Queering explanatory frameworks for wartime sexual violence against men

Abstract

In this article we argue that prevalent explanatory frameworks of sexual violence against men primarily pursue one line of inquiry, explaining its occurrence as exclusively strategic and systematic, based on heteronormative and homophobic assumptions about violence, gender and sexualities. Feminist IR scholarship has significantly complexified our understanding of conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV), documenting its multiple forms and causes across time and space—thereby moving beyond the persistent opportunism-strategy dichotomy and critically engaging with the dominant ‘rape as a weapon of war’ narrative. Drawing on empirical material from Sri Lanka and northern Uganda we queer the current explanatory frameworks, analyzing multiple instances of CRSV against men that both simultaneously seem to confirm and defy categorizations as opportunistic or strategic, while being situated in broader and systematic warfare dynamics and unequal power-relationships. Our empirical material shows that relying on crude categorizations such as the opportunism–strategy binary is unproductive and essentialist, as it tends to mask over the complexities and messiness of deeply gendered power relationships during times of war. Binary strategy/opportunism categorizations also imply broader unintended political consequences, including the further marginalization of sexual violence acts that fall outside the dominant scripts or binary frameworks—such as sexual violence against men with opportunistic underpinnings.

Feminist Security Studies in Europe: Beyond Western Academics’ Club

“…A number of researchers discuss the causes and consequences of sexual violence against women and men in and out of armed conflicts (Kirby 2013;Swaine 2018;Schulz and Touquet 2020;Zalewski et al 2018). Analyses tend to focus on sexual violence perpetrated during war outside Europe: for example, Schulz (2018) studies sexual violence against men in Northern Uganda; Baaz and Stern (2009) focus on the Democratic Republic of Congo; Boesten (2014) studies Peru.…”

Disparities and Diversification: Feminists in Europe Study War and/or Militaries

“…This literature itself is also becoming increasingly complex and nuanced. Recent scholarship has begun to critique and complicate some widespread assumptions about male victimization in the existing literature, including heteronormative ideas (see Schulz and Touquet 2020) and the sense that such violence necessarily results in the 'emasculation,' 'feminization,' or 'homosexualization' of its victim-survivors (Schulz 2018).…”

From ‘It Rarely Happens’ to ‘It’s Worse for Men’

“…A fixation on the 'weapon/tactic of war' frame obscures additional forms and drivers of sexual violence. This issue has been addressed in the academic literature on sexual violence against women and girls (see Eriksson Baaz and Stern, 2013), but for men and boys, the false assumption is generally that they are sexually abused for strategic reasons only (Meger, 2018; also see Schulz and Touquet, 2020).…”

“…Sexual violence may also be a form of 'entertainment' for the perpetrators, through the staging of forced sexual acts and through sexual humiliation, including of queer or 'effeminate' men (Grupo de Memoria Histórica, 2011; Serrano-Amaya, 2018). These drivers of sexual violence are not necessarily mutually exclusivethe sexual violence and humiliation in Abu Ghraib (Eichert, 2018), or some of the sexual violence against men perpetrated in Bosnia-Herzegovina (Touquet, forthcoming) and in Libya (Chynoweth, 2019a) and elsewhere, has had 'entertainment' aspects to it in addition to other drivers, such as subjugation and dominance (see Schulz and Touquet, 2020).…”

“…Sexual violence against men and boys in armed conflict has garnered increasing attention over the past decade. 1 A growing body of evidence demonstrates that sexual violence against men and boys is perpetrated in many conflicts and that men and boys are also subject to sexual violence during displacement (Chynoweth et al, 2020b;Féron, 2018;Hossain et al, 2014;Johnson et al, 2008Johnson et al, , 2010Schulz, 2020;Schulz and Touquet, 2020;Touquet, 2018a). The notion that little to no research exists is no longer valid.…”