Gender and Violence against Political Actors is an ambitious and much needed contribution to the study of violence, politics, and gender. The editors bring disciplinary, theoretical, and methodological diversity to a scholarly exploration of how “gender dynamics are manifested in violent acts against political actors” (241). Drawing especially on scholarship from peace and conflict studies, political science, and feminist studies, the book seeks to move beyond the scholarly silos that have led to a fragmentation of gendered research on political violence.
The structure of the book reflects this attempt to bridge disciplinary differences. The introduction, written by the editors, provides the conceptual framework to the three key concepts explored in the book: politics, violence, and gender. It is followed by four chapters emphasizing the different disciplinary and theoretical approaches used to study gendered violence against political actors (part I, “Theoretical Approaches”). Then, the book expands the concept of violence (part II, “The Continuum of Violence”) with four chapters that each provide a detailed analysis of one type of violence: physical, psychological, sexual, and online. This is followed by six chapters exploring gendered political violence in different contexts (part III, “Case Studies”). The book concludes with five chapters focusing on the policy implications of gendered studies of political violence and one final chapter written by the coeditors proposing a way forward in the study of gender and political violence (part IV, “Policy Responses”).
The editors do a laudable job in developing an introductory framework and reinforcing the commonalities in approaches in the conclusion (chapter 21). Key contributions come from the development of what they call the “psychological-physical continuum of violence” and the robust discussion surrounding online violence throughout the book. The recognition of violence occurring along a continuum helps connect the conflict literature that often emphasizes physical violence to the burgeoning literature on violence against women in politics (VAWIP) while also providing the conceptual delineation of how the book approaches violence against political actors. It is important to note that economic violence is not part of this continuum, because the coeditors argue that it pertains to structural issues and not necessarily to intentional acts that “violate the personal integrity of the political actors” (8).
The book frames politics narrowly and in relation to the victim of violence and reinforces the importance of gender as a key concept and analytical category. In part I, contributors apply this framing to contextualize gender and political violence in peace and conflict research (chapter 2), VAWIP (chapter 3), and conflict-related sexual violence against men (chapter 4). Chapter 5, the last chapter in part I, provides an overview of the approaches discussed in the previous chapters and expands on an approach emphasizing the violent act, asking, “How is an act of political violence gendered?” (p. 46). This chapter introduces the act-based approach to understanding politics, violence, and gender while attempting to bridge the theoretical differences in the previous three chapters. Together, these four chapters establish the conceptual guardrails for the chapters to come.
In part II, the contributors provide theoretical, methodological, and empirical considerations for each of the types of violences enumerated in the continuum described in the introduction: physical, psychological, sexual, and online. Chapter 6, on physical violence, relies on quantitative event-based data to expand on the concept. Chapter 7, on psychological violence, emphasizes the importance of interview data and case studies to complement quantitative data. Chapter 8, on sexual violence, discusses the promise and limitations of current quantitative (coded) data on sexual violence, as well as the potential and limitations of qualitative (fieldwork) data. Chapter 9, on online violence, enumerates established methods and approaches to understand the phenomenon, highlighting quantitative (sentiment analysis and social network analysis) and qualitative (critical discourse studies) methods. Taken together, these four chapters provide a glimpse at the wide array of methodological approaches to understanding the continuum of gendered violence, highlighting some of the most recent developments in the study of such phenomena.
The case studies introduced in part III combine the theoretical foundations from part I and the methodological discussions in part II to provide brief empirical analyses of gendered political violence in different political contexts. Chapter 10 focuses on electoral violence targeting voters in Papua New Guinea, where authors remind us that “violence does not occur in a vacuum; it is heavily influenced by context, histories of conflict, and underlying power dynamics” (110). Chapter 11 discusses election violence in Uganda, highlighting that “while women in Uganda report a wide range of experiences with violence during elections, they demonstrated resolve in exercising their political rights” (130). Chapter 12 focuses on harassment of parliamentary candidates in the United Kingdom, where women candidates “pay a larger cost than men for expressing distinctive political views, especially when these views do not correspond to what is socially expected from them” (147). Chapter 13 shows how gender and race influence the US local and state context, where “women mayors are more likely to experience violence” (158) and women of color state senators experience higher rates of violence while men of color experience violence at similar levels to white women (159). Chapter 14 explores violence against local-level Swedish politicians, suggesting that it has increased over time and that women mayors are targeted far more than any other officeholders (173). Chapter 15 develops an intersectional approach to the study of online violence against women in politics in Israel, suggesting that “online violence differs in form and impact across actors and geographic contexts” (187). Although all the case studies provide important contributions, the emphasis on elections and violence against candidates and elected political actors prioritizes the focus on the comparative politics literature, leaving little room for direct analyses of political violence in conflict and postconflict settings.
The book concludes with a discussion on policy responses, highlighting global and country-level efforts to curb violence against women in politics and sexual harassment (chapters 16, 19, and 20), policy responses to political violence online (chapter 17), and responses to conflict-related sexual violence (chapter 18). All the chapters provide examples of attempts to curb gendered political violence, highlighting positive results and areas for improvement. The book concludes with a call to continue the dialogue between the different fields of research and practice (247), emphasizing the importance of intersectional analyses.
This book is an essential read for anyone conducting research or developing policies related to gender and political violence. The complexity of the three main concepts (politics, violence, and gender), combined with disciplinary differences on how to approach them, means that some chapters do not fully fit into the theoretical and conceptual delimitations proposed by the editors. Yet, this book contributes greatly to the study of gender and political violence and provides a good model for cross-disciplinary conversations of complex concepts.
