The Gendered Dimensions of Identity Wars - The Case of the Former Yugoslavia

• Main Authors: Arvidsson, Sara, Nermany, Roza
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Linköpings universitet, Institutionen för ekonomisk och industriell utveckling 2007
• Subjects: Political Science (excluding Public Administration Studies and Globalisation Studies); Statsvetenskap (exklusive studier av offentlig förvaltning och globaliseringsstudier)
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-17308

In this thesis we investigate gendered dimensions of the war in the former Yugoslavia. We do this with the help of gender theory, as well as theories about the construction of identities and the role of the identity aspect in contemporary warfare. By combining these theoretical points of departure we hope to shed light on how gender can be used by political and military leaders and by the media in times of war. We explore how underlying gender assumptions in the Yugoslav society affected the course of war as well as how gender relations were altered just before and during the war. We come to the conclusion that gender was central to the construction of collective identity in the Yugoslav wars. Women were pushed in to traditional gender roles and constructed as carriers of culture and mothers of the nation. Further the symbolic values associated with women made them vulnerable to sexual violence, since an attack against enemy women were considered to be an attack on the entire nation. The intersections between gender and identity aspects in the Yugoslav wars made women strategic targets of military violence.