Professor True argued for attentiveness to the ways in which conflict economies are gendered and often create opportunities for women to enter into paid work and other economic activities. These initiatives are, however, often not recognized and swept away by neoliberal austerity, growth, investment and privatization plans that are championed by International Financial Institutions (IFIs) and governments in post-conflict societies. As Professor True demonstrated, efforts to restructure and restore post conflict economies do not attend to gendered divisions of labour nor do they recognize and support women’s agency. Instead they tend to entrench inequalities, further marginalize women’s agency and exacerbate women’s vulnerability to sexual and gender based violence (SGBV).

The feminist political economy approach

As a method, the feminist political economy approach ‘broadens both the explanation and the solutions to violence against women’ (True 2012: 7). This approach acknowledges that violence against women is pervasive in all countries, across every socioeconomic group and at every stage of life (True 2012: 3). However, marginalized groups such as indigenous persons, ethnic and racial minorities, refugees, human rights defenders, those with disabilities and those living in conflict situations tend to be more vulnerable to violence. When we look at post conflict economies through this lens, we see two opposing trends. The first is the increased need for care work (health, education, rehabilitation, reconciliation). Care work is largely feminized and undervalued, if valued (read: paid) at all. During violent conflict health and social services are often disrupted, directly targeted or their resources (for example, buildings and people) are significantly depleted. This means that as the demand for care work increases the resources to do so decrease. Second, post conflict economies are expected to structurally reform following the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and donor mandates with a focus on neoliberal strategies to promote international trade and investment. Often this involves the privatization of public services and infrastructure, which may negatively impact women’s capacity to participate economically and politically in post conflict transitions. As Professor True highlighted in her lecture, neoliberal reforms rely on increasing the already significant burden on women’s (largely unpaid) care labour, often funded through remittances, informal and barter economies. Women are expected to do more with much less.

Feminist visions of peace and inclusive economies

Being attentive to gendered patterns of labour, remuneration and resource allocation is critical in societies both afflicted by armed conflict and those considered ‘peaceful’. However violent conflict, crisis, change and transition create opportunities to rethink, reorganize and redistribute how land, credit, resources and wealth are organized and allocated. A central pillar of Professor True’s argument is that building post conflict economies that are inclusive, that invest in social infrastructure and recognize the social and economic value of care work creates the societal stability necessary for sustainable peace. It also raises important questions about how we think about peace: what does it look like or feel like to live in a peaceful society and who gets to set those standards? For many women in post conflict societies the ‘post’ is a misnomer, as although official ceasefires or peace agreements are signed, gendered patterns of violence continue unabated and in some instances, may even increase.

Understanding the kinds, continuities and economies of violence requires thinking through the linkages between IFIs and other economic actors, such as private firms and the WPS agenda, as True put forward in her lecture. This presents an opportunity to include a feminist political economy approach in the WPS Agenda. Adjusting IMF loan conditions is one example whereby the connections between militarization, economic restructuring, violence and gender function to either ameliorate or entrench inequalities. In this regard, Professor True highlighted that the IMF or World Bank are constrained by their mandates from imposing conditions on a borrowing government’s military budget. In post conflict situations, this means that while spending and investment in social infrastructure and care sectors are either cut or non-existent, military budgets remain immune to the neoliberal logics of austerity. A feminist political economy approach draws attention to the ways in which upward trends in military spending are linked to the privileging of militarized masculinities at the literal expense of spending on physical security, social services and the necessary care work required to recover in conflict prone regions. It also highlights that the political economy of demilitarization is inherently gendered and intimately connected to establishing the structural conditions for enduring peace. To return to the question that Professor True’s lecture explored, approaching the political economy of militarization and arms trade through a feminist lens highlights there is significant potential for feminist political economy approaches to contribute to understanding how to build inclusive, peaceful societies. To create and foster peace it is critical to analyse the ways in which the feminist political economy approach can be used as a ‘framework for individuals, communities, states, and other actors to realize more fully their obligations to prevent violence and to uphold women’s human rights whether in good or bad times’ (True 2012: 8).

Works cited:

UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UNWOMEN), Preventing Conflict Transforming Justice Securing the Peace - A Global Study on the Implementation of United Nations Security Council resolution 1325, 12 October 2015, available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/561e036b40c.html [accessed 7 June 2018]

True, J., 2012. The Political Economy of Violence against Women. OUP USA.