Gendering Resistance: Multiple Faces of the Kurdish Women's Struggle

The article explores the Kurdish women's movement in Turkey by bridging two forms of resistance: those of guerrilla women fighters and of activist women. Based on my extensive ethnographic and archival research, I ask how women under conditions of war engage in different modes of resistance. In what ways does the “heroic resistance” of guerrilla women resonate with and/or contradict the everyday, “ordinary” struggles of activist women? The potent image of the Kurdish guerrilla woman that emerged in the early 1990s is constitutive of many other modes of political subjectivities, even among women who do not or cannot become guerrillas. One of those subjectivities is that of the activist woman. My analysis suggests that women's activism opens up a middle ground of action between “heroic” and “ordinary” resistance by reconciling revolutionary politics with everyday activism around gender‐based violence, democracy, and human rights. Although both revolutionary movement participants and scholars of revolutionary resistance often contrast the “ordinary” with the realm of armed resistance, this article challenges this dichotomy. I take the two realms of resistance—the ordinary and the heroic—as the core constituents of revolutionary resistance, and I reconsider the gendered interplay between them.     

Hospital Mergers

Abstract

When secular and sectarian (often Catholic) hospitals merge, women's reproductive healthcare services are often put in jeopardy. Some merger efforts are successful and others fail. Several issues arise as a result of this situation. First, what role do women's reproductive rights activists and their supporters play in effecting hospital merger decisions? This question does not assume that all women support women's rights organizations or that all women support a full range of reproductive rights. Secondly, what other factors seem to effect the outcome of merger discussions? In order to answer these questions, it is first necessary to understand the extent of Catholic hospital expansion and the nature of the hospital merger movement itself. These considerations will provide perspective for the two case studies of the American hospital merger movement that provide venues for examining the issues relating to participation and other factors that effect the outcome of merger talks. Cumberland and Baltimore are the two communities examined in this study. Though it would be a mistake to generalize to all merger situations based on these two cases, there are lessons that women's reproductive healthcare advocates can learn from the experiences of these two communities.

The issue of hospital mergers and the availability of reproductive healthcare services for women does raise an additional issue. Private sector decisions are being made that have a direct impact on public services, that is, the availability of a set of healthcare services in communities. This is not the direction that most public policy analysts consider.

The more frequently asked policy questions begin with public policy decisions and ask how they influence non-governmental decisions.     

Mujeres '94

ABSTRACT

Periods of democratic transition may provide space for increased political participation by women. Often, however, women's participation inexplicably falls off after the transition period to former low levels. This article argues that the form women's participation takes in transitions is crucial to both the shape of the resulting new democracy, and the subsequent impact of the new democratic institutions on building or sustaining a women's movement. A case study of the 1992-1994 transition period in El Salvador suggests that women must be present and contribute to the transition; form autonomous organizations but remain engaged with the state; and transform their political behavior from opposition to interaction with the new state.     

Religion,Nationalism, and Transnational Civil Society in the Eritrean Diaspora

This article examines the emergence and significance of religion among Eritreans in the United States as a basis for building community in diaspora, reconfiguring nationalist identity, and constituting transnational civil society. It argues three related points: that religious identity and gatherings help mitigate against fractured political identities that have weakened secular diaspora associations; that practicing Eritrean identity through religion challenges the hegemonic power of the Eritrean state to transnationally control diaspora communities and dictate national identity; and that the very incipience of religious bodies as transnational avenues provides Eritreans in diaspora with an autonomous space to resist the state's totalizing demands. Through a critical ethnographic investigation of religious identity and church bodies in Eritrea and one United States diaspora community, the article shows that uneven transnational networks between the United States and Eritrea create new spaces for political action. Specifically, the relative autonomy of churches and the incipience of their transnationalism allow diaspora Eritreans to use religion in the constitution of an emergent transnational civil society.     

Eritrean Refugees’ Utilization of Antenatal Services in Israel

This study analyzes Eritrean refugee women's utilization of antenatal services in Israel by means of retrospective self‐reports surveys (N = 63) targeting women's service utilization (array of services used, frequency rates, facility rates and demographic correlates) and semi‐structured interviews (N = 10) targeting women's experienced barriers for service utilization. Findings show that Eritrean women make substantive use of the full array of services, with user rates increasing over time. However, frequency rates are low, although increasing when women have more experience with the system. Facility rates are not in keeping with the recommendations of the Israeli Ministry of Health. Interviews reveal that the barriers of work and a complex system of antenatal care limit women's frequent service utilization in the right facility, while the barrier of miscommunication limits their understanding of the services they actually utilized. Findings stress the importance of analyzing different facets of utilization and their demographic correlates.     

A Luta Kontinua (The Struggle Continues)

This article examines how East Timorese women's contributions to the resistance against the twenty-four-year Indonesian occupation (“the Resistance”) have been marginalized within the veteran's valorization scheme (veterans' scheme) established in the post-conflict period. Drawing on interviews with politicians, veterans and members of women's organizations, we show that although women played significant roles within the Armed, Clandestine and Diplomatic fronts, for the most part they have not been recognized as veterans within the veterans' scheme. Instead, the scheme has reinforced perceptions of women's roles as wives, mothers, homemakers and widows, rather than as political actors, suggesting that the return to “peace” in Timor-Leste has been accompanied by the strengthening of patriarchal traditions and the expectation that women return to “traditional” roles. We argue that the failure to recognize women as veterans is problematic both for East Timorese women and society as a whole. It represents a lost opportunity to recognize women's agency and potentially to improve their social status in society. It also narrows the way in which the independence struggle is remembered and represented and further promotes a culture of “militarized masculinity” that elevates and rewards men who show the capacity to use violence.     

Women Acting for Women

In the new country of Timor-Leste, women constituted in 2011 32 per cent of the parliament, a relatively high figure in the world and in the region. But to what extent has the presence of women in parliament contributed to progress towards gender equality? In this article we argue that the passage of a parliamentary resolution on gender-responsive budgeting in Timor-Leste was an act of substantive representation, and we draw on a range of data to examine what made it possible. We find that while ‘newness’, international norms, women's movement unity, women's machinery in government and parliament and networks linking them were important, it was the development of a cross-party parliamentary women's caucus that was crucial to success. The role of gender-focused parliamentary institutions in supporting critical actors has rarely been examined in the literature on substantive representation. This is in contrast to the rich literature on institutions such as women's policy agencies. Our study suggests that more focus on parliamentary institutions is needed to discover what enables women parliamentarians to become critical actors.     

Wearing your Politics on your Sleeve: The Role of Political Colours in Social Movements

This article provides evidence of the significance of political colours and associated emblems in the repertoires of social movements and related political parties. It argues that political colours play an important role not only as visual symbols of the cause but also in the emotional life of social movements. Political colours help to create and sustain collective identities and illustrate the role of affect in political life. The article includes a case study of the role of colours in the women's movement, showing how one set of first-wave organizational colours took on much broader symbolic meanings during the second wave of the women's movement. It provides evidence from both the first and second waves of the women's movement of the emotional meaning of the colours for activists. The case study also illustrates the contestation over public memory that occurs in relation to powerful symbols.     

More Powerful Forces? Women,Nonviolence, and Mobilization

In this survey of studies of women's nonviolent mobilization, I scrutinize “more powerful forces,” the mobilizing forces of marginalized social actors that add to and make possible the development of broad‐based people power. The study of people power has yet to extensively consider the contribution of marginalized social actors. Specifically, I ask: (i) What do women contribute to the development of nonviolent protest power and (ii) What can we learn about mobilizing power, the power of people to protest nonviolently and gain the franchise they seek, when we expand our analytical lens to incorporate women's roles? How do we account for the gendered but often unseen actions taken by marginalized social actors? My focus on women in nonviolent mobilization stems directly from my research on gendered invisibility with an empirical focus on women's gendered socialization. Here, I review how gendered social structures shape women's power of participation and success in nonviolent mobilization.     

Women's self‐defense and sexual assault resistance: The state of the field

Public attention to sexual assault has increased dramatically over the last decade, spurring questions about how it can be prevented. One approach that has received scant attention is women's self‐defense training (sometimes known as sexual assault resistance training). This neglect is curious because empowerment‐based women's self‐defense (ESD) training is so far the only approach that has produced substantively significant decreases in victimization rates. In this article, I review the research evidence on women's self‐defense training. Does resisting a sexual assault affect the outcome of sexual violence? Does self‐defense training further reduce women's risk of violence? What are the other consequences of self‐defense training? How does self‐defense work for different groups of women—for example, those who have survived prior victimizations? Are the critiques of women's self‐defense training valid? Finally, what do we still need to learn about women's self‐defense? Overall, I argue that this evidence presents a compelling case that women's self‐defense training should be central to any efforts to prevent sexual violence.     

Setting the Agenda

Abstract

Foreign funding for women's non-governmental organizations (NGOs) during democratic transition plays a crucial role in shaping values and attitudes within civil society. Concepts of feminism, gender equality and the role of women in democratic politics are affected by the discourse established by foreign funders. In this article, the role of US and Nordic gender policies are examined in the Estonian context using a feminist constructivist framework. I explore the effects of neoliberal versus social-democratic gender policies and conclude that, while funding for women's NGOs serves to create a necessary discourse on women's equality, these policies may actually serve the funders' needs to gain geopolitical influence in the region.     

Survivors of Woman Abuse

Abstract

The feminist social work and related literature on abused women has focused on women's processes of empowerment but has overlooked the question of women's movement from individual survival to collective resistance. In this feminist qualitative study, I explore the processes through which survivors of abuse by male partners become involved in collective action for social change. Using story telling as a research method, I interviewed 11 women about the processes, factors, insights, and events that prompted them to act collectively to address violence against women. I found that women's movement from individual survival to collective action entails significant changes in consciousness and subjectivity. Women's processes of conscientization are complex, contradictory and often painful because they involve political and psychic dimensions of subjectivity, protracted struggles with contradictions and conflict, and resistance to knowledge that threatens to unsettle relatively stable notions of identity. I suggest that feminist social work theory and practice must take into account three interrelated elements of women's transformative journeys: the discursive and material conditions that facilitate women's movement to collective action; the social, material and psychic costs of women's growth; and the multifaceted and difficult nature of women's journey in recognizing and naming abuse, making sense of their experiences, and acting on this knowledge to work for change. I recommend that feminist social work practice with survivors recognize that survivors can and do contribute to social change, and develop new, more inclusive liberatory models of working with survivors of abuse.     

A Reappraisal of the Quality of Women Candidates

Abstract

This article focuses on “second-wave” feminist perspectives on the role of the state and its effectiveness in removing gender-based inequality in Indian society. The major argument is that feminist rethinking of the relationship of women to the state illustrates the maturity of the Indian women's movement and its recognition that well-planned, mobilized, and effective state policies are crucial to the promotion of women's interests. Recent scholarship has addressed, more systematically and more critically than any in the past, the nexus between social and political processes and the subordination of women. It provides a contextualized and nuanced understanding of the complex interconnections between gender, state, religion, and community. Consequently, not only have feminist writings of the past two decades in India added to current gender sensitive scholarship on the state and development, they have also facilitated the construction of programmatic guides for realizing “strategic gender interests.”     

The Social and Political Implications of Muslim Middle Eastern Women's Participation in Violent Political Conflict

Five cases from the twentieth centuty Islamic Middle East are investigated in terms of the role patterns of women's participation in violent political conflict and the post-conflict social and political consequences of their participation. The study finds extensive role segregation between male and female participants, and virtual absence of women from leadership roles. These conflicts are seen not to be a catalyst for permanent social and political change, and reason for this consequence are discussed.     

‘Putting an ocean between them’: Gender relations among Italian immigrant families in twentieth‐century Argentina

The article starts from the premise that dominant research paradigms of both ‘melting pot’ and ‘multiculturalism’ have concentrated almost exclusively on the institutions of ethnic groups in the study of one of the twentieth century's principal immigrant nations, Argentina. The article makes a case for refocusing the study of immigration in more individual categories. It takes as its example gender, and analyses the role of women in two Italian family networks who emigrated to Argentina. The findings demonstrate that women's roles changed significantly in the migratory process and that women were, in fact, crucial in offering the prospect of social mobility for newly immigrated men. The article concludes by advancing a view beyond the issues of gender on the continuities and discontinuities of political ideologies in the new society.     

Marching toward reproductive justice: coalitional (re) framing of the March for Women's Lives

This article examines how coalition frames develop and what happens to that frame after the formal coalition ends. To that end, I analyze the frame shift around the 2004 March for Women's Lives (March). The March initially focused on established ideas of reproductive rights around which the four national mainstream co‐sponsors previously organized. However, after a newer reproductive justice organization joined the coalition, material and organizing reflected a shift in framing to reproductive justice. How did this change happen? What are the impacts of this event for the women's movement? Through document analysis and interviews, I trace the negotiations that facilitated this framing shift. I argue that this new coalition frame translated into positive lasting changes in organizing for women's reproductive health even as the coalition dissolved and some of the tensions within the larger women's movement remain.     

Farm women in Canada,New Zealand and Australia redefine their rurality

This paper focuses on rural women's networks in Ontario, New Zealand and Australia. It investigates three issues: the social contexts in which farm women in Canada, Australia and New Zealand have developed new networks since the late 1970s; the responses of farm women in each country to the changes in the agricultural industry in the last two decades; and the way farm women's organisations are responding to contemporary changes in rural society. In the concluding section, the farm women's movement is interpreted in terms of agency and structure. It is suggested that the establishment of organisations that can speak for farm women at government levels has countered their deep sense of marginalisation and alienation within their industry. In keeping with the dynamic nature of contemporary society, farm women's organisations will need to be flexible and adaptable in order to facilitate quick responses to rapidly evolving economic an social issues.     

We Did Not Realize about the Gender Issues. So,We Thought It Was a Good Idea

This article explores the link between nationalism, as expressed by the Burman state and ethnic and student opposition movements, and the emergence of a multiethnic women's movement engaged in resistance activities. In focusing on women's involvement in oppositional nation-making projects, this article aims to broaden our understanding of gender and conflict by highlighting women's agency in war. Drawing on interviews carried out with founding members of the women's movement, non-state armed groups and others active in civil society, the article investigates how a gendered political consciousness arose out of dissatisfaction with women's secondary position in armed opposition groups, leading to women forming a movement, not in opposition to conflict per se but in opposition to the rejection of their militarism, in the process redefining notions of political involvement and agency. By invoking solidarity based on a gendered positioning, rather than on an ethnic identity, the women's movement resisted the dominant nation-making projects, and created a nationalism inclusive of multiethnic differences. Burmese women's multiple wartime roles thus serve to upset supposed dichotomies between militancy and peace and victim and combatant, in the process redefining the relationship between gender, nationalism and militancy.     

Whose Body Is It Anyway? Pressures and Control for Women with Learning Disabilities

What women with learning disabilities think and feel about their bodies should be of interest to those concerned with women's rights and disability rights. Yet scant attention appears to have paid to these issues. It has been suggested in the past that one of the 'blessings' of having a learning disability is that one is free from many of the pressures society places on individuals to conform. However, the research presented here suggests that far from being immune to these pressures to conform, women with learning disabilities are, indeed, subject to strong influences, and overt and covert control mechanisms shape their bodies and minds towards achieving certain norms of femininity.     

Undergraduate Activists in the Woman's Movement and Their Public: Attitudes towards Marriage and the Family

Abstract

This paper compares the attitudes towards women's home and famiy roles of two groups of undergraduate women: undergraduate activists in the Women's Liberation Movement and a random sample of non-activist undergraduates. Data from both of these groups pertaining to career aspirations, marital and fertility expectations, communal living arrangements, and possible strains between future family and work roles are examined. While the desire to combine family and career roles is typical of undergraduate women in both groups, there are important differences between activists and non-activists in their plans for integrating the two role constellations. Activist women's responses are also compared with positions on women's family roles indicated by spokeswomen of the wider radical Women's Movement, and some important differences are suggested by the data. The paper concludes by briefly exploring the implications of the findings for future social change in the family and in the society of which it is a part.