Legitimizing Military Action through “Rape-as-a-Weapon” Discourse in Libya
Critical Feminist Analysis
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 6353941 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Sarka Kolmasova (0000-0002-2304-5995, Metropolitan University Prague), Kateřina Krulišová (0000-0001-8065-188X, Metropolitan University Prague) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 15 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 130-150 |
| Publication date | 2019-03-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Politics & Gender (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1743-923X • E-ISSN: 1743-9248 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s1743923x18000326 |
| OpenAlex | W2883703348 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 6 |
| References cited | 38 |
Contemporary discourse on sexual(ized) violence in armed conflicts represents a powerful source for legitimization of highly controversial military interventions. Recent gender-responsive security studies have called for enhanced protection of women and girls from widespread and systematic sexual(ized) violence. Yet military operations reproduce the Western masculine hegemony rather than providing inclusive and apolitical assistance to victims of sexual assault. The article aims to critically assess discourse on sexual violence in a case of military intervention in Libya initiated under the rubric of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). The case study indicates a set of discursive strategies exercised by Western political representatives and nongovernmental organizations and even more expressively by the media to legitimize the military campaign. Typically, sexual(ized) violence is presented as a weapon of war, used by one of the conflicting parties without an adequate response of the state. This is followed by urgent calls for international action, willingly carried out by Western powers. The simplified narrative of civilized protectors versus savage aggressors must be challenged as it exploits the problem of sexual(ized) violence in order to legitimize politically motivated actions
Action (physics · Criminology · Hegemony · Intervention (counseling · Narrative · Political science · Politics · Rubric · Sexual violence · Sociology · State (computer science · Gender Studies · Gender, Security, and Conflict · Global Security and Public Health · Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics · Law · Psychology
Aportes y desafíos de la narrativa violencia sexual como arma de guerra para la prevención de crímenes atroces basados en el género
‘We know Charlie’
From the White Man’s Burden to the Responsible Saviour
Sexuality, Gender, and the Colonial Violence of Humanitarian Intervention
Double flipsiding
Vulnerable women and barbaric rapists
The Image before the Weapon
Discourse and Practice
Discourse and social change
Critical Approaches to Security
Maneuvers
Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis
Analysing Discourse
Ideology
Engendering the Responsibility to Protect
Responsibility to Protect or Prevent? Victims and Perpetrators of Sexual Violence Crimes in Armed Conflicts
Mapping Gender and the Responsibility to Protect
Contested Governance
The Nato Intervention in Libya
The misguided and mismanaged intervention in Libya
Recognizing Gender-Based Violence Against Civilian Men and Boys in Conflict Situations
Leading from Behind”
RtoP Alive and Well after Libya
The Ethics of Humanitarian Intervention in Libya
Rape as a Weapon of War
Ten Myths About the 2011 Intervention in Libya
The Morning After
The social construction of reality
Innocent Women and Children
Why Do Soldiers Rape? Masculinity, Violence, and Sexuality in the Armed Forces in the Congo (DRC)
The Fetishization of Sexual Violence in International Security
How is rape a weapon of war? Feminist International Relations, modes of critical explanation and the study of wartime sexual violence
Dangerous tales
Sexual Violence as a Weapon of War
Rethinking 'Rape as a Weapon of War
War/rape/porn
Modernising women and democratisation after the Arab Spring
Critical discourse analysis
Do Muslim Women Need Saving
Refusing to be a Man
| Unique citing works | 6 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1 |
| Citation span | 2020 - 2025 (6) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 5 |