Engaging with Feminist IR Theory

By focussing on the gender bias embedded in the way IR theorists consider concepts like the state, power and security, feminist thought has the potential to transform the theory and practice of international relations. In practical terms, liberal feminists have been particularly successful in disseminating their arguments in favour of including women in politics, using popular advocacy to get gender on the agenda (Steans, 1998, 162). ‘Gender mainstreaming’ has become a well-known concept within the United Nations, with some of the most symbolic advances in women’s rights emanating from the Security Council in Resolution 1325 (2000) on Gender, Peace and Security, and Resolution 1820 (2008) on the recognition of rape as a weapon of war. Liberal feminist figureheads, like US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, have been instrumental in situating women in policy in the US, and the UK government has identified the prevention of sexual violence in conflict as a main foreign policy objective (McCrummen, 2012; FCO, 2012).

Despite their practical success, liberal feminists have been accused of having a simplistic attitude to women’s empowerment, labelled as an “add women and stir” approach (Steans, 1998, 161). They have also been accused of imperialism, particularly in the context of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, where some post-positivist feminists contended that while these wars were couched in the language of women’s rights and liberation, in reality this language was used to mask more conventional ends of maintaining military power and guaranteeing Western economic interests in the Middle East (Chew, 2008, 80-81; Ruby, 2002, 149; Craft, 2002, 152).

However, in the realm of theory, conventional scholars in the discipline have been somewhat reluctant to engage with feminist arguments (Sylvester 2002, 12; Steans, 2003b). Firstly, there are scholars who dismiss feminist theory, questioning whether feminists are even ‘doing’ international relations (Tickner, 1997, 615). Traditional IR has developed around a self-contained, rationalist, research agenda, situating questions about states and the state system as the central focus (Steans, 2003b, 431). Conversely, feminists employ an ethnographic approach that underlines the importance of individual experiences and social relations rather than state behaviour and abstraction, thus concentrating on people, places, authorities and activities that are outwith the scope of traditional IR (Sylvester, 1999, 10-12). These epistemological differences mean that mainstream theories are concerned with completely separate questions to feminist theorists, making it seem as though feminist analysis is ill-fitted for the study of IR in the conventional sense (Tickner, 1997, 617-620).

Secondly, and building upon the implications of these epistemological differences, there are scholars who try to discipline feminists into contributing “properly” to what they see as an already given research agenda (Sylvester, 1999, 255). In 1989, Robert Keohane responded very positively to the critiques of feminist standpoint theorists on power and interdependence, inviting an alliance between neoliberal institutionalism and feminist standpoint, while rejecting what he saw were less useful forms of feminist theory, like feminist post-modernists.

Weber (1994) responded by disparaging his engagement, arguing that he was attempting to re-impose boundaries on feminist thought by re-presenting feminist standpoint outwith the overall context of feminist literature. She contended that feminist scholars visualise the whole of feminist literature simultaneously, looking through gender lenses to view international relations from several perspectives at once (Weber, 1994, 339). As such, feminists have a tendency to query the idea of “theory” itself because it creates arbitrary boundaries that force the discipline to ignore issues that are not included in the snapshot of the world that is presented by that theory (Sylvester, 1999, 271). From this angle, Keohane is hijacking feminist ideas by removing parts of the literature he dislikes and moulding those he agrees with to his own theories, thereby bringing feminists into line with conventional IR theories (Weber, 1994, 347). Keohane’s encounter with feminists underscores their manifest fear of being co-opted, fundamentally resisting integration into larger bodies of thought within the IR discipline (Tickner, 1997, 620).

Sylvester (1999) identifies two further types of engagement with feminist IR theory. A third group of theorists tip their hat to feminist theories in politically correct footnotes rather than incorporating them into the main text (Sylvester, 1999, 255). Finally, the fourth group of scholars actively engage and incorporate feminist ideas into their writing, such as Brown (1994). Arguably, there exists a fifth group of scholars, who accept gender as a constitutive of identity and an important variant of analysis, and embed gender consciousness into their work without mentioning feminism in particular (see for example, Smith 2004). Sylvester (2002, 11) suggests that feminist literature on gender could have helped develop constructivist thought on identity, but it is not mentioned in key constructivist texts like Wendt’s (1999) Social Theory of International Politics.

Conclusion

In sum, the contribution of feminist IR theory to the discipline as a whole is difficult to assess. It is clear that liberal feminists continue to make a substantial contribution the practice of international politics, affecting change in national and international policies. Similarly, it is evident that feminist analysis can transform the way in which IR scholars understand central concepts like the state, power and security, bringing theory closer to reality by refocusing our interest in soft power, interdependence, individual human rights and women’s rights.

However, debates between liberal feminists, standpoint feminists and post-positivist feminists suggest that there is an inherent tension between their desire to situate women’s voices on the international scene and their goal of deconstructing gender altogether (Sylvester, 1999, 268). Consequently, the feminist approach is somewhat diffuse and difficult to pin down as it is not clear whether they want to completely reconstruct the core of IR or reject the mainstream literature of the discipline and continue to critique from the margins. Overall, however, this division works to keep feminist theory from parodying mainstream literature, with post-modern feminists checking and balancing the tendency in particular of standpoint feminists to claim to speak for all oppressed peoples.

In addition, the epistemological differences between post-positivist feminists and mainstream positivist theorists mean that theoretical discussions between the two are fraught with complications. Each is troubled by the other’s attempt to broaden or narrow the boundaries of the discipline. Arguably, both discourses suffer from the same hubris: both are intent on gate-keeping for their own respective literature in their own particular ways. Feminists’ discomfort with cooption and the need for their theories to be employed in full is equalled by mainstream IR theorists’ controlling approach to the feminist research agenda. The result is a shaky relationship in which neither fully understands the other, and neither wants to get very much closer.

Nonetheless, feminist literature makes a very substantial contribution to IR as a whole. Feminist theory as a whole demonstrates the underlying normative biases embedded in the very foundations of conventional IR theory. They also make evident the ways in which mainstream theories are lacking: to be unable to account for half the population of the world is an almost unbelievable oversight. These deep-seated partialities are, once known, difficult to brush aside. In this sense, feminist theory provides a rich analytical tool that will continue to make insightful and transformative contributions to the IR discipline.