The New Militia: War, Politics and Gender in 1750s Britain

Abstract

Given the machismo of Latin American politics and the historical domination of the United States over the region, surprisingly little scholarship on gender and international relations has covered inter-American relations, and even less has explored anti-US resistance. Panama provides a unique case study of a particularly feminised gendered national identity in the face of overwhelming US power. Based on interviews, literature and documents from both countries, this article argues that the sedimentation of a feminised Panama over several decades helped produce the watershed event of the Riots of 1964 in which nationalists unleashed a redemptive violence that aimed not only to change policy but also to subvert their self-image.

A Fatherland of Free Men. Virility and ‘Frailty’ in Spanish Liberalism (1808–1814)

“…In doing so, these qualities were naturalised and universalised: they were now expected to be appropriate of 'all' men of 'all' nations, narrowing the social differences between them and legitimising everywhere, at the same time, their supremacy over women. 7 The languages of civic humanism were fundamental in this process. In this tradition of political thought, freedom is the greatest good both for each individual citizen and for society as a whole.…”

A Man’s Sphere? British Politics in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries

“…Anti-establishment politics focused on the movement to reform the militia, which revelled in the image of the manly householder who would defend all that was dear to him as a husband, a father, a patriot and a Protestant. 30 The politician who benefitted most from the sense of crisis was the Elder Pitt, who rode to power on a wave of patriotic enthusiasm. The first 'popular' prime minister, 'The Great Commoner' projected a masculine image that was patriotic, sincere and above the blandishments of party politics.…”