Protective Masculine Norms: A Theoretical Framework of Violence Against Women after Civil Wars

Scholars and policy-makers have increasingly sought to understand the nature and levels of violence against women after civil wars. Empirical and theoretical work describes how violent masculine norms can lead to higher levels of violence against women as former fighters, inculturated to violent militarized practices, bring those violent practices home with them. Backlash may also occur as men return from the warfront to displace women and re-establish their former roles of primary breadwinner in the home (e.g. Ostby, Leiby and Nordas 2019; Webster, Chen and Beardsley 2019). Yet, these theories understand the primary vector of violence to be former fighters themselves rather than seeking to understand how these norms permeate societies more broadly. Drawing upon Enloe's (2000) quintessential insight that militarization permeates far beyond members of fighting forces, this paper presents a theoretical framework for how armed conflict can shape tolerance for violence against women amongst general noncombatant populations. I argue that, to understand whether and when communities tolerate crimes against women after exposure to armed group violence, we need to understand internal dynamics of community self protection, or securitization from the ground-up. In weak states undergoing low scale civil wars, the state and other sources of civilian protection are largely absent and local populations are left to protect themselves. After incidents of armed violence, communities sense a heightened need for self-protection and place higher value on potential providers of security (and their behaviors) within their midst. Gendered ideas about who is able to provide security and protection within the community lead to the systematic devaluation of women's contributions to peace and security, increasing tolerance for `private' forms of violence against women. However, when forms of violence against women are linked with community security provision, there will be less tolerance for those crimes. In describing the theory of protective masculine norms, the paper recognizes the contributions of prominent frameworks about violence against women such as violent masculinities, women's empowerment and backlash theory while identifying theoretical assumptions and evidentiary gaps.