Engaging men and boys in the Women, Peace and Security agenda: beyond the "good men" industry

Since the signing of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (UNSCR 1325) in October 2000, there have been two explicit references to men in resolutions on the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda. For the first 13 years of the agenda resolutions included men by default without naming them directly, referring to gender broadly and many particular instances of violence presumably caused by men.1 The first explicit mention appeared in 2013 in Resolution 2106, which mentioned “the enlistment of men and boys in the effort to combat all forms of violence against women.” Resolution 2106 was followed up in 2015 by Resolution 2242, which reiterated “the important engagement by men and boys as partners in promoting women’s participation in the prevention and resolution of armed conflict, peacebuilding and post-conflict situations”. These direct mentions of men within the WPS architecture limit the agenda to that of “enlisting” or “engaging” men and boys in achieving the goals of WPS, rather than a more sustained treatment of men and masculinities. While the focus on men and boys has entailed a broad effort to expand WPS to the “other side of gender”, the majority of current actions appear to follow the language within UNSCRs 2106 and 2242 by focusing on “engaging men and boys”.

Should policy-makers align attempts to transform violent masculinities?

As part of a series exploring continuums of violence, David Duriesmith looks at policy responses to men’s violence against women and to (men’s) violent extremism, urging policymakers to see beyond the notion of ‘toxic’ masculinity and the ‘bad man’ and acknowledge structural causes

The masculine logic of DDR and SSR in the Rwanda Defence Force

Since the 1994 genocide and civil war, the Rwandan government has implemented an externally funded Demobilisation, Demilitarisation and Reintegration (DDR)/Security Sector Reform (SSR) program culminating in the consolidation of armed groups into a new, professionalised Rwanda Defence Force (RDF). Feminists argue that DDR-SSR initiatives that exclude combatant women and girls or ignore gendered security needs fail to transform the political conditions that led to conflict. Less attention has been paid to how gendered relations of power play out through gender sensitive DDR and SSR initiatives that seek to integrate women and transform hyper-masculine militarised masculinities. This article investigates how Rwanda’s DDR-SSR program is governed by an oppressive masculine logic. Drawing on critical studies on men and masculinities and feminist work on peacebuilding, myths and the politics of belonging, it is argued that Rwanda’s locally-owned DDR-SSR program places the military and militarisation at the centre of the nation-building program. Through various ‘boundary construction’ practices, the Rwandan government attempts to stabilise the post-1994 gender order and entrench the hegemony of a new militarised masculinity in Rwandan society. The case study draws on field research conducted in 2014 and 2015 and a discourse analysis of RDF historical accounts, policy documents and training materials

Hybrid warriors and the formation of new war masculinities: a case study of Indonesian foreign fighters

At the heart of new wars are economic structures, patterns of violence and formations of collective meaning, which appear to blend localised and globalised practices of gender. While new wars appear to mirror the kind of warrior masculinity that preceded the modern state, they also draw on new technologies and symbolism to give meaning to acts of war. In the case of foreign fighters, armed groups increasingly draw on globalised cultural products (film, electronic publications and images) to entice volunteers to fight on the battlefields of the 21st century. The use of masculine models and gendered discourses to recruit men to fight in these conflicts has been well studied. However, the process through which 'local' and 'global' practices of gender are blended by highly mobile fighters to forge the practices of new war has received far less attention.Drawing on the notion of cultural hybridity, this article asks how interactions between different configurations of gender make new wars possible. To do this, it empirically explores encounters between notions of militarised manhood through the lives of four Indonesian former foreign fighters. By utilising life history interviews, this article makes the case that the masculinity of these 'new warriors' relied on the tensions between, and synthesis of, anti-colonial notions of organised violence that are rooted in Indonesian history and globalised jihadi discourse on war

Manly states and feminist foreign policy: Revisiting the liberal state as an agent of change

Support for antiviolence campaigns represents a significant step forward in mobilizing the state in achieving feminist goals, while at the same time these actions uncover underlying tensions in challenging gender inequality by drawing on institutions defined by masculine modes of action. This chapter looks at the HeForShe campaign as a recent state attempt to pursue profeminist policies in the international arena. It argues that the use of the liberal state as an agent of change risks a quixotic search for a “good” masculinity as a basis for the state achieving feminist change. Comparing HeForShe to masculinities theorization on gender activism, the chapter challenges the notion that states can internationally break free from their masculinist underpinnings without adopting the position of being reflective allies to feminist causes

'The Other Half on Gender' in Sierra Leone's Civil Conflict: A Critical Response to John Idriss Lahai's "Fused in Combat"

This article responds to John Idriss Lahai's article " 'Fused in Combat': Unsettling the Gendered Hierarchies and Women's Roles in the Fighting Forces in the Sierra Leone's Civil War," published above in this issue of ARAS, and suggests that a more detailed account of male privilege and oppression is needed when exploring gender relations in combat. It is argued that when analysing gender relations in 'the camp' the focus should not be on how women's actions led to their suffering abuse. Rather, the focus should remain on men's actions as abusers. The explanation of sexual violence in Sierra Leone's civil war is critically explored from a pro-feminist perspective. To do this a clear account of masculinity is needed that can fully understand how gender relations are constructed