressing the structural inequalities that make violence possible in the first place.
Conclusion: Women, Agency, and Transformative Politics
Women’s participation in war and peace movements reveals the limitations of traditional, male-centered accounts of global politics. Women are neither natural victims nor inherently peaceful; they are complex political actors navigating constrained choices.
Feminist IR highlights women’s agency while critiquing the gendered structures that shape war and peace. By centering women’s experiences and activism, this perspective broadens IR’s analytical scope and points toward more inclusive and transformative approaches to security and peace.
References
- Enloe, Cynthia. Bananas, Beaches and Bases.
- Cockburn, Cynthia. From Where We Stand: War, Women’s Activism and Feminist Analysis.
- Tickner, J. Ann. Gender in International Relations.
- Sylvester, Christine. War as Experience.
- Yuval-Davis, Nira. Gender and Nation.
