Recovering from Conflict: Does Gender make a difference?

• Author: Sorensen, Birgitte Refslund

Many discussions on relief to countries in armed conflict and post-conflict reconstruction have not considered gender. Among relief practitioners, the issue of gender has often been seen as a secondary priority and postponed to the development phase. Academics have failed to incorporate a gender perspective, as they have relied on gender-blind theories and conceptualizations of war to peace transitions. However, over the past few years, a steadily growing body of field studies has demonstrated the salience of gender in conflict and post-conflict situations, and forced gender and women onto the international agenda.

Existing material on gender can be divided into documentation of the gendered impact of war and of how women make a useful contribution to post-war political, economic and social reconstruction.

The internal wars that have followed in the wake of decolonialization and the dismantlement of the bipolar cold war world order share the feature that they all involve civil populations in an unprecedented manner. But in our dismay over the cruelty with which these wars are being fought, we should not forget to analyze more carefully the way in which their actions and implications are gendered. The most obvious example of this is the way in which women have become targets of politicized sexual violence, because they are regarded as the embodiment of a group's cultural identity. As an indication of the general militarization of State and society, women are also exposed to violence and abuse by members of their own communities. This, for instance, happens when they transgress established gender boundaries, even when this is done in an effort to assist in the restoration of livelihoods. But violence is not the only example of gendered impacts. We know that gender is important in defining people's entitlements to resources and their social mobility. And this means that displacement and disintegration of communities may hit women harder.

Why? Because they lose access to resources essential for their survival and well-being. Apart from determining the vulnerability of women during crisis, such experiences of course also play an important part in defining the issues that women would like to see addressed during the reconstruction period.

The documentation of the gendered impact of war has tended to reinforce a perception of women as helpless and passive victims. But experiences from war-affected countries give ample evidence of women's...