In her chapter titled "Updating the Gendered Empire", Cynthia Enloe discusses the role of women both in in war and in post-war societies. She begins with pointing out that many feminist historians have actually given us fresh and detailed accounts of how women and notions of femininity were originally pressed into our society by early empire-builders. Topics that would have previously been considered human interest stories largely surrounding the lives of women should not be considered as serious commentaries on foreign policies. Although the empire builders might have all been men, they were, as Enloe points out, "men who thought (and worried) a lot about women" (271). She continues by describing a meeting in the 1980s in which a group of native Canadian women of the Innu community brought together dozens of women to discuss the effects that a NATO air force base was having on their lives. This conversation surrounded how unequal international power relations between masculine governments depend on unequal relationships between men and women and also on global ideas about where women will be and where they should stay. The results of this conference pointed out five important political realities: (1) women are intimately engaged in the little noticed daily workings of those unequal international military alliances (2) women's roles in these large structures of international power are far from uniform (3) every one of these women is where she is on the global map due to dominant ideas of femininity (4) many women are privately ambivalent about the complicit roles they play in these unequal international power structures and (5) the women are still counted upon by foreign policy-makers to keep playing their supportive, or at least passive, roles.
She continues by describing how the roles of masculinity and femininity are determined both by the powers in charge and by the imperial powers. Empires are created out of unequal alliances between the ambitious imperialists and the local actors who believe they will be able to gain from supporting the outsiders. She claims that "the military strategy that the Bush administration adopted to conduct its invasion [of Afghanistan] has hobbled, not facilitated, the genuine liberation of most of Afghanistan's women and girls" (283). The differing and rival forms of masculinity in Afghanistan are necessary for the investigation of contemporary American expansionism. This contest is often called one between the "warlords" and the "neckties". The warlords' ability to control women in their provinces and act as the guardians of true Afghan femininity is a crucial component of their ability to raise and mobilize armies. The neckties' on the other hand see themselves as builders of a new centralized state, a political structure based on laws and budgets instead of on guns and armed road blocks. This contest, however, simply makes women into mere symbols, subordinates, admirers or spectators.
Enloe continues by discussing how Afghan women are largely left out of the process of constitution writing and therefore will face a set of laws that potentially continues and enhances the male dominance of society and government. The only individuals who are able to change things in the government are those she calls "closed-door" bargainers, who gain their influence and power through public support, access to weapons and armed men, economic resources and credibility in the eyes of the foreign men who are orchestrating the bargaining. Women, however, have none of these aids and are therefore largely left out of the government system once again. She describes how "women's liberation in any country rarely follows a simple path onward and upward" and feminist progress needs to have staying power. She concludes by pointing out that there is a never ending temptation for women who live outside of war-torn areas to not know what should really be focused on in the feminist struggle. Although the crafting of expansive, cohesive politic influence is tricky, founders must keep gender in mind when forming new government. Masculinity has always been necessary in empire-building but instead these masculinzed political cultures need to be investigated while paying serious attention to women. The only way to ensure that extreme masculinity can be avoided is by paying close attention to women's experiences, actions and ideas.
In her paper "Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflections on Cultural Relativism and Its Others", Lila Abu-Lughod questions the US argument that part of justification of the "War on Terrorism" is the saving of the Afghan women. Instead of acknowledging differences between cultures, we seek to "save" others. Lughod discusses how Americans view the veil as oppressive and against basic human rights; however this is not at all the case. We must instead work with people of different cultures in situations that we "recognize as always subject to historical transformation" and we need to think of our own responsibilities to address injustice. Abu-Lughod stresses that we must first accept the limits of "cultural relativism" before trying to change societies in order to save them.
In her article "Whose Security", Charlotte Bunch argues that the perception created by President Bush and the Western media that almost all American support Bush's militaristic threats is not at all true. Feminists have actually been opposed to Bush's actions from the beginning but it is clear that they do not have very much impact on US foreign policy, which is military and corporate driven. Bush used Afghan women's rights to rally support for war but he has done nothing to sustain this commitment to women. She points out that other countries resent the US for our reactions to 9/11 and "this resentment stems in part from the fact that 9/11 is not seen as a defining moment for the rest of the world". She argues that we must also not accept the idea that our government had no other choice but to declare war. 9/11 has actually increased many problems feminists had already been dealing with including (1) growing global and national inequities (2) the rise of extremist expression of religious and/or nationalist fundamentalisms that threaten progress on women's rights (3) the escalation of racist and sexist violence and terrorism in daily life that is acompanied by economic exploitation and trafikking of women and (4) an increase in militarism, wars, conflicts and terrorism that affects or targets civilians, largely women and children in deadly ways. The efforts to promote human security were actually hindered by 9/11 due to the rise in masculine warrior tendencies. She ends her article by saying that the "excuse of 9/11 has been used not only to curtail human rights in the United States but also around the world". The US "commitment to human rights" actually helps legitimize the abuses of governments that have never actually accepted these standards. Despite women's attempts, they are still not respected or largely listened to in major human rights organizations. Women have changed many aspects of life in recent history but women's activism must be both local and global in order to truly succeed.
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