This book investigates challenges to the U.S. military’s gender regime of hetero-male privilege. Examining a broad set of discursive maneuvers in a series of cases as focal points—integration of open homosexuality, the end of the combat ban on women, and the epidemic nature of military sexual assault within its units—Stephanie Szitanyi examines the contemporary link between gender and military service in the United States, and comprehensively analyzes forms of gendering produced by the military as an institution. Using feminist interpretivist methods to analyze an impressive combination of visual, textual, archival, and cultural materials, the book argues that despite policy changes since 2013 that may be positioned as explicit episodes of degendering, military officials have simultaneously moved to counteract them and reinforce the institution’s gender regime of hetero-male privilege. Importantly, these (re)gendering processes continue to prioritize certain forms of service and sacrifice, through which a specific version of masculinity—the masculine warrior—is continuously promoted, preserved, and cemented.
The Persian Gulf War changed the face of combat. It brought women’s military roles into the spotlight, in large part via the mass media, and showed that many women performed combat roles similar to those of men during the conflict. The war was thus an impetus for changes in laws that had prevented women from serving in combat assignments. In past centuries, because it was not culturally acceptable for women to serve in combat, surprising numbers joined secretly under assumed male names. After defining exactly what is meant by “war” and “combat,” this work presents historical and present-day views of the involvement of women in the military. The impact of regulations on women in combat is analyzed, as is the role of the American public in the controversy. Female combat is put into context with sociological theory; also discussed are readiness, cohesion, ability, sexuality, equal opportunity and family issues.
This book examines NATO's engagement with gender issues through its military structures. Drawing on newly declassified NATO documents, this volume provides the first comprehensive account of NATO’s long-established engagement with gender issues. These documents bring to the fore the stories of the NATO women and ‘gendermen’ who have organised within NATO across the decades to advocate on gender issues and highlights the continued challenges to pursuing transformative agendas within resistant institutions. The book argues that NATO is an institution of international hegemonic masculinity, with gender norms and values learned by member and partner states through socialisation and the engagement of a masculinist protection logic. It therefore provides an important context for NATO’s recent implementation of the Women, Peace and Security agenda encapsulated in UN Security Council Resolution 1325 and the seven follow-up resolutions. The volume interrogates how Women, Peace and Security has mapped on to NATO’s pre-existing concerns as a global security actor, providing impetus for further critical knowledge building of NATO which centres on gender. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of NATO, Critical Military Studies, Gender Studies, Critical Security Studies and IR in general.
Monograph on women's participation in the armed forces in the USA - traces the traditional role of women in the armed forces, examines attitudes towards a more active military role for women, and discusses women's rights and sociological aspects, costs and effects on efficiency, etc. Graphs, references and statistical tables.
Contents: (1) Background and Analysis; (2) Discharge Statistics; (3) Issues: Legal Challenges; Actions Following the Murder of Private Barry Winchell; Recruiting, JROTC, ROTC and Campus Policies; High Schools; Colleges and Universities; Supreme Court Review of the Solomon Amendment; Homosexuals and Marriages; Foreign Military Experiences. Charts and tables.
Over the past two decades of conflict, women have served with valor and continue to serve on combat aircraft, naval vessels, and in support of ground combat operations. The expansion of roles for women in the Armed Forces has evolved since the early days of the military when women were restricted by law and policy from serving in certain occupations and units. Women have not been precluded by law from serving in any military unit or occupational specialty since 1993 when Congress repealed the remaining prohibitions on women serving on combatant aircraft and vessels. However, Department of Defense (DOD) policies have prevented women from being assigned to units below brigade level where the unit's primary mission was to engage directly in ground combat. This policy barred women from serving in infantry, artillery, armor, combat engineers, and special operations units of battalion size or smaller. On January 24, 2013, then-Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta rescinded the rule that restricted women from serving in combat units and directed the military departments and services to review their occupational standards and assignment policies and to make recommendations for opening all combat roles to women no later than January 1, 2016. On December 3, 2015, Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter ordered the military to open all combat jobs to women with no exceptions. This most recent policy change followed extensive studies that were completed by the military departments and by the Special Operations Command (SOCOM) on issues such as unit cohesion, women's health, equipment, facilities modifications, propensity to serve, and international experiences with women in combat. These studies also included a review and validation of gender-neutral occupational standards for combat roles where such standards existed. On March 10, 2016, Secretary Carter announced that the Services' and SOCOM's implementation plans for the integration of women into direct ground combat roles were approved. Some concerns about the implementation of the new policy remain, including the recruitment, assignment, and career management of women into the new roles, and the impact of integration on unit readiness. Congress has oversight authority in these matters, and may also consider issues such as equal opportunity, equal responsibility (such as selective service registration), and the overall manpower needs of the military.
This book is inspired by a statement released by the World Health Organization directed at preventing and eliminating disrespectful and abusive treatment during facility-based childbirth. Exploring the nature of vulnerability during childbirth, and the factors which make childbirth a site for violence and control, the book looks at the role of law in the regulation of professional intervention in childbirth. The WHO statement and other published work on ‘mistreatment’, ‘obstetric violence’, ‘birth trauma’, ‘birth rape’, and ‘dehumanised care’ all point to the presence of vulnerability, violence, and control in childbirth. This collected edition explores these issues in the experience of those giving birth, and for those providing obstetric services. It further offers insights regarding legal avenues of redress in the context of this emerging area of concern. Using violence, vulnerability, and control as a lens through which to consider multiple facets of the law, the book brings together innovative research from an interdisciplinary selection of authors. The book will appeal to scholars of law and legal academics, specifically in relation to tort, criminal law, medical law, and human rights. It will also be of interest to postgraduate scholars of medical ethics and those concerned with gender studies more broadly.
Making Gender, Making War is a unique interdisciplinary edited collection which explores the social construction of gender, war-making and peacekeeping. It highlights the institutions and processes involved in the making of gender in terms of both men and women, masculinity and femininity. The "war question for feminism" marks a thematic red thread throughout; it is a call to students and scholars of feminism to take seriously and engage with the task of analyzing war. Contributors analyze how war-making is intertwined with the making of gender in a diversity of empirical case studies, organized around four themes: gender, violence and militarism; how the making of gender is connected to a (re)making of the nation through military practices; UN SCR 1325 and gender mainstreaming in institutional practices; and gender subjectivities in the organization of violence, exploring the notion of violent women and non-violent men.
Reveals the different ways women navigate the traditionally masculine environment of the military Drawing on surveys and interviews with almost 300 female military personnel, Melissa Herbert explores how women's everyday actions, such as choice of uniform, hobby, or social activity, involve the creation and re-creation of what it means to be a woman, and particularly a woman soldier. Do women feel pressured to be "more masculine," to convey that they are not a threat to men's jobs or status and to avoid being perceived as lesbians? She also examines the role of gender and sexuality in the maintenance of the male-defined military institution, proposing that, more than sexual harassment or individual discrimination, it is the military's masculine ideology--which views military service as the domain of men and as a mechanism for the achievement of manhood--which serves to limit women's participation in the military has increased dramatically. In the wake of armed conflict involving female military personnel and several sexual misconduct scandals, much attention has focused on what life is like for women in the armed services. Few, however, have examined how these women negotiate an environment that has been structured and defined as masculine.
