Evolution of Feminism in IR

• Feminism as an academic discipline emerged from the feminist movement of the 1960s and 1970s, which sought political, social, and economic equality for women.
• Feminist perspectives entered the International Relations (IR) discipline at the end of the 1980s, coinciding with the end of the Cold War.
• This timing was not coincidental, as the Cold War conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union had dominated IR for four decades.
• The post–Cold War decade (1989–2000) witnessed relative peace among major powers, allowing new issues to emerge on the IR agenda.
• Greater focus was placed on economic relations, leading to debates between proponents of globalization and critics who argued it failed to reduce world poverty.
• The concept of security was expanded from state-centric to include human security, emphasizing individual well-being.
• IR began addressing ethno-national conflicts and the high civilian casualties—notably that around 90% of casualties in modern wars are civilians, mostly women and children.
• Increased attention was given to international organizations, social movements, and non-state actors, reflecting the shift beyond inter-state relations.
• Feminist approaches found these broader global issues more compatible with their analytical frameworks.
• Feminists reject limiting international politics to state-to-state relations, emphasizing non-governmental and grassroots participation.
• Women have always participated in international politics, but mostly in non-governmental settings such as social movements rather than in policy-making.
• Women engage globally as diplomats’ spouses, migrant domestic workers, and sex workers trafficked across borders, illustrating the gendered dimensions of global politics.
• Despite limited representation in state power or military leadership, women are deeply affected by the decisions of political leaders.
• Women constitute the majority of the world’s poor, and economic policies made in distant global centers influence local resource distribution.
• Thus, broader global frameworks—rather than narrow state-centric models—are better suited for examining gendered impacts in global politics.
• Many feminists link knowledge construction with political practice, calling it emancipatory knowledge—knowledge aimed at improving women’s lives.
• The core goal of feminist theory is to explain women’s subordination—present to varying degrees in all societies—and to find ways to end it.
• Feminists disagree on the causes of subordination, leading to multiple types of feminist theory with different explanations and strategies for overcoming inequality.
• Major feminist theories include liberal, Marxist, socialist, post-colonial, and post-modern perspectives.
• Liberal feminists argue that legal reforms and the removal of formal barriers can achieve women’s equality.
• Post-liberal feminists (Marxist, socialist, post-colonial, post-modern) argue that deeply rooted patriarchal structures cannot be dismantled by legal changes alone.
• Marxist and socialist feminists locate women’s subordination in the capitalist labor market, where paid public work is valued more than unpaid domestic work, creating a double burden for women.
• Post-colonial and post-modern feminists emphasize that women’s experiences differ by class, race, and culture, rejecting universal generalizations about “all women.”
• All post-liberal theories treat gender as a central category of analysis.
• In common usage, gender refers to biological sex, but feminists define it as socially and culturally constructed characteristics that vary across time and place.
• Traits like power, autonomy, rationality, and public orientation are associated with masculinity, while weakness, emotionality, dependence, and privacy are linked with femininity.
• Studies show that both men and women tend to value masculine traits more positively, reinforcing gender hierarchies.
• These definitions are relational, meaning masculinity and femininity derive meaning from each other—to be a “real man” means not displaying feminine traits.
• Because gender traits are socially constructed, women in power—like Condoleezza Rice or Margaret Thatcher—may act like “real men” in political spaces.
• Some feminists argue that adopting masculine behavior is often necessary for success in the male-dominated sphere of international politics.
• Feminists stress that gender is not synonymous with women; it concerns both men and masculinity as well.
• Since international politics is largely a masculine domain, it is vital to study how masculine traits such as power, autonomy, and rationality are used to legitimize states’ foreign and military policies.
• Gender extends beyond personal traits—it is a structure of meaning that reflects and reproduces power relationships.
• Because masculine traits are valued more, gender becomes a mechanism for the unequal distribution of social benefits and costs.
• Thus, gender analysis is essential for studying global inequality, insecurity, and social justice.
• Feminists believe it is crucial to make unequal gender structures visible to transform them.
• IR feminists use gender-sensitive analysis to explore global politics—V. Spike Peterson and Anne Sisson Runyan call this “putting on our gender-sensitive lenses.”
• The rise of feminist perspectives in International Relations (IR) was reinforced through seminal works and international conferences that reshaped how world events were examined.
• Key publications marking this intellectual shift include:
  • Jean Bethke Elshtain – Women and War (1987)
  • Cynthia Enloe – Bananas, Beaches and Bases: Making Feminist Sense of International Politics (1989)
  • J. Ann Tickner – Gender in International Relations: Feminist Perspectives on Achieving Global Security (1992)
  • V. Spike Peterson and Anne Sisson Runyan – Global Gender Issues (1993)
  • Christine Sylvester – Feminist Theory and International Relations in a Postmodern Era (1994)
• Several international conferences also helped bring women’s issues to global attention:
  • • Mexico Women’s Conference (1975)
    • Copenhagen Women’s Conference (1980)
    • Nairobi Women’s Conference (1985)
    • Vienna Human Rights Conference (1993)
    • Beijing Women’s Conference (1995)
• 1975 was declared the International Women’s Year, and 1976–1985 the UN Decade for Women, marking major milestones in global gender advocacy.
• The adoption of CEDAW (1979) – Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women – and the UN Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women (1993) represented the institutional victories of global women’s movements.
• Three academic conferences further boosted feminist thought in IR:
  • Millennium: Journal of International Studies Conference, London School of Economics (1988)
  • University of Southern California Conference (1989)
  • Wellesley Conference (1990)
• In 1997, J. Ann Tickner led a debate in International Studies Quarterly identifying three key misunderstandings among mainstream IR scholars regarding women’s issues:
  1. 1. Misunderstandings about the meanings of gender
     2. Different ontologies (ways of understanding reality)
     3. Epistemological divides (differences in how knowledge is acquired and validated)
• In her earlier work, “Hans Morgenthau’s Principles of Political Realism: A Feminist Reformulation” (1988), Tickner challenged classical realism, the dominant, masculine perspective in IR centered on power politics.
• Tickner argued that realism provides only a “partial description” of international politics due to its masculinist bias, and proposed a feminist reformulation of Morgenthau’s six principles:
  • Objectivity is culturally defined and associated with masculinity; hence, objectivity is always partial.
  • National interest is multi-dimensional; no single set of interests should define it.
  • Power as domination and control privileges masculine values.
  • All political action has moral significance—ethics and politics cannot be separated.
  • We should seek common moral elements within political actions.
  • Feminists reject the autonomy of the political realm—narrow definitions of “political” have historically excluded women’s concerns and contributions.
• Through these interventions, Tickner and other feminist scholars broadened IR discourse, questioning its androcentric foundations and introducing gender as a vital analytical lens in understanding global power, ethics, and security.