Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism: Critical Approaches to Security Studies 3030372332, 9783030372330

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Aleksandra Gasztold

Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism Critical Approaches to Security Studies

Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism

Aleksandra Gasztold

Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism Critical Approaches to Security Studies

Aleksandra Gasztold Faculty of Political Science and International Studies University of Warsaw Warsaw, Poland

ISBN 978-3-030-37233-0 ISBN 978-3-030-37234-7 https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37234-7

(eBook)

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

To my beloved parents

Preface

This book is the result of experience gained teaching at the University of Warsaw about contemporary terrorism and the fight against it, as well as of many discussions and consultations which took place in other academic centers in Poland and abroad. An important element of my research was the participation in the work of the external expert team in Polish Government Security Center (Rządowe Centrum Bezpieczeństwa, RCB), being a member of the network Women in International Security (WIIS), Poland, and Vice-President of the AT-System Group Foundation (main mission: anti-terrorism awareness). A long participation in the work of this organization and numerous discussions with experts contributed to a wider perspective of studies on terrorism and security policy as it evolved during the redistribution of gender power in international relations. This perspective was also furthered by several fellowships abroad—i.e., in the USA (Indiana University Bloomington, 2013), in Germany (University of Constance 2015, 2016), and in Austria (Vienna University 2015). My stays there allowed me to become familiar with the opinions of the wider academic community on feminist theories and contemporary terrorism. I would like to thank all those whose inspiration, encouragement, and expert advice have contributed to the writing of this book. I am particularly grateful to Prof. Gerald Schneider of the University of Konstanz for his ongoing support and assistance in the organization of library searches and consultations. I am also very grateful to Jean-Jacques Granas for invaluable language consulting. My choice of topic is due to life experience. I was very fortunate to meet many amazing women who taught me the meaning of civil courage and a detached attitude toward reality, and who demonstrate by their attitude that “security is a woman.” It means that there is no security without women. However, I still experience in my academic work compassion for “dealing with typically men issue” [terrorism].

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Preface

Had it not been for the generous help I received with household chores from my husband Przemysław, my parents, and my mother-in-law, I would never have been able to complete this book. Writing it corresponded with the arrival of my son Witold and the challenges of new motherhood. With all my heart I would like to thank my entire family for their unstinting faith in my creative abilities and for their support in managing the chaos of daily life. Warsaw, Poland October 7, 2019

Aleksandra Gasztold

Contents

1

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.1 The Research Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.2 The Research Perspective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.3 The Structure of the Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . .

1 1 3 6 11

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The Theoretical Framework of Feminism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1 Feminism in Post-Positivism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 The Essence of Feminism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3 Gender as a Category of Feminism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4 Feminist Movements and Factions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.5 Feminist Epistemology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.6 Women’s Studies and Gender Studies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.7 Final Remarks: The Phenomenon of Feminist Political Science . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . .

13 13 15 17 19 23 27 28 32

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Feminism and the Question of Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1 Women and the Issue of Violence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.1 The Myth of Protection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.2 Armed Combat: The Masculinization of Militarism . . . . . 3.1.3 The Armed Woman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2 The Male Perspective on Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.1 Women: Political Animals or Deviants? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.2 The Mirage of Matriarchy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.3 Final Remarks: Feminism in Security Studies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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37 38 42 44 46 48 50 52 53 54

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Feminism and the Problem of Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1 The Notion of Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2 Studies on Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3 Feminist Concepts and Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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59 60 64 71 ix

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Contents

4.4

Final Remarks: The Dominance of the Male-Centered Approach in Studies on Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Specificity of Female Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1 The Radicalization of Women Leading to Violent Extremism and Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.1 Radicalization Factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.2 The Radicalization of the Individual and Group Pressure . 5.2 Women in Terrorist Organizations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2.1 Participation and Roles of Female Terrorists . . . . . . . . . . 5.2.2 Women as Terrorists Worldwide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.3 Final Remarks: “Adding Women” to the Studies on Terrorism . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. 85 . 85 . 90 . 98 . 98 . 103 . 115 . 116

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Feminist Approaches to Counterterrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1 The Role of Women in the De-radicalization Process . . . . . . . . . 6.2 The Gender-Oriented Fight Against Terrorism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3 Final Remarks: “Adding Women” to Counterterrorism Policy . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

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74 78 83

123 124 134 139 143

Chapter 1

Introduction

All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts [. . .] W. Shakespeare (1623, p. 194).

1.1

The Research Problem

The research problem discussed in this book is terrorism as a type of violence used for centuries by individuals and organized groups, and even states, to attain their political goals. Terrorism is understood here as a form of radical political violence that is undertaken with premeditation in order to produce a climate of extreme fear, and to influence a wider community than the victims of direct violence—an aim which often leads to the random choice of the place to attack and of the victims, and is used to oppose the community in which the attack takes place. The bestial nature of an attack has as its function to evoke fear and indignation, and sometimes has a retaliatory function (Wilkinson 1996, p. 3). Simply put, terrorism is a means to act upon a given audience through force or violence aimed at persons or property in order to scare and/or coerce governments and/or civilians. Therefore, the term terrorism can be regarded as a means of action whose psychological effect is to evoke fear (Jenkins 1975). Three elements may be used to characterize terrorism: (1) violent tactics based primarily on the use of violence for (2) political purposes by (3) non-state actors (Laqueur 1987, p. 11). These elements form the basis for the study of terrorism (Zięba 2014). Although a consensus on the definition of terrorism has not yet been reached, scholars and experts have provided terrorism to four areas: academic discourse, the position of the state, public debate stimulated by the media, and discussions in extra-system circles which support the use of violence against “repressive power” (Schmid 2012, p. 91). In this book, the author attempts to examine contemporary political terrorism as viewed from the point of view of feminist theory. © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 A. Gasztold, Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37234-7_1

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1 Introduction

The scholarly discourse on political violence that arose in the second half of the twentieth century, mainly within the field of security studies, saw terrorism as an activity proper to men, even though the wave of anarchist-revolutionary terrorism of the 1960s and 1970s included many organizations in which women held a dominant role or in which women constituted almost 40% of members. This was the case for such organizations as the West German Red Army Faction, the Italian Red Brigades, the Japanese Red Army, the Black Panthers and Weatherman in the USA, the Peruvian Sendero Luminoso, and Uruguayan Tupamaros. Only sporadically did perception of women’s role in terrorism break through this gender blindness. Women terrorism was treated as a niche category that distorted the image of political violence—an image reflecting men’s privileged position. The history of terrorism remained “his” story, as did the history of wars. This approach was reproduced in Walter Laqueur’s famous book The Age of Terrorism, first published in 1977, in which the author describes the growth of political violence, from the Russian revolutionaries, through nationalism and separatism, the extreme left and the extreme right, to international terrorism. The author did not perceive the specificity of terrorism with the participation of women, and saw radical political violence as a typically masculine phenomenon. He devoted less than three pages (out of 383) to women terrorists, and his comments begin with the following statement: “Almost a quarter of the Russian terrorists were women, whose devotion and courage are described in the work of many contemporary authors. [. . .] Female terrorists in Ireland or Japan were quite unthinkable and there were only two or three in India. Bomb-throwing was clearly considered a man’s job [. . .]” (Laqueur 1987, p. 79). Despite being in obvious agreement with the widely held view that terrorism was a male occupation, Laqueur noticed a qualitative and quantitative change in the participation of women in the 1970s, even among the Iranian Mujahedin (the People’s Fighters’ Organization of Iran). However, further on in the argument he replicated the so-called male gaze in his analysis of crimes perpetrated by women. Referring to women’s involvement in terrorism in Germany, he wrote that: “Their commitment to terrorism was mainly emotional and could not be shaken by intellectual arguments” (Laqueur 1987, p. 80). The tendency to diminish the role of women is also present in other works that have become landmarks in security studies in English-speaking countries. If women were mentioned at all, their role was either depreciated or contrasted with that of men. Even in the successive editions (1998, 2006, and 2017) of Bruce Hoffman’s famous Inside Terrorism textbook, the author’s reflections devoted to women appear on several pages in the context of their operational capabilities—largely based on deceit—in organizations such as the Algerian National Liberation Front and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam’s suicide bombings, and attacks carried out jointly by Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Even Cindy C. Combs, while distinguishing gender as one of the indicators to be taken into account in research on socialization to terrorism, reiterates, after Laqueur, the opinion that “female members of terrorist groups have proved to be tougher, more fanatical, more loyal, and they have a greater capacity for suffering” than men, in her popular academic textbook Terrorism in the Twenty-First Century. In her opinion, the contemporary activeness of women in terrorism does not reflect the “progress” of terrorism or

1.2 The Research Perspective

3

terrorists themselves (Combs 2011, p. 74). Evolution is not about gender relations, but about tactics which promote the optimization of terrorist action. The choice of the subject of terrorism from the feminist perspective is dictated by the contemporary perception of terrorism and the exposure of its many aspects in scholarly discourse and public debate. Before the events of September 11, 2001, terrorism mainly drew the attention of researchers in the field of politics and sociology. Since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the issue of terrorism studies has been present not only in the political sciences, but also in a wide range of security-related sciences, in law, psychology, anthropology, cultural studies, etc. Terrorism continues to be discussed by researchers in the political and sociological sciences. The escalation of terrorism and the new challenges associated with it, including the participation of women in all contemporary terrorist currents, create the need to redefine the traditional concept of a terrorist as a man. The aim of this work is thus to analyze the problem of terrorism in terms of the assumptions of internally differentiated feminist theory. It will show the relationship between feminism and security, or rather the relationship between feminism and the threat to security through terrorism. In the end this will make it possible to formulate conclusions showing the specificity of female terrorism.

1.2

The Research Perspective

This publication rests on the general research premise that the social sciences are dominated by two main research philosophies (models): positivism and postpositivism. The basic assumption of positivism is based on the view that the researcher functions outside the subject of the research and is able to explain and formulate effectively the laws that govern reality using methods specific to the exact sciences. Positivism assumes that social and political phenomena can be studied in the same manner as the natural sciences. Faith in positivism goes back to the philosophy of Auguste Comte (1798–1857). A later French sociologist, Emile Durkheim (1858–1917), noted that “social facts should be treated as things.” Irrespective of what is being researched, the scientific method remains the same, that is, it is based on a quest for “objectivity, rationalism and an attempt to isolate ties between various phenomena” (Włoch 2015, p. 202). Positivism represents a type of traditional research approach, which is based on rational premises presented in the seventeenth century by the French philosopher François Descartes (1596–1650). Rationalism distinguishes between object (research) and subject (researcher), both of which are by definition immutable, regardless of time and place. The positivist approach to political phenomena is reflected in the works of Carl Schmitt, a twentieth-century lawyer and political scientist, and in part, of Hans Morgenthau, an international relations researcher and whose work was modeled on Schmitt. The latter is considered as a co-author of the theory of political realism. The scientistic trend of the 1940s and 1950s, which included the theory of behaviorism, was an attempt to bring a mathematical approach to the study of international politics and relations (Sałajczyk 1988).

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1 Introduction

On the other hand, the time immediately following the First World War saw the emergence of post-positivist approaches, which question the existing philosophy of science canon based on the premises of the disconnection of the object of research and the subject conducting the research, and that of the objectivity and rationality of research in the social sciences. The post-positivists refer to the so-called participatory history developed in France in the nineteenth century and to the great German sociology of Karl Marx and Max Weber. Marx is the origin of the premise that scientific knowledge is an element of the social superstructure, that is, of consciousness shaped by social existence (the economic basis), and Weber’s of the thesis that in order to explain something, it has to be first interpreted and understood (verstehen). Only a small step stands between this and the statement made by researchers that there is no knowledge that is free from values and interests. The Frankfurt School (Max Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno), established after World War I, was part of this current. It was scholars from this school who analyzed the notion of the Enlightenment and the ideals of freedom, emancipation, and progress that it embodied and came to the paradoxical conclusion that these ideals had been radically deformed and had been turned against the notion itself. This has led the authors to reject traditional theory and to adopt the critical theory whose task is to identify problems, to give direction to scholarly research, and to propose alternatives (Włoch 2015, p. 204). Jürgen Habermas, an eminent disciple of the Frankfurt School, inspired by Marxism, drew attention to the question of the legitimatization of political systems by people. He stressed the importance of deliberation in public life, that is, the resolution of arising conflicts through discussion (Włoch 2015, p. 204). This led directly to forming the bases of critical theory. Two sociologists, Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann, contributed to the development of the post-positivist approach. In the mid-1960s, they pointed out that social reality is created by people, even though it seems objective and external to them, and can, therefore, be treated as a form of awareness (Berger and Luckmann 1966, p. 61). It is, therefore, a social construct, the product of social life, the effect of its reinterpretations, and is part of the scholarly tradition. Other researchers concluded from this that social and political reality does not exist autonomously, but rather as an intersubjective consciousness between people. As Alexander Wendt wrote in the early 1990s—relations between the object and subject of research, including between them and other entities (actors) are defined by the meaning ascribed to them. This means that social relations are fundamentally made up of thoughts and ideas, and not of material elements (Wendt 1992, pp. 396–397; Ringmar 1997). Others later added the study of meaning, signs, signals, beliefs, interpretations, discourse, norms, and the identity of subjects being studies is important for the diagnosis of social relations. According to constructivists the basic ideational (intellectual) element is made up of intersubjective beliefs (ideas, concepts, assumptions, etc.), universally shared by people. It is those beliefs that create and express people’s interests and identity. This means that the social world is a world of human consciousness. The social world constitutes, therefore, an intersubjective sphere—it makes sense to those people who created it, who live within it and who understand it because it is their creation and they fell at home in it.

1.2 The Research Perspective

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Within constructivism several currents can be distinguished. In simple terms, two basic trends can be seen. The first, recognizing the legacy of positivism, which holds that the social world exists in reality, but that its essence is determined by the meanings it is given by entities. It is a moderate trend represented by Alexander Wendt and John Ruggie, two US researchers. The second, a broader current of European provenance, focuses on the consciousness (ideational) plane of social reality. It is a typical post-positivist trend that touches upon postmodernism. It is represented by Nicholas Onuf, Christian Reus-Smit, Scott Burchill, and Thomas Risse-Kappen, among other scholars. Their primary points of reference are the writings of French philosopher and sociologist Michel Foucault (1926–1984). Postmodernism is also very popular among the post-positivists, which is mainly related to the work of Foucault and Jacques Derrida (Arac 1993; Smart 1993). Feminism as a scholarly theory is distinguished mainly on account of the research subject—women and their role in society, politics and international relations. This theory assumes that women’s subjective traits and behaviors in society are different. Feminism undermines fair access to objective reality by singling out the object of social life (fragmentation and decentralization). In a way, it undermines the notion of “identity as a fixed and unified phenomenon” (Sawicki 1988, p. 174). It should be stressed that feminism is not homogenous and many currents, often referred to as waves, can be distinguished in it. Some authors use the plural expression: feminist theories. On the other hand, the point of departure for the deliberations of some authors is the assumption that gender, as well as the role and place this category occupies in political theory and in public life are social constructs. In epistemological terms, feminism can form a part of both positivism and postpositivism. It is classified as a post-positivist current, however, given the importance that researchers accord to the difference between women’s subjective traits and social behaviors, and this is affected by accepted ideas influencing the cognition process. The theory of feminism can be used to analyze the diverse phenomenon of terrorism, as it focuses on research at the level of the individual—a woman and a man. Gender difference, as a constitutive variable of social reality, is of key importance. Feminist concepts have gained in popularity, mainly among English-language scholars. This is reflected not only in scientific debate, research centers, monographs, collective publications, magazines published above all in the United States and the United Kingdom, but also in the school curricula, which have also been adopted in continental Europe—in Germany and Austria, for example. The consequence of the selection of research topic, of the adopted research aim and assumption, is the necessity to answer the following questions: – – – –

What is the essence of feminism as a theory in the social sciences? What are the main currents of feminism? What is the conceptual grid of feminism? How are safety issues perceived by scholars who represent the theory of feminism?

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1 Introduction

– How do feminism representatives analyze political terrorism? – Do gender-related factors influence analyses in this area? – How is the participation of women and men in terrorist groups presented in the literature? – What is the role of stereotypes and prejudices in existing research and analyses? – What is the specificity of female terrorism? – Do counterterrorism efforts be gender-oriented? The main assumption of this book is that research into political violence, and terrorism in particular, is dominated by gender stereotypes and meanings that are part of the so-called male gaze. For this reason, feminist theories may be used to broaden the analysis and outline a fuller picture of this phenomenon. The main hypothesis of this book is that the research on terrorism with the use of the theory of feminism makes it possible to broaden the scope of its analysis and demonstrates that the genesis, structure, functioning, and consequences of terrorism are shaped by cultural, social, and even biological factors. The feminist approach makes it possible to analyze more fully the motives and methods underlying terrorist activity by women, and thus to demonstrate the specific nature of female terrorism. The approach adopted in this book is characteristic of gender studies. It focuses on the differences and similarities between men and women, which are a product of social life, and assumes that the social status and the roles and possibilities of women constitute a relative phenomenon and are determined in relation to the status, position, and roles of men in a given space. The analysis of the research problem being addressed in this book was conducted using the theory of feminism and the feminist approach to international relations (IR). At the same time, this book follows an interdisciplinary approach that is characteristic of the political and security sciences, and makes use of the achievements of various social sciences, mainly political science, international relations science, security studies, sociology, and law. This broadly defined, but actually twofold research problem necessitated the use of many scientific research methods. Among the methods proposed in the typologies of Józef Kukułka (2000, pp. 151–176), and Ziemowit Jacek Pietraś (1984, pp. 25–28), the following were used: methods of theoretical research (classification and systematization, verification), general logical methods (analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction), and empirical methods (indirect observation and description). Other research methods typical of social sciences, such as statistical, comparative, source analysis, analysis, and criticism of the subject literature, were also used.

1.3

The Structure of the Book

The structure of the book is functional, in keeping with the research problem’s successive resolution stages. The second chapter, entitled The Theoretical Frameworks of Feminism, presents the general principles of feminist theory, which I place

1.3 The Structure of the Book

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as part of the post-positivist approach. It presents the essence of feminism, its conceptual grid, gender variable, the waves of development of feminist thinking and theoretical currents (factions) and divisions into the favored feminist epistemology (feminist empiricism, feminist position, feminist postmodernism). The evolution of women’s studies and gender studies has also been highlighted. In the third chapter, entitled Feminism and the Question of Security, I attempted to show the feminist interpretation of various phenomena proper to security studies. In it, I have sought to demonstrate that the presentation of security issues in political science is still dominated by the so-called male skew, which sees the history of political violence as being “his,” not “hers.” I highlighted this issue by referring to armed conflicts and the issue of the re-sexualization of violence. Women are excluded, overlooked, relegated to the role of passive security objects, most often as victims in this narrative. In criticizing this approach, I call for the use of “gender lenses” and for a feminist perspective in order to broaden our knowledge. This chapter seeks primarily to demonstrate that gender specificity in the analysis of the problem—and particularly of the threats—can contribute to the development of studies on security and on political violence and increase the resilience of the state. The fourth chapter, entitled Feminism and the Problem of Terrorism contains a broad analysis of terrorism from the perspective of feminist theory. In it, I have treated terrorism as a type of political violence, and pointed to the indispensability of using feminist terms and concepts in the analysis of this phenomenon. The issue of the position of women in armed conflicts is only one of the aspects I address because, in my view, terrorism can be seen from the prism of either political violence or criminal activity. In this chapter I referred to the achievements of criminology and psychoanalysis in order to emphasize the issue of replication of incomplete and discriminatory views that portray the female criminal as a kind of deviation, a caprice, or an anomaly. The principal argument proposes new demasculinization of the methodology used to study terrorism with the use of feminist theories. The fifth chapter, entitled The Specificity of Female Terrorism, concerns the radicalization of women toward brutal extremism and their participation in terrorism. In this chapter I discuss the process of the radicalization of women. This problem is fast becoming one of the greatest challenges to terrorism countering systems. It is present and is growing within all types of terrorist currents and in all parts of the world. The process of radicalization toward terrorism is increasingly becoming a choice of lifestyle and—as unbelievable as this may seem—of occupation, for women as well as for men. Radicalization can therefore be understood as a process that develops in reference to a particular political movement and concerns the readiness to use extraordinary measures to achieve extremist aims. The models of radicalization to which I refer are those proposed by Alex P. Schmid (2013, pp. 3–5), as well as by Clark McCauley and Sophia Moskalenko (2008). The second part of this chapter deals with women’s motives for involvement in terrorist organizations and their roles in them. I also show that the activeness of women has been observed in national liberation and separatist groups (PKK, ETA, LTTE, RIRA), right-wing (AN, KKK), religious (Hezbollah, Hamas, AQ, LRA), revolutionary (FARC, SL), and single-issue groups (ALF, ELF, SHAC). Women, like men, have different

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1 Introduction

functions in terrorist organizations. Their position is related to their place in the group’s hierarchy and is associated with certain powers. Women’s participation in terrorism is determined by the group’s structure, the distribution of functions and the status associated with them. Women’s duties and privileges arise from their roles. They do not necessarily have to reflect the status of women and men in the community to which the group refers or in which it operates. In the sixth chapter, entitled Feminist Approaches to Counterterrorism I discuss radicalization and female terrorism as challenges to counterterrorism policies. In it I present de-radicalization and deprogramming issues as component parts of a broad anti-terrorism policy. I complement my argumentation by offering examples of programs addressed to women. My main aim is to demonstrate that gender specificity at the level of terrorism prevention may contribute to the development of studies into political violence and to the growth of detection and defense abilities of security institutions. The inclusion of women in prevention programs, especially at the local level, holds the key to improving the tools used to recognize vulnerability to fascination with extreme ideologies and violence. Each chapter ends with conclusions allowing the reader to better understand the difficulty being analyzed in them. The summarizing is placed in seventh and the last chapter. The terminology used in this book calls for more detailed clarification. When discussing various feminism-related issues, the notion of gender must be addressed. The term “gender” (as opposed to the word “sex”) is used to denote the problem of sex/gender and the inequalities related to it. It stands for “a culturally shaped set of attributes and behaviors ascribed to women and men” (Humm 1993, p. 164), and is expressed by the social constructs of “masculinity” and “femininity” which, in turn, are based on oppositions such as strong/weak, assertive/submissive, etc. Gender is a set of attributes, attitudes, social roles, and behaviors attributed by culture to a man or woman. It refers, therefore, to acquired traits. The term sex refers to innate traits such as the genital organs, chromosomes (allosomes), and sex hormones. The term gender is therefore not derived from sex, although traditionally (culturally) social differences between men and women are considered a natural consequence of biology. This link is entirely arbitrary and artificial. In fact, the concept of gender refers to social and psychological constructs, not physical properties. Physical differences between the two sexes matter when they are given a situational context. The notion of gender used in this book refers to differences between men and women that arise and are a product of social and political life. In this sense, the term gender is understood in cultural terms, in contrast to biological ones, which refer to differences which are neither removable nor imposed and which are due to strictly physical factors. In writing this book, I used the extensive existing literature on security and terrorism. Various publications on security and the notions associated with it, such as violence, force, conflict, and war, have proved very useful. Particularly extensive is the literature on the understanding of terrorism, its essence, genesis, forms, occurrence in today’s world, and strategies and policies used to fight it. In this group of sources, the works of authors from Western countries, published mainly in English, were the most useful. I refer to the most recent publications in this area,

1.3 The Structure of the Book

9

which, however, do not take a holistic approach to the phenomenon of terrorism, but focus on selected terrorist organizations. The question of women in terrorist groups is usually discussed while ignoring the feminist perspective. There are some valuable and innovative publications that emphasize gender issues in studies on political violence, however. Examples include works of: Jessica Davies, Women in Modern Terrorism (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers 2017); Swati Parashar, Women and Militant Wars: The Politics of Injury (London: Routledge 2014); Lori Poloni-Staudinger, Candice D. Ortbals, Terrorism and Violent Conflict: Women’s Agency, Leadership and Response, New York: Springer 2013); Tamara Herath, Women in Terrorism: The Case of the LTTE (London: Sage Publication 2012); Mia Bloom, Bombshell: The Many Faces of Women Terrorism (London: Hurst 2011); Laura Sjoberg and Caron E. Gentry (Eds.), Women, Gender and Terrorism (London: The University of Georgia Press 2011); Miranda H. Alison, Women and Political Violence: Female Combatants in Ethno-National Conflict (Routledge: London-New York 2009); Kim R. Cragin and Sarah A. Daly, Women as Terrorists: Mothers, Recruiters and Martyrs (Santa Barbara/Denver/Oxford: Praeger Security International 2008); Cindy D. Ness (Ed.), Female Terrorism and Militancy: Agency, Utility, and Organization (London, New York: Routledge: 2008); Luizella de Cataldo Neuburger and Titziana Valentini, Women and Terrorism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan 1996); Barbara Victor, Army of Roses: Inside the World of Palestinian Women Suicide Bombers (Rodal: Emmaus 2003) and Joshua P. Goldstein War and Gender. How Gender Shapes the War System and Vice Versa (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2001). My analysis rests primarily on English-language sources. This is due to the fact that feminist concepts are developed to a large degree by American and British researchers. I have used mainly the works of authors such as Judith Butler, Sandra Lipsitz Bem, Cynthia Enloe, Jean B. Elshtain, Susan A. Farrell, Sandra Harding, Nancy C. M. Harstock, Judith Lolber, Amy G. Mazur, Elisabeth A. Grosz, Kate Millett, Maria Mies, Spike V. Peterson, Sarah Ruddick, Anne Sisson Runyan, Christine Sylvester, J. Ann Tickner, Nira Yuval-Davis, and Annick T. R. Wibben. Numerous articles published in the following scholarly journals have proved useful: Feminist Studies, Journal of Strategic Security, International Feminist Journal of Politics, International Studies Quarterly, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, Perspectives on Terrorism, Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Societies, Theories of Women’s Studies, Terrorism and Political Violence, Security Studies, and Studies in Conflict and Terrorism. Publications in English, German, French, Russian, and Polish have provided the principal reference base for this book and allowed me to present various points of view. This turned out to be extremely important for the analysis of this book’s subject, due to the differences in the development of research centers dealing with feminism and terrorism in Poland and in the West. Among German-language publications, the works of Jürgen Habermas and Merz Ferdinand deserve special mention. Among French-language publications, I have made extensive use of the works of Laurent Bibard, Jacques Derrida, Simone de Beauvoir, Michel Foucault, and Luce Irigaray, among other authors. Irina Zherebkina’s works in Russian were

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1 Introduction

also useful. A detailed list of the subject literature can be found in the References at the end of each chapter The lack of in-depth analyses of feminist issues by Polish scholars of the political and security sciences turned out to be a limiting factor in writing this book. This may be due to their underestimation of post-positivist theories and to the prevailing stance of reluctance shown toward gender and feminism in the public debate. Attempts to marginalize the achievements of scholarship in areas linked with gender are also common in public debate, despite the fact that numerous Polish academic centers are conducting research in the sphere of gender studies and of the roles and functions of women in public life.1 In the Polish political sciences, feminism is not very popular, although recently, especially in the Białystok, Kielce, Lublin, Poznań, Wrocław, and Warsaw centers, there have been many interesting initiatives aiming to popularize this subject. They take the form, among others, of debates, seminars, scientific conferences, and publications. The principal aim of this type of projects is the conscious and systematic integration of gender issues into all projects carried out at universities, in keeping with the principle of gender mainstreaming. It is worth mentioning the interdisciplinary Unit of Border Questions at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, which has been including issues of feminism, gender, and queer in its didactical programs since 2007/2008. On the other hand, at the University of Warsaw, political scientists embarked on a discussion about women and on women’s behalf. In 2011, a workshop called Gender and Politics (PiP) was established at the Faculty of Journalism and Political Sciences (currently the Faculty of Political Sciences and International Studies) of the University of Warsaw, in which I was an active participant. Cyclically, as part of four PiP editions, performances were organized on International Women’s Day (March 8) in the form of happenings and public debates that exposed gender stereotypes and counteracted discrimination. The feminist-oriented initiatives bring together scholars, men and women, who in their work boldly go beyond the boundaries set by traditional Enlightenment scientific canons, and inspire with innovative didactical methods. However, the mere presence of women in Polish political science does not entail an interest in feminism as a research issue. Hence, no “Polish school of feminism” cannot be distinguished. There continues to be a problem with the stigmatization of women who seek to make their mark in the academic space and the use of the term “feminist” in the negative sense, associated with that which is unpleasant,

1

Research in this area is conducted in various academic centers, in frames of philosophy, sociology, and political science, such as at the University of Warsaw (Graff 2011; Środa 2010); at the Univesrity of Łódź (Desparak & Kuźma 2016; Malinowska et al. 2012); at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań (Bobako 2010; Andruszkiewicz 2017), at the University of Wrocław (Baer 2003), at the Jan Kochanowski University in Kielce (Włodkowska-Bagan & WiniarczykKossakowska 2019), at the Koszalin University of Technology (Gasztold 2015); at the Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin (Maj et al. 2015), at the University of Białystok (WaśkoOwsiejczuk 2018), the Univeristy of Silesia (Ślęczka 1999), and at the University of Szczecin (Zawadzka 2015).

References

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aggressive, and excessively dominating (Gasztold 2017, p. 140). The stigmatization of concepts related to feminism, and above all on the term gender, by circles associated with the Catholic Church and right-wing parties which emerged from the public debate has had a significant influence on this. This does not make it any easier for scholars to discover new research areas. Moreover, the specific two-dimensionality of feminist theory, which imposes certain ideological values which affect not only into a research perspective but also daily practice, does not inspire confidence in the social sciences. The above factors have an influence on the reluctance of the scholarly milieu to deal with the problems of feminism and to follow the trends set in the West, rather than to work out their own concepts in this area.

References Andruszkiewicz, I. (2017). Polityka równości: polskie realia. Wydawnictwo Naukowe WNPiD UAM: Poznań. Arac, J. (Ed.). (1993). After Foucault: Humanistic knowledge, postmodern challenges. New Brunswick, London: Rutgers University Press. Baer, M. (2003). Women’s spaces: Class, gender and the club: An anthropological study of the transitional process in Poland. Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego. Berger, P. L., & Luckmann, T. L. (1966). The social construction of reality: A treatise in the sociology of knowledge. Garden City, NY: Doubleday. Bobako, M. (2010). Demokracja wobec różnicy: multikulturalizm i feminizm w perspektywie uznania polityki. Poznań: Wydawnictwo Poznańskie. Combs, C. C. (2011). Terrorism in the twenty-first century (6th ed.). Boston: Longman. Desparak, I., & Kuźma, I. (Eds.). (2016). Kobiety niepokorne: reformatorki-buntowniczkirewolucjonistki. Łódź: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego. Gasztold, B. (2015). Stereotyped, spirited, and embodied: Representations of women in American Jewish Fiction. Koszalin: Wydawnictwo Politechniki Koszalińskiej. Gasztold, A. (2017). Teorie feministyczne w naukach o polityce. Kwartalnik Naukowy. OAP UW “e-Politikon”, 22, 138–165. Graff, A. (2011). Świat bez kobiet: płeć w polskim życiu politycznym. Warsaw: Wydawnictwo W.A.B. Hoffman, B. (2006). Inside terrorism. New York: Columbia University Press. Humm, M. (1993). Słownik teorii feminizmu. (trans. B. Umińska, J. Mikos). Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Semper. Jenkins, B. M. (1975). International terrorism. A new mode of conflict. In D. Carlton & C. Schaerf (Eds.), International terrorism and world security (pp. 13–49). New York: Halsted Press. Kukułka, J. (2000). Teoria stosunków międzynarodowych. Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Scholar. Laqueur, W. (1987). The age of terrorism (2nd ed.). Boston, Toronto, London: Little, Brown and Company. Maj, D., Marczewska-Rytko, M., & Pomarański, M. (2015). Feminizm. Lublin: Wydawnictwo UMCS. Malinowska, E. et al. (Eds.). (2012). Gender approach in social research. Łódź: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego. McCauley, C., & Moskalenko, S. (2008). Mechanism of political radicalization: Pathways toward terrorism. Terrorism and Political Violence, 20(3), 415–433. Pietraś, Z. J. (1984). Podstawy teorii stosunków międzynarodowych. Lublin: UMCS.

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Ringmar, E. (1997). Alexander Wendt: A social scientist struggling with history. In I. B. Neuman & O. Wæver (Eds.), The future of international relations: Masters in the making? (pp. 267–289). London: Routledge. Sałajczyk, S. (1988). Nurt scjentystyczny w amerykańskiej nauce o stosunkach międzynarodowych. In J. Kukułka (Ed.), Zmienność i instytucjonalizacja stosunków międzynarodowych (pp. 63–79). Warsaw: PWN. Sawicki, J. (1988). Feminism and the power of Foucauldian discourse. In J. Arac (Ed.), After Foucault: Humanistic knowledge, postmodern challenges (pp. 161–178). New Brunswick, London: Rutgers University Press. Schmid, A. P. (2012). The response problem as definition problem. In J. Horgan & K. Braddock (Eds.), Terrorism studies: A reader (pp. 91–98). New York: Routledge. Schmid, A. P. (2013, March). Radicalisation, de-radicalisation, counter-radicalisation: A conceptual discussion and literature review (ICCT research paper). The Hague (pp. 3–5). Retrieved November 6, 2018, from http://www.icct.nl/download/file/ICCT-Schmid-Radicalisation-DeRadicalisation-Counter-Radicalisation-March-2013.pdf Shakespeare, W. (1623). As you like it. In. Idem, Mr. William Shakespeare’s comedies, histories & tragedies (pp. 185–207). First Folio Facsimile, Oxford: Clarendon. Ślęczka, K. (1999). Feminizm. Ideologie i koncepcje współczesnego feminizmu. Katowice: Wydawnictwo “Książnica”. Smart, B. (1993). Postmodernity. New York-London: Routledge. Środa, M. (2010). Kobiety i władza. Warsaw: Wydawnictwo W.A.B. Waśko-Owsiejczuk, E. (Ed.). (2018). Kobiety w polskich służbach mundurowych. Warsaw: Aspra JR. Wendt, A. (1992). Anarchy is what states make of it: The social construction of power politics. International Organization, 46(2, Spring), 396–397. Wilkinson, P. (1996). Inquiry into legislation against terrorism, Report by Lord Lloyd of Berwick, 2 (Cm 3420). October, London: HMSO. Włoch, R. (2015). Teoria krytyczna. In R. Zięba, S. Bieleń, & J. Zając (Eds.), Teorie i podejścia badawcze w nauce o stosunkach międzynarodowych (pp. 201–215). Warsaw: Wydział Dziennikarstwa i Nauk Politycznych UW. Włodkowska-Bagan, A., & Winiarczyk-Kossakowska, M. (2019). A report on women in Polish political science. From diagnosis to cooperation. Warsaw: Maja Rynkowska Publishing House. Retrieved 27 March, 2019, from http://www.kobietywpolitologii.pl/media/10027/a_report_on_ women_in_polish_science.pdf. Zawadzka, K. (2015). Kwestie gender w polityce edukacyjnej. Analiza programów polskich partii politycznych. Świat idei i polityki, 14, 391–412. Zięba, A. (2014). Badania nad terroryzmem w naukach o bezpieczeństwie. In S. Sulowski & M. Brzeziński (Eds.), Trzy wymiary współczesnego bezpieczeństwa (pp. 220–236). Warsaw: Dom Wydawniczy Elipsa.

Chapter 2

The Theoretical Framework of Feminism

Women are to be found on the periphery—on the garbage heap of the symbolic order, among the refuse of the patriarchal narrative. Iwasiów (2008, p. 90)

2.1

Feminism in Post-Positivism

Feminism is the study of the place and roles of women in social and political life. Its principal aim is to contribute to the scholarly and public discourse, and to formulate various ideas and strategies for action. Feminism’s main premise is the refusal to accept social inequalities based on gender. Over the course of several decades, this idea has led to the emergence of different visions of public order, sociocultural theories, currents, philosophies, and methods of action. Amy G. Mazur sees feminism as a classic example of the “contested concept,” in reference to the political practice of women’s movements and to the attitudes of actors outside that movement on the one hand, and to the history of political thought and of other epistemological positions on the other (Mazur 2002, p. 2). The history of the feminist movement and of feminist thought has evolved from focusing on the discrimination of women in the public, social, cultural, and economic spheres, to defining women’s place and role in the world. Today, belief in the cultural coexistence of both genders is favored. Most such currents are post-positivist, and—given their critical view of the social order dominated by men and their calls to change it—are part of critical theory informed by the spirit of Karl Marx’s famous statement: “The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it” (Nicolson 1998, p. 113). “Critical theory,” understood as one theory or a set of critical theories, emerged in the so-called fourth inter-paradigmatic debate of the late 1980s, and is dominant in English-language literature. Polish political scientist Jacek Czaputowicz, however, uses the term “critical theories” in connection with many theories of international relations. While he is aware that feminist theories have been evolving since the end of the First World War, Czaputowicz includes them in the critical theories, as he does with historical sociology (Czaputowicz 2007, p. 383). © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 A. Gasztold, Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37234-7_2

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Even though feminism is a diverse movement, it is usually treated in theoretical works as one of the post-positivist approaches, like constructivism, postmodernism (post-structuralism), critical theory, and green politics. This has to do with a different critical and polemic view of the real world of politics, and with the deconstruction of existing research premises and approaches, in which scholars place themselves not outside their subject of study, but within it. Critical theories in the political sciences are referred to as post-positivism, which is connected with polemicism/criticism of the dominant positivist view of the world of politics. The term post-positivism is used to refer to a set of views which are critical of the positivist premises concerning the philosophy of science. Postpositivist theories criticize the statements underlying the mainstream currents in the political sciences and are based on the assumption that existing paradigms are relative. They thus call for the boundaries set by existing mainstream theories— realism, liberalism, and globalism—to be questioned and crossed (Smith 1995, pp. 24–26). Concepts considered as post-positivist focus on epistemological issues, ontology, and the language used by traditional theoretical concepts, including the exposition of rationality and objective reality. Instead of perceiving the world in terms of an orderly opposition—subject–object, order–anarchy, continuity–shift, woman–man, etc.—post-positivism proposes thinking that is conditioned by the multidimensional nature of the categories being analyzed. It calls for connecting the subject of the study with its object, rather than opposing them to each other. “Thus, an understanding of the objects must include reference to the role of subject or knower in constituting the object of inquiry” (Peterson 1992, p. 189). Four currents of post-positivist thought can be distinguished. The first is related to critical theory (in the singular) and the Frankfurt School. The works of Jürgen Habermas are particularly stressed in this context, due mainly to his criticism of positivism and to his claim about the nonexistence of neutral knowledge (See Habermas 1985). In his view, knowledge should always be considered in connection with a specific interest framework. Habermas’ discourse theory has offered much to feminist thought on power, autonomy, morality, norms, and subjectivity. The second current, called historical sociology—whose leading exponents are Michael Mann, Charles Tilly, and Theda Skocpol—focuses on the genesis and the essence of the state and on its evolution, which is the result of the interaction between internal forces and the external environment (Mann 2005; Tilly 2006; Skocpol 1984), and not only—as was assumed by neorealists in particular—the effect of the external environment. The third current comprises the work of authors who focus on women’s issues and aspects of male dominance, as well as gender and identity research. First of all, mention should be made in this respect to the work of Cynthia Enloe, Jean Elshtain, V. Spike Peterson, Anne Sisson Runyan, and Christine Sylvester (Enloe 2000; Elsthain 1987; Peterson and Sisson Runyan 1999; Sylvester 1994). The fourth current comprises the work of the postmodernists (also called the post-structuralists) Richard K. Ashley and Rob B. J. Walker, James Der Derian and Michael J. Shapiro. Their research ties into the legacy of the French thinkers Pierre Boudrieu, Michel Foucault, and Jacques Derrida. Moreover, they criticize the

2.2 The Essence of Feminism

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rationalism of the Enlightenment and the belief in the possibility of knowing objective truth, because in their view the observer is always implicated in the cognitive process. They also criticize the paradigm of realistic schools, especially from the standpoint of the sciences on international relations (Ashley 1998; Walker 1988, 1993; Der Derian 1987; Bógdał-Brzezińska 2015, pp. 218–219). Among other things, they question the concept of the state’s sovereignty and take the view that it is impossible to define and demarcate the boundaries of the disciplines involved in political studies (Smith 1995, pp. 24–25). These boundaries are a social construct and can thus be constantly crossed (i.e., deconstructed). The creation of any holistic theories aimed at developing generalizations that can be applied toward further deliberation and research is pointless in this respect, because the structure of reality is a matter of convention, as is the truth (Linklater 1992, p. 88). However, the key to cognition can be language, symbolism and assigned meanings, the alternative nature of solutions and the wide range of possible interpretations. The research methods that are typical of postmodernism are texture, discourse, gemology, deconstruction, and logocentrism. The position of relativism and subjectivism is at times used in other currents of post-positivist thought, such as constructivism or postmodernism (Rosenau 1990, 1992). Further on in the book we will see the importance of the relationship between politics and violence. Violence will be of a dual character: that of a process and of conditionality, which can become both a “poison and a remedy” for today’s sovereign communities. This problem can be clearly seen in the debate on restricting freedom for the sake of security in democratic countries (the fight against terrorism provides an excellent example of this).

2.2

The Essence of Feminism

The notion of feminism (and that of the feminist) in the positive sense is connected with the struggle to improve the social position of women. The term was most likely coined by Hubertine Auclert in the paper La Citoyenne in 1882 (Auclert 1882). It is used today to define the organized women’s rights movement; the ideology calling for the recognition of women’s role and place in the world and for transformations leading primarily to equality; and also as a theory in the social sciences. Most often, the notion of feminism is understood as a manifesto of liberation from the unjust situation in which women find themselves. Its negative connotations, depicting feminist women as filled, among other things, with aggression toward men, is widespread, however. Feminism is not very popular among political scientists. It is seen as articulating the postulates of certain groups of women and as contributing little to understanding of the world and its political mechanisms. Feminist research in the field of international relations in particular has been influenced by articles published in American academic journals, such as Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society (University of Chicago, published since 1975), Feminist Studies (Department of Women’s Studies,

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University of Maryland, published since 1980), Journal of Women, Politics & Policy: A Quarterly Journal of Research & Policy Studies (called Women and Politics before 1980, Institute for Women’s Policy Research, George Washington University), Women’s Studies International Forum (called Women’s Studies International Quarterly before 1978) and the British Millennium: Journal of International Relations (London School of Economics and Political Science, published since 1971) and the International Feminist Journal of Politics, a quarterly established in 1999 within the framework of the International Studies Association (ISA). In 1987, the journal Signs carried an article in which Jane Flax formulated her famous critique against established cognitive theory. She stressed that it had only been a few years since the potential existence of three types of history in each culture—his, hers, and ours—had been discovered. At the same time, the equivalence of his and ours was universally taken for granted, and when women were noticed, it was rather as a deviation and, therefore, as an exception to the rule. An examination of the political and social reality that includes “the pervasive impact of gender relations on all aspects” of culture is rare in research (Flax 1987, p. 629). In scientific terms, feminism is mostly included in the post-positivist current on account of its criticism and opposition to the dominant gender hierarchies and the so-called male gaze.1 Hence, like other post-positivist concepts, feminism presupposes the crossing of boundaries, and thus criticism of positivist achievements, and deconstruction of theory due to variable gender. While feminists are largely women, a growing number of men among feminist scholars have been observed. Only rarely are they called “feminists”—more frequently they are referred to as “pro-feminists” or “feminist sympathizers,” as if only women could be expected to engage in furthering the postulates of feminism, with men being reduced to a supportive or a countering/ negationist role (Ślęczka 1999, p. 12). This is also related to another widespread phenomenon in the political sciences: the allocation of the role of subject and active participant of politics to men. This is stressed by Christine Sylvester who, in her analysis of international relations theory, claims that “‘women’ are allocated other roles from which they can go on to visit international relations, exclusively for the purpose of providing support services for the policies of ‘men’” (Sylvester 1994, p. 4). She notes, moreover, that men are even identified with states and their policies. This is reflected, among other things, in the presentation of men as having a socially stronger position than women, as decision-makers, politicians, soldiers, terrorists, etc. In this manner, they are inserted—with the help of specially designed theories—into specific places and positions and act (play their role) in keeping with the premise adopted by the scholar. Such a premise, however, may be due to an erroneous imagination (and thus, theorizing) or be the reflection of the innate talents of the person being analyzed. The allocation of specific traits and values does not necessarily reflect reality (Sylvester 1994, p. 5).

1

Term introduced by Laura Mulvey (1975).

2.3 Gender as a Category of Feminism

2.3

17

Gender as a Category of Feminism

The notion binding various interpretations of feminism is the abovementioned category of gender that serves to define a trait which permeates all aspects of social life and, hence, is used in scholarly debates about them. The term is derived from the Latin word genus meaning “kind.” In English, the word denotes grammatical gender and sex. It can be used to define cultural and social gender, as well as gender identity, in contrast to the term “sex,” which stands for biological traits (anatomy, hormones, physiognomy). The term “gender” is indicative of a multidisciplinary approach, because it involves many spheres of social life and several scholarly disciplines. Feminists believe that, traditionally, research has negated cultural gender and, therefore, all attempts to extend gender neutrality to all analyses which center on the human being and its interactions in the public sphere. They hold the view that existing scientific paradigms falsify reality by creating an illusory myth of objectivity, without taking into account the factors influencing the roles and place of the subjects of politics (See more: Rosicki 2012). The polarization of traits ascribed to women and men is uninterruptedly created and recreated with the help, if only, of the roles and standards of accepted behavior, and by social norms and stereotypes ascribed to the masculine and the feminine. “Nature defines if we are of the masculine or feminine sex; culture decides what it means to be of the masculine or feminine sex” (Merz 1979, p. 5). Sexual difference is natural because it arises from physical traits and does not lead to the formation of moral, political, or social norms, and because it is not relative. It is given meaning only by the cultural context in which it is interpreted. Thus the division of the sexes has a dual dimension: “It is always natural and cultural, real and symbolic, biological and psychological” (Agaciński 2000, p. 25). In contrast, the notion of gender is conditioned by stereotypes, roles, and behaviors adopted by men and women in a specific historical period and in a given culture, language, or civilizational circle. It is consolidated by the process of socialization. It is thus an acquired element of personality and action, and forms a structure on top of the biological traits. According to Anna Titkow, the fundamental function of the gender category is to articulate the social organization of sexual differences (Titkow 2007, p. 28). Gender is not, however, the sole and unequivocal term that feminism refers to. Judith Butler, the author of the concept of gender performativity, expressed her firm protest against viewing feminist thought solely through the prism of cultural gender. She had doubts about the emphasis placed on the distinction between sex and gender. In her view, the blurred boundaries between that which is biological and that which is social do not preclude the study of the entirety of complex issues having to do with women. While biological sex can define the identity of the individual, it is still historically conditioned cultural gender that informs behavior and the means of self-expression through continuous repetition and replication. Through reference to biological facticity (which is not neutral), the definition of cultural and social gender legitimizes and reproduces “doing gender,” that is, “gender performativity.” It then becomes a fact around which specific social

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relations, inequalities, and discrimination develop. Biological sex does not impose behavior consistent with cultural gender. In Butler’s view, the question about sexual dissimilarity is and will continue to be asked—and will remain an open question. The patterns of man and woman are thus created by culture. As difference is an unstable category created by discourse, she suggested replacing it with differentiation, in reference to Derrida’s term différence (See Butler 1999, 2005). Every culture that finds expression through language refers to that which is attributed to each sex. These meanings also include expectations about how each person should behave. Exaggerated expectations are perpetuated as gender stereotypes that can be related to specific traits connected with sex (Lolber and Farrell 1991; Basow 1992; Wharton 2011). Through the generalization of such stereotypes and through the so-called male gaze, generalizations connected with the articulation of an individual’s needs and political interests do not usually entail any gender differentiation or affect the real position of a given person in society. They are concentrated on the human being, the citizen, the man. For this reason, supporters of the feminist perspective point out that the omission of the gender aspect excludes from the scope of research, in the field of politics, for example, certain conditions and certain processes which are important for the world of politics (True 1996, pp. 211–212). Therefore, Simone de Beauvoir’s thesis that patriarchal culture adopts positive values and behavior ascribed to men as norms, while women appear as the “other” and negative element of the social structure, seems valid (de Beauvoir 1949). Postmodern humanities endeavor to cross borders and discover otherness, and this despite the acceptance of the fact that feeling one’s own and someone else’s otherness (we–they, me–you) was considered the most universal of emotional and social experiences. In contrast, Nancy C. M. Hartsock, who belongs to the post-Marxist current of feminism, has shown—using the psychoanalytical Object Relations Theory—that differences in gender identity are due to post-Oedipal cleavages perpetuated in phallocentric patriarchal communities. They shape a man’s ego on the basis of opposition to mothers and on the emulation of absent fathers. Distinguishing oneself—or rather separating oneself—from one’s parents contributes to the shaping of the so-called “abstract masculinity” and, therefore to destructive dualisms, such as abstract/concrete, mind/body, culture/nature, ideal/real, stasis/change. Only one element of each pair, however, is associated with the male sex, and thus desirable. The female ego, in contrast, is more empathic and has the ability to form a community because, among other things, of the absence of a need for a sharp separation from mothers. One’s sense of self is conditioned by the experience of a positive relationship and its continuity, as well as by contact with the natural world (Hartsock 2003, pp. 295–299; Tormey and Townshend 2006).

2.4 Feminist Movements and Factions

2.4

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Feminist Movements and Factions

Feminism is not homogenous. The literature distinguishes the “first phase,” the suffrage movement of the turn of the nineteenth to the twentieth centuries, the feminism of the “second wave,” which began in the 1960s and 1970s, and some distinguish a “third wave,” referred to as post-feminism (Gable 1999). The first wave (also called the “old wave”) arose along with the internal criticism of enlightened liberalism, and is associated with the struggle for the civic rights of women. In the United States its beginnings are associated with the letter Abigail Adams wrote in 1776 to her husband John Adams and future president of the United States (1797–1801), in which she enjoined him to “remember the ladies” while working on legislation shaping the new American state. The 1792 book A Vindication of the Rights of Woman: With Strictures on Political and Moral Subjects, in which the author, Englishwoman Mary Wollstonecraft, demanded rights for women to decide about their own fate, became a Bible of sorts (Wollstonecraft 1891), even though a year earlier Frenchwoman Olympe de Gouges published the Déclaration des droits de la femme et de la citoyenne (de Gouges 1995). The ideological ground for the feminist movement was laid out in the 1830s, alongside the struggle to abolish slavery. Abolitionist slogans served as an inspiration for women’s emancipation. Demands for the right to vote (suffrage) for women and the right for them to run for office were included in the declaration ending the First Convention on Women’s Rights held in Seneca Falls, NY on July 19–20, 1848. The specific aims characteristic for this period were connected with a number of public life spheres primarily subject to statutory law. Among them, the following demands and tasks can be singled out: • Political equality (this postulate concerned mainly electoral rights) • Economic equality (equal pay to that of men, the right to dispose off one’s earnings and assets) • Reform of family law (the repeal of wives’ dependence on their husbands and spousal equality with regard to children) • Education reform (giving women access to higher education) • General social matters (demands for combating alcoholism and other social ills) • International policy questions (demands concerning disarmament and peaceful conflict resolution) The first wave did not formulate a cohesive theory, but was nevertheless of great importance in consolidating the issues related to the emancipation of women. The first country to grant women the right to vote at the national level was New Zealand in 1893.

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The second wave,2 however, articulated social demands with an emphasis on liberalization and space for women, that is, women centeredness.3 This had to do with the popularization of demands for equality and stressing the aspect of race, ethnicity, and denomination, and economic factors affecting the situation of women. The movement’s efforts gravitated toward three issues: civic rights, anti-war demands, and libertarian theory. In her 1963 book The Feminine Mystique (Friedan 1963), Betty Friedan addressed the position of women, also referred to in the United States as the “problem that has no name.” The way that Friedan described the model of a woman limited to the role of mother, wife, and homemaker (and by the same, condemned to a life without a sense of purpose and subject to depression) made her the voice of her generation and a precursor of the liberal feminist current. She became actively involved in the effort to integrate women in America’s social and political structures, and especially in its labor market. In 1966 she founded the National Organization for Women (NOW). Among other things, the second wave is also known because of the women liberalization currents called radical feminism (struggling against sexism and discrimination) and Marxist feminism. These introduced many new notions, concentrating on the juxtaposition of the notions of sex/gender, nature/culture, and masculinity/femininity. In time, it turned out that these notions were not stable, much less distinct. As part of the second wave, two main types of feminism took shape in terms of the perception of the relationship between the sexes. The first was the feminism of identity (also called egalitarian feminism) of the 1960s and 1970s, based on the view that a human being has both feminine and masculine traits (the androgenic concept). Androgyny was seen as something positive for the individual, male or female, because it did not limit freedom in the social sphere. It made choices possible for men and women, slightly justifying them. Second-wave feminist theorists began to argue that differences in behavior were due to social convention and conditioning and, thus, that their criticism should be aimed primarily at culture-shaping inequalities such as the socialization of girls, and their demands should aim for a revision of social roles. The main idea was that such differences were not due to biology but that they were caused by culturally imposed gender roles. In the 1980s, the feminism of difference, resting on the assumption that differences between men and women were real, began to take on a dominant position. Such differences did not preclude equality, which can be attained by reshaping the social order in which, in addition to masculine experiences and positions, women’s contributions would also be taken into account (Gardner 2006, p. 15). Today, many proponents of feminist thought conduct their research with reference to other theories and concepts, like critical theory, post-structuralism, post-colonialism, and queer theory (Jagose 2001; Reiter 2013). The third wave is at times described as post-feminism, in which a radical and a moderate faction can be discerned. The

2 This notion was introduced by Marsha Weinman Lear in The New York Magazine of March 10, 1968. 3 This term was adopted mainly within the medical sciences. See Giarratano (2016).

2.4 Feminist Movements and Factions

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debate is focused on the condition of women (including their mental condition) in the contemporary world. Feminism is perceived rather as a form of struggle for the recognition of women’s distinctiveness, but not separateness, as separateness would entail exclusion. For example, it is pointed out that the study of contemporary Western democracies should take into consideration the problems of the politicization of identity, whose principal elements are precisely the issues of exclusion and inequality, but in doing so it should also identify different perceptions of the term identity, including its ethnic, cultural, religious, gender, and sexual aspects, etc. Monika Bobako proposes to use the terms difference and identity interchangeably, and considers relationality (particularly in connection with exclusion/“otherness” and with subordination) and collectivity (group identification by self or others) to be their main characteristics (Bobako 2010, pp. 9–10). Amy G. Mazur in her research on the condition of feminist politics in contemporary democracies does not focus on terms that form the bond of feminism (such as gender, sex, difference), but treats women as a socially, economically, and culturally diverse group with a specific status in the public and private spheres and which is subjected to the real actions of the state. In relation to this group politics may deepen, reduce, or eliminate inequalities between men and women that are rooted in a gender-based hierarchy or in the patriarchate. As Mazur sees it, Feminist Comparative Policy (FCP) analysis consists of eight areas (subsectors): (1) equal rights policy (blueprint policy/equality policies); (2) the promotion of women in politics (political representation policy); (3) equal employment policy; (4) a policy of reconciliation between men and women, mainly concerned with work and responsibilities at home; (5) family law policy; (6) body policy I: reproductive rights; (7) body policy II: sexuality and violence; and (8) public service delivery policy (Mazur 2002). Feminist analysis includes many different approaches and is not limited to one cohesive research concept. Cynthia Enloe, a leading scholar of feminism, lists the following feminist currents or foci: liberal, socialist, radical, substructural, and postcolonial (Enloe 2007, p. 104). Maggie Humm, in The Dictionary of Feminist Theory, singles out, among others types of feminism, the abolitionist, anarchist, Christian, liberal, Marxist, radical, etc. (Humm 1989). In Polish political science mentioned are many currents in feminism, like liberal, radical, socialist, cultural, and power feminism, or the most popular divisions of feminism into the liberal, Marxist, and postmodernist currents (Gasztold 2017, p. 149). For example, the corporeal feminist current has taken shape as part of postmodernist philosophy and focuses on the development of the theory of the female body as the basis of human existence (See Jaggar and Bordo 1989; Grosz 1994). In political terms, one can distinguish a general division of feminism into the liberal, socialist, Marxist, radical, lesbian, black, Latin American, anti-colonial, anarcho-feminist, and ecofeminist currents. When, however, the determinant criterion is to be a specific concept or theory which serves as the main research tool, one can single out existential feminism,

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psychoanalytical feminism, and cyber-feminism. Divisions within the framework of specific social problems have led to the emergence of anti-pornographic, anticensorship, religious, Catholic, essentialist, constructivist, new-feminist and other currents.4 Feminist theory, like other scientific theories, makes use of categories and terms that are specific to it. Joanna Bator sees “interpretative categories of each feminist theory: sexual differences, women and emancipation” as being fundamental. On the other hand, she sees “perspectivism, intersexuality, references to knowledge/authority, to sexual difference, fundamentality, the relationship between theory and practice, the emphasis on what in ‘masculine’ tradition was usually omitted, incidental, private, carnal, and feminine” as characteristic features of feminism (Bator 2001, pp. 29–34 and 44). The common denominator of all currents of feminism is the conviction that women in society are victimized (oppressed) on account of their sex, that this oppression is perpetuated by the social system, and that this situation can and should be changed. And it is precisely women who are to be the causative factor of this change. It follows that very often the ideology of feminism translates into activeness, including involvement in social, political, artistic, or theoretical-research endeavors whose aim is the transformation of knowledge. The main levels of “oppression of women as part of the system of knowledge” that should be opposed are sexism, the patriarchy and phallogocentrism (Grosz 1988, p. 93). In patriarchal systems in particular, sex defines biology (nature) and the fate of both women and men. The work in which the author demonstrated that gender is a cultural and not innate construct, was the 1968 book by Robert J. Stoller about the shaping of gender identity in the postnatal period (Stoller 1968). Ann Oakley introduced this term to sociology. The terms “masculine” and “feminine” refer to a set of attributes that characterize the behavior and personality traits determined by biology and are completed by recognized social values. Masculine standards determine normality and affect the stereotyping and subordination of women as a group (Oakley 1972). Those studies began to be used to show that sex does not determine a woman’s life, while gender opened up new possibilities, even if it was relative. Nonetheless, this is the term that most feminists began to use (Barry 1996, p. 188). In the initial phase, the aim of feminist research was to examine the androcentric viewpoint—commonly regarded as real and normal—which affected theoretical models in political science in an unequivocal manner. Such research was mainly based on the belief in the existence of gender neutrality, and thus if, for example, the issue of rational decision-making was analyzed, a model was developed based on traits socially attributed to men. In classic publications on foreign policy decisionmaking, even if much attention was paid to the personal characteristics of the decision-maker, no distinction was made about whether this person was a man or a woman (Verba 1961; Frankel 1963; Allison 1969; Lentner 1974; Janis 1989; Steinbruner 2002). Yet another aim of feminism was the reconstruction of women’s

4

“Nurty feminizmu” In. Rudaś-Grodzka et al. (2014, p. 251).

2.5 Feminist Epistemology

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presence in many social contexts, including that of political violence. The intention was to analyze women as a subject, and their experiences, with the simultaneous premise that these were distinct from the experiences of men, because social conditions can be different precisely on account of the abovementioned gender roles and the meaning attributed to them. This stage in the development of feminism is described as “adding women.” It held as priorities to take into account women as the subject of analysis and gender as a variable. Most attempts undertaken in this respect, however, failed to have a significant impact either on traditional research models and techniques, or on the conceptual framework of the political sciences. For the development of feminist thought, a language that would fully stress the presence of women in social and political life is considered important. This is especially valuable given the widespread underrepresentation of women in culture. Judith Butler even calls for more work on language that seems “necessary to foster the political visibility of women” (Butler 2005, p. 145). In the third phase of its development, feminist research joined the post-positivist criticism trend. Today, this research concentrates on questioning existing theoretical and methodological assumptions and points in particular to inconsistencies in language and terminology which place women in a lower/less favorable position with regard to men. This is mainly connected to the placement of women in a given context (Peterson 1992, pp. 191–197).

2.5

Feminist Epistemology

The existence of divisions within feminism does not mean that as successive phases of scientific deliberations took place, the results of earlier research have been forgotten. In contemporary feminist concepts one can find all the above positions, and this is reflected in the existence of different cognition theories. The rise of feminism has contributed above all to giving meaning to the variable of gender and to the reevaluation of many androcentric assumptions about, among other things, the subject of cognition, rationality, and objectivity. It was further found that cognition could not be sexually neutral because it is socially situated and “reflects the gendered perspective of the knowing agent” (Cudd and Andreasen 2005, p. 173). Feminists have not, however, developed a unified answer about how gender determines the subject of cognition in relation to the object, and whether it is necessary to develop a single feminist epistemology for all currents. According to Sandra Harding, the first outstanding feminist epistemology is feminist empiricism (Harding 1986, pp. 24–28; See also Millman and Kanter 1975), whose framework includes positivist scientific standards recognizing that statements about knowledge can be justified mainly through experience. “Feminist empiricism shares this basic assumption, but deviates from traditional empiricism by rejecting some of its basic assumptions—such as the presumed value-neutrality of inquiry” and of their object. Cognition is conditional upon gender and is not, therefore, neutral. Thus value-neutrality should not be perceived as the desirable

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aim of science. This approach presupposes that placing the masculine element at the center of attention can be eliminated through strict adherence to existing methodological norms of reasoning, logic, measurement, and verification. The sex of the researcher is only significant insofar as women find it easier to notice androcentric distortions (Light and Halliday 1994; Longino 1987; Anderson 2005). In reference to the construction of gender and the femininity–masculinity juxtaposition related to it, the empirical current undermines the reality of social gender constructions, primarily by negating the thesis about unequal opportunities and abilities, including intellectual ones, between men and women. The use of notions, assumptions, and structures characteristic of feminism in empirical studies by researchers of Feminist Comparative Policy (FCP), for example, can be described as the operationalization of feminist theory (Mazur 2002, p. 7). Feminist empiricism therefore focuses on proving that men and women have the same traits and can thus perform the same roles, also in the world of politics (True 1996, p. 214). This is therefore an assumption based on liberalism, which maintains that all people are equal. This approach is criticized within the feminist movement itself. Above all, it is reproached for replicating “male role models” with regard to women and of harboring a utopian belief in the existence of something like “good science” expressed, among other ways, in the correct asking of questions (See Harding 1991, pp. 15–16, 2005). The conviction that expanding the sciences so as to include the feminine element would enhance the ability to acquire new knowledge will not necessarily affect that knowledge’s reality and credibility. The trend of liberal feminism is an example of the lack of influence on reality of knowledge formulated by feminists. Its main aim is to provide women in society with the same rights as those of white privileged adult men (in the liberal democracies) (Sylvester 1994, pp. 37–41). The paramount aspect of this assumption is that of the equal rights of every individual, regardless of gender. Feminist empiricism recognizes certain scientific assumptions as being true, while liberal feminism, which is a current, accepts the theoretical foundations of liberalism, but criticizes their use in practice, including their application to women. Women scholars from another epistemological stance called feminist standpoint proposed that the equalization of women with men be abandoned. The main idea behind this point of view is to consider social reality through the prism of women’s experiences. Thus, it is a form of developing feminist consciousness. It analyzes, among other things, the sources of violence and oppression against women, and this broadens knowledge of global phenomena and of humanity in general (See, for example, Tickner 2001). Women are therefore privileged as researchers, but it is worth noting that there is no single common stance. The epistemic authority of many previously marginalized groups (on account of race, gender, sexual preference, class, ethnicity, etc.) is assumed. Post-Marxist feminists tried to frame the knowledge gained from women’s experience (and their struggle against oppression) in categories of certainty (See, for example, Hartsock 2003). In their research, proponents of the female perspective contrast the social construction of “femininity” with that of “masculinity,” but their view of femininity is more positive and sometimes the superiority they grant it serves to give it a higher

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moral status. This can be seen most clearly in the so-called “maternal thinking” current. It is based on the claim that women are a better moral role model given their experience of maternity and their caring traits. Among other things, this concept is connected with the concept of the “natural peacefulness of women” given their role as mothers. In this view, a woman is perceived through the prism of her biological traits, as a giver of life with, therefore, a lesser inclination to take it away. This view is often contrasted with the aggression and violence of men, particularly in the political sphere, such as armed conflicts, wars, or terrorism. This view did not find many supporters in the post-positivist current, mainly because it overemphasizes gender differences, and this contributes to the perpetuation of stereotypes and thus to the reinforcement of the social structures of femininity and masculinity (True 1996, p. 215). The proponents of postmodernism are firmly opposed to the use of dichotomy in any form. Within the framework of postmodern theories there are such concepts as post-feminism, linguistic feminism, and ludic feminism (Hyży 2003, p. 68). The claim that “femininity” and “masculinity” are social constructs that perpetuate unequal relations between the two sexes can be disproved by pointing to examples of active and voluntary participation by women in political violence, including acts of terrorism, and armed conflicts, and to examples of them working for the armaments industry (Woollacott 1998). In postmodernism, the existence of a reality outside the structure given to it by the scholar is negated. This hampers the creation of a feminist epistemology because the feminist concept is anchored in the social processes which it rejects. If feminism continues to strive toward building the entirety of cognition and setting its boundaries, it is feared that it may itself become a hierarchical system of knowledge, which is a formula negated by postmodernism. However, this trend of feminism is incohesive, mainly due to the lack of consistency in its view of the relativity of science and subjectivity of cognition on the one hand, and its emphasis on the commitment (of feminism) to change objective reality on the other. Rejection of the category of agency deprives feminist identity and politics of their subjectivity (Light and Halliday 1994, pp. 50–51). Two directions related to feminism can be singled out within postmodernism: feminist postmodernism and postmodern feminism. The first is viewed as a branch of the French philosophy of post-structuralism, with the prevailing tendency to deconstruct power (authority) referring to the works of Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida (Foucault 1969; Derrida 1972). In this current, research has developed (mainly in France) based on the analysis (deconstruction) of language and on the reign of phallocentric symbolism (Irigaray 1974, 2003). These conclusions were then developed by the well-known constructivists Nicholas Onuf and Friedrich Kratochwil, who believed that the conceptualization of the language of social relations and the study of their linguistic aspects were crucial in epistemology (Onuf 1989, pp. 66–82, 2013, pp. 1–2 and 29; Kratochwil 1989, pp. 34 et seq.). On the other side of the Atlantic, other aspects of post-structuralism became popular, such as an emphasis on the experience of women and, thus, the narrative of women about women (the so-called écriture féminine) (Sylvester 1994, p. 12). In turn, postmodern feminism was born from the negation of both the feminist point of

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Table 2.1 Currents in feminist theory Currents Feminist empiricism

Representatives Marcia Millman Rosabeth Moss Kanter Judith Stiehm

Feminist standpoint

Cynthia Enloe Maria Mies J. Ann Tickner

Feminist postmodernism

Christine Sylvester Jean Bethke Elshtain Cynthia Weber

Premises The proper definition of women’s activities in various areas of international politics requires a strict adherence to existing scientific standards. The existing methodology is warped by social prejudices against women. Scientific epistemology is not objective, as even good knowledge does not repeal lasting stereotypes about women. There is a need to build a feminist epistemology, to study the sources of discrimination against women and to include the feminine viewpoint in the study of international relations. The criteria for legitimating knowledge are disturbed on account of sex. “Women” are a category invented in order to maintain the inequality, domination, and subordination that are seen as natural.

Source: Czaputowicz (2007, p. 377)

view and the skepticism of postmodern feminism. Its utopian vision is first and foremost aimed at “placing women at the centre and decentralize everything outside women” (Ferguson 1993, p. 3). Questions important for political life arise, such as how manifestations of gender hierarchy co-determine power relationships and interactions between states. For example, Cynthia Weber wonders how sexuality and queer refer to and influence international sovereignty, security, and politics (Weber 2016). However, in the thicket of assumptions and negations of positivist philosophy it is difficult to fully present its essence in this chapter. Jacek Czaputowicz attempted to analyze the views of the authors representing the three main feminist currents in the context of research on international relations. His conclusions are set out in Table 2.1. The diverse range of attitudes and currents notwithstanding, the aim of feminist works seems to be: (1) to examine critically the traditional theories and concepts, paradigms and language, and (2) to create a feminist conceptual grid, assumptions, and explanations that are useful on both the theoretical and practical levels (Light and Halliday 1994, p. 51). Feminism recognizes that traditional theories in the political sciences as well as critical theories marginalize the importance of women and the role of gender as a category of social and political life (True 1996, p. 226). Feminism’s main research method is to raise awareness and thus to make this approach universal both in theory and in practice (Hartsock 1979). The role of quantitative research, viewed as a patriarchal instrument used to lock science within the framework of the male vision, is being marginalized. Feminism sees itself as new knowledge about already existing problems. The primary purpose of research within the scope of nonhomogeneous feminism is to create a theory based on experience and in women’s language and to raise questions about matters that are passed over in silence (Harding 1987). In this, the emotional involvement of the researcher is accepted, in contrast to the artificiality of

2.6 Women’s Studies and Gender Studies

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male objectivism and detachment. This is because the research process is meant to shape the awareness of both the subject (object) of research and the researcher. They are meant to reflect practical knowledge which, among other things, depends on everyday experience (DuBois 1983; Stanley and Wise 1990). For example, in her research Maria Mies proposes to take into account: (1) conscious favoring, (2) the experience of women (conducting research “from the bottom up”), and (3) practical traits and solutions (traits of awakening consciousness) (Mies 1983). Qualitative research is thus favored, in particular participatory observation, experience analysis, and case studies (Reinharz 1979). In this manner, the researcher can play the role not of an expert, but of a learner, and thus be accepting of the result and of his changing initial assumptions. An important assumption is the use in research of different types of research methods and techniques, as well as an appropriate analysis of the material gathered in order to broaden the knowledge about the role of women, but also about the specific nature of what is masculine and feminine, and, therefore, about cultural and social tensions related to gender. The “sex” of the source should also be checked, as a factor that determines narration and is in a way “contaminated” with a specific perspective (the so-called male gaze). Men may show a tendency to reproduce in works about women and dedicated to women their imaginings about them, thus distorting reality. However, Agnieszka Jagodzińska believes that, particularly in historical works “the absence of women in the source material is illusory, and the degree of reconstruction of the female voice in the joint historical narrative depends not only on the type of source, but also on the way it is read” (Jagodzińska 2010, p. 42).

2.6

Women’s Studies and Gender Studies

The main aim of women’s studies is to examine issues related to power, social status, and gender. They focus mainly on women’s individual and collective experience in the social and cultural reality. Women’s studies are a vague concept as it can also refer to academic activity and to social activities, e.g., awareness raising educational workshops. Its forms may thus vary, although in the 1960s the initiative for courses for women, for example, originated in the academic community (Cathy Cade and Peggy Dobbis, New Orleans Free School in 1966; Juliet Mitchell Anti-University in 1968–1969). Knowledge of feminism was also popularized by the abovementioned scholarly journals Signs, Feminist Studies, and Woman’s Studies International Forum. Therefore, the task of women’s studies is to broaden knowledge and strengthen the identity of women, and thus to transform teaching and research. Towards 1975, a term which began to grow in popularity was gender studies. It was expanded as an area of interdisciplinary research to include homosexuality and transsexuality. The main assumptions of such research are that in the public and private sphere the constant gender reproduction and gender differentiation deepens social inequalities, and that gender is a trait of individuals as well as entire structures.

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This research is not limited to gender issues, but extends to research about age, ethnicity/nationality, race, class membership, sexual orientation and how they affect the identity development process of an individual and a collective. The popularity of these studies was due to the widening circle of “excluded” women, that is, the departure from the interpretation of “white” educated women who claimed the right to represent women and to awaken their awareness. This was in part due to the growth of black feminism, post-feminism, gender criticism and many other concepts that deconstructed group identity (Chołuj 2001). Over time, queer studies, which include LGTB (lesbian, gay, transgender, and bisexual) studies, transgender studies, and others, emerged. They were the result of the negation of accepted dichotomies such as feminine/male, hetero/homosexual. Gender studies developed very rapidly, especially in the 1990s, by combining cultural studies and sociology, but also including the political sciences, on account of a research interest in power relations and domination and in their effects (especially at the mental, social, and political planes). Research on the mechanisms shaping relations and inequalities between women and men, and homosexual and heterosexual people, has displaced women’s studies. For example, in Germany gender studies are not a distinct area of study (they exist as an interdisciplinary field) but rather as gender and women’s research (Geschlechter- und Frauenforschung). In Poland, gender studies were established at the University of Warsaw in 1966, and then at the Jagiellonian University and other institutions. Earlier, research in women’s studies was undertaken at the Institute of Literary Research of the Polish Academy of Sciences and at the University of Łódź . However, most scholars did not recognize women’s studies, gender studies, and queer studies (as a current of gender studies) as a separate field of research, but rather as a form of interdisciplinary approach focused primarily on the study of the lives of women, their social status, identity, and sexuality. Traditionally oriented scholars and conservative politicians undermine all efforts to single out women’s studies, gender studies, and queer studies as a separate scientific discipline. However, in many Polish institutions of higher learning they function as separate fields of study (Gasztold 2017, p. 161).

2.7

Final Remarks: The Phenomenon of Feminist Political Science

There are many theories in the political sciences. Feminism, a specific group among them, is treated as a single theory by some scholars and by others as a set of theories or as an ideological concept aimed at questioning the social order which has existed since time immemorial and in which men are dominant and women are subjected to various forms of violence. Feminism thus remains a controversial notion referring on the one hand to the history of social thinking, including the theory in the social sciences, and on the other to the political practice by women’s movements whose

2.7 Final Remarks: The Phenomenon of Feminist Political Science

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goal is to improve the social condition of women. The balance of power between women and men is feminism’s main area of interest. Feminism is not all that popular in the Polish political sciences, even though many interesting initiatives related to the popularization of this subject have been undertaken recently. They are expressed, among others, in the form of conferences,5 and publications (See, for example, Pietrzak 2008; Musiał-Karg 2009; Kołodziejczak 2011; Rosicki 2013; Maj et al. 2015; Lendzion and KotowskaWójcik 2015; Zięba 2016; Andruszkiewicz 2017; Waśko-Owsiejczuk 2018; Gasztold 2019; Klejdysz 2019), some of which are supported by the Polish Political Science Association (PTNP). The main assumption in this type of project, according to the principle of gender mainstreaming, is to integrate the gender issues into all projects carried out at universities in a conscious and systematic manner. In this context it is worthwhile to mention the interdisciplinary Laboratory of Broader Questions at Poznań’s Adam Mickiewicz University, which has included the issues of feminism, gender, and queer in its teaching programs since 2007/2008. The journal Praktyka Teoretyczna also publishes works that belong to different trends of feminism, including postcolonial feminism (Praktyka Teoretyczna 2013). At the University of Warsaw in turn, political scientists are engaged in a discussion about women and on behalf of women. In 2011, the Gender and Politics (PiP) workshop was established at the Faculty of Journalism and Political Science (now the Faculty of Political Sciences and International Studies). The author of this book is one of PiP’s founding members. On a regular basis and in four editions, PiP organized performances in the form of happenings, as well as a public debate on Women’s Day (March 8 in Poland), which exposed gender stereotypes and counteracted discrimination. The author of this book is also involved in promotion of gender lens in security studies in the Steering Committee of Women in International Security section Poland (WIIS Poland). As a network of security experts WIIS consulted for example Polish National Actions Plan for years 2018–2021 about realization of UN Agenda Women Peace and Security (2018) (See Gasztold 2018; NAP 2018). Such initiatives bring together scholars who in their work reach beyond traditional, Enlightenment scientific canons, not only through the courage of their views, but also through innovative teaching methods. Worthy of particular mention is the project Women in Polish Political Science (2017–2018), which was conducted by Prof. Agata Włodkowska-Bagan and Prof. Małgorzata WiniarczykKossakowska, and was concerned with women’s perception of themselves in the academic community, their challenges and problems as well as with research areas

5

For example, the all-Polish conferences Płeć, ciało i tożsamość w dyskursach wyborczych, University of Wrocław/University of Warsaw, October 9–10, 2019; Ewolucja postaw kobiecych w przestrzeni publicznej w XX i XXI wieku, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, March 30, 2019; Kobiety i Bezpieczeństwo, University of Warsaw, March 8, 2018. Kobiety w polskich służbach Mundurowych, April 20, 2017, University of Białystok; Feminizm, May 14–15, 2014, Maria Skłodowska Curie University in Lublin; Perspektywa gender w badaniach nad bezpieczeństwem narodowym i międzynarodowym – bezpieczeństwo bez kobiet? March 7, 2012, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań.

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selected by women (researchers’ base) (Włodkowska-Bagan and WiniarczykKossakowska 2019). In October 10, 2019 has officially started to work the section Gender & Queer Politics within the framework of the Polish Political Scientist Association, 40 years later compared to American or international counterparts.6 The greatest contribution to the introduction of the concept of gender to the Polish discourse and in addressing feminist issues, however, was made by Polish sociologists. This includes pioneering work by Prof. Renata Siemieńska-Żochowska, who headed the UNESCO Chair for Women, Society and Development at the Faculty of Philosophy and Sociology of the University of Warsaw in 1996 (See Siemieńska 1990, 1996, 1999). An analysis of the scientific activity in the political sciences (POL-ON System of Information on Science and Higher Education, PBN Polish Scientific Bibliography, POL-INDEX Polish Citations Database) makes it possible to formulate a hypothesis about “male exclusivity” in determining the development of this discipline, as well as about the impact of patriarchal rules on the path of professional advancement. Women had limited access to informal old boys’ networks and, therefore, to key resources (positions, research grants, time, contact networks) (Majcher 2008, p. 187). It would be worthwhile to verify the hypothesis presupposing that a limited number of women gaining the title of professor in the political sciences could be a sign of covert prejudice and sexism (greater demands placed on women) and also the result of excessive administrative duties being placed on women by the learning institution. One should be aware, however, that this trend is undergoing some transformations thanks to the involvement of women professors and to the steps taken, for example, within the framework of the PTNP, especially by its regional offices.7 However, the mere presence of women in the Polish political sciences is not reflected in an interest in the research issues of feminism or in the use of the feminist lens in research. Hence, one cannot single out a “Polish school of feminism.” There is a still noticeable problem of the stigmatization of women who try to make their presence felt in academic space. Moreover, the use of the term “feminist” in a negative sense, in connection with things aggressive and dominant. In the public debate, the stigmatization of notions having to do with feminism and, above all, the 6 Within the framework of International Political Scientist Association (IPSA) a women section was created at first as a research group in 1976 was created and then in 1979 granted as a research committee Gender Politics and Policy. The section Women and Political Research was founded in 1986 in American Political Science Association (APSA). 7 The function of PTNP chairperson was for many years filled by women—Prof. Grażyna Ulicka (1998–2001), and Prof Teresa Sasińska-Klas (2004–2010). Presently (term of office 2016–2019), Dr. Ewelina Waśko-Owsiejczuk is the chairwoman of the PTNP Białystok branch; Dr. Alina Kaszkur of the Bydgoszcz branch; Prof. Agnieszka Kasińska-Metryka of the Kielce branch; Dr. hab. Krystyna Leszczyńska of the Lublin branch; Prof. Alicja Stępień-Kuczyńska of the Łódź branch; Prof. Teresa Astramowicz-Leyk of the Olsztyn branch; Prof. Agnieszka Pawłowska of the Rzeszów branch; Dr. Anna Chabasińska of the Gorzów Wielkopolski branch and Prof. Renata Podgórzańska of the Szczecin branch. Source: Polish Political Science Association. http://ptnp. org.pl. Accesed on 1 September 2019.

2.7 Final Remarks: The Phenomenon of Feminist Political Science

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term gender by circles connected with the Catholic Church and the right side of the political stage (including the Law and Justice party) has had a significant impact on this issue. The book by Marguerite A. Peeters in which the author presents gender as a harmful ideology on a par with Marxism has gained much popularity in Poland (Peeters 2013). In Polish political science, the prevailing approach to feminism is critical. Ryszard Skarzyński’s criticism of feminist research in political science as a form of “heresy,” “whimsy,” or “pseudo-science” holds sway (Skarżyński 2014, pp. 24–25). This does not make it any easier for researchers to uncover new research areas. Moreover, the specific two-dimensionality of feminist theory which imposes certain ideological values, whose impact is felt not only in the research perspective but also in practice, undermines trust and credibility of this approaches for some social scientis. The above factors contribute to the social sciences milieus’ disinclination to take up feminist issues, and lead them to follow western trends rather than to formulate their own concepts in this sphere. The answer to the question about whether it is possible to distinguish the area reserved for feminism within the political sciences remains open. Not every task dedicated to women in politics is a feminist one. One may attempt to define a research area within which the gender diversity of people and their impact on the public space will be taken into consideration. However, is the combination of a scientific discipline, which political science undoubtedly is, with feminism, which is seen as a social movement and ideology at all defensible? It is more rational to use the term feminist perspective within the political sciences. This perspective includes a specific way of thinking about society and politics. A problem remains, however, in that there is no single feminism, so that this feminist perspective gives the researcher full discretion in his/her choice of notions and concepts within a particular current (Corrin 1999). Łukasz Wawrowski feels that the use of the term feminist political science is justified because of three arguments: absence, relevance, and legitimacy (Wawrowski 2015). The argument of shortage also has to do with the lack of women political scientists and of research interests related to the issues raised by feminism. Some changes in this area began to appear with the second wave of feminism. The next argument, namely the issue of relevance raised by the author, boils down to the meaning of gender in science and politics. Gender is a permanently differentiating factor, over which the individual has no influence and which occurs in all societies because the social position of women is inferior to that of men everywhere in the world. The division into the private sphere, which is often associated with what is feminine, and the public one, which is associated with what is masculine in its many variations remains culturally conditioned. An individual is not responsible for the sex he or she acquires at birth and, on the whole cannot change it, like his or her religion. The division into men and women takes place irrespective of time and place, so while it is a universal differentiation, its meaning is doubtful (the problem of whether the discriminatory situation of women is legitimate). According to the author, the third way of argumentation is to include the gender perspective into mainstream activities (gender mainstreaming). This recommendation is widespread within the European Union and is to be included, at every stage, by all actors

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carrying out political activities. Therefore, since such guidelines are in force in the political world, this must be taken into account by the sciences dealing with that world. Because of these traits, feminism should be assured of a permanent place in political research. Human beings are immersed in gender. Therefore, the gender perspective refers to who is researching what and how (Wawrowski 2015, pp. 38–41). It is worthwhile to stress, after Cynthia Enloe, that “feminism puts women—their experiences, their ideas, their actions, thoughts about them, efforts to convince and manipulate them—on center stage, while feminism also makes ‘men-as-men’ visible and masculinity problematic” (Enloe 2007, p. 99). In doing so, feminist perspectives make cognition more complete because they make reference to humankind as such. They uncover the woman, the man, and the shadow play in the Platonic cave. The fact that feminism was born outside the academic world does not mean that political science cannot draw from it. As a social movement, it is political by nature (Randall 2010), and can, therefore, be the subject of political research. The analytical feminist approach is very valuable in political science, particularly when one considers the ease with which it integrates the gender perspective in the study of specific phenomena and its critical approach to the institution of the state.

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Chapter 3

Feminism and the Question of Security

Security is a chimera Greer (1970, p. 341)

Approaches which form part of the critical current attempt to shift analyses about security to a non-state-centric approach. Among other things, they undermine the usual dichotomies in realist discourse about national security such as, for example, peace/war, or order/anarchy. Feminist research in the sphere of security is directed above all at the reformulation of the theory and the reevaluation of empirical premises. They redefine the understanding of sovereignty, the state, and security, by extending it so as to include research concerning the presence (or, rather, the causes of the absence) of women in the entities that shape foreign and security policy. The feminist approach is especially convenient in the analysis of threats to security (wars, armed conflicts, and asymmetric threats such as partisan operations or terrorism), their sources, specificity and consequences, with consideration for the question of gender (Tickner and Sjoberg 2007; Gasztold 2017, 2018). In the feminist perspective, security is perceived above all in terms of human needs. The inclusion in the perception of security of, as J. Ann Tickner notes, economic and environmental aspects results in the state no longer being an appropriate (and self-sustainable) security-providing institution (Tickner 1997b, p. 187). Feminism concentrates not only on the very notion of security and its new dimensions (“what security means”), but also on the institutions that provide it and for whom (“whose security is guaranteed”). For this reason, the security analysis often goes from the bottom up, that is, from the viewpoint of the individual, then through the prism of local communities, to states and the international system. This is meant to show the two-pronged nature of interactions, that is, in what manner the security of the individual is connected with national and international security and how international relations affect the security of individuals, even on the local level (Tickner and Sjoberg 2007, p. 193). In contrast, the basic aim of feminism is to introduce into security studies the category of gender as a variable of reality and to deepen the knowledge about the experiences of women. This is based on the conviction that focusing on the unequal relations between the sexes and on the female viewpoint will lead to the emergence of a wider definition of security—something that contemporary © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 A. Gasztold, Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37234-7_3

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critical thinking is also aiming for. The placement of women on the margins of the public sphere allows for a wider perspective of processes taking place within the center, that is, institutionalized society. Given the traditional understanding of the state’s internal and external functions as the provider of security through violent means—associated with masculinity since time immemorial—the roles of women were marginalized or simply by-passed (Tickner 1997b, p. 190). The battle for the voice of women, especially at the United Nations, was in large measure conducted by women researchers dealing with physical and structural violence (Falk et al. 1991, pp. 392–401). A pioneering role in the debate on security was played by Jane Addams, the founder of the Woman’s Peace Party. Among other things, she contributed to the organization of a congress brought a thousand women from North America and Europe, to The Hague between April 28 and May 1, 1915, in the middle of the First World War. The debates at the congress were mainly concerned with ending the war and formulating a peace agreement. The congress led to the establishment of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF). It was Jane Addams who—along with other activists of the women for peace movement, like Emily G. Balch and Alice Hamilton—who actively called for a new internationalism at the beginning of the twentieth century and who criticized nationalism, which they saw as the principal cause of the war. In doing so, they stressed that it was women and children who were the main victims of armed conflicts (Addams et al. 1916). For their efforts, Addams won the Nobel Peace Prize 1931 and Balch in 1946.

3.1

Women and the Issue of Violence

Violence against women, particularly as a consequence of political circumstances, also arose in the international discourse following the Second World War. The United Nations published regular reports concerning the situation of women, including those from regions engulfed in armed conflict. An extreme example of such violence was and remains the recognition in certain regions of so-called honor killings, maiming practices, and the rejection of unmarried and childless women as norms of violence.1 Women and children constitute the largest group of refugees,2 and it is they who are the primary victims of all injustices, whether in times of peace or war. Interest in the role and situation of women in wartime was marginal, especially within the traditional political sciences. It is mainly women political scientists, not necessarily feminists, who first brought changes to this situation. Their work, however, had little impact on the wider discussion under way about

1

Pedwell (2010). For the situation of women in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan, see Moghadam (2005). 2 United Nations (1991). For contemporary statistics see the website of the United Nations HighCommissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), http://unhcr.gov. Accessed on 2 April 2018.

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the history of militarism or on the formulation of a “feminist theory of war.” The gender variable continues to be on the periphery of the main discussions. The history of war remains the history of men (Goldstein 2001, pp. 34–36). Armed conflicts lead to the intensification of both physical and psychological violence of a sexual nature against women. Considering the situation of American women in the 1960s, Susan Brownmiller went so far as to state that being vanquished had been associated with women for so long that it had with time become an integral part of the feminine role (Brownmiller 1982, p. 284). Her conclusion can be applied to the situation of women in wartime: winning is the domain of men, whereas the task of women is to seek shelter or to be the victim. The resexualization of violence, including the use of rape on an ethnically distinct population (such as in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Rwanda, Congo, and Myanmar) is a universal phenomenon (Münkler 2002; Skjelsbæk 2006; Seifert 1994; Askin 1999; Pratt and Werchick 2004; Hayden 2000; No authors 2002). Reports and investigations which document sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) have made public opinion sensitive to the gendered nature of military conflicts. Connected with gender aggression during contemporary warfare are mass killings of a particular gender called gendercides. They may target especially women and young girls, but also men or groups viewed as a social threat, like homosexuals, for example (See Jones 2006). Both the international crimes tribunals for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and Rwanda (ICTR) included rape in the catalogue of crimes against humanity. Those tribunals issued charges of sexual violence and the accused were found guilty of rape, abduction, and torture, of crimes committed with the specific intent of destroying the whole or a part of a given group (a crime of genocide by means of rape), and of violating the laws and customs of war. The intentionality of rape and its physical and psychological consequences make it akin to the notion of torture. Rape was also recognized as a form of discrimination against women because they are women. The rules formulated by the ICTY and ICTR were included in the Rome Statute of the International Crime Court (ICC) in Article 7(g) and Article 8(vi), which have entered into force on July 1, 2002 (the inaugural session of the ICC took place on March 11, 2003) (Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court 2011). Herfried Münkler recognized rape as one of the phenomena characterizing the new war economy (Ökonomie der neuen Kriege) (Münkler 2002). The resexualization of violence is also connected with humiliating men, that is, depriving them of their masculinity through the mechanism of transfer of guilt (for their inability to protect their women), with which victims are burdened. “Violence against women becomes an assault on men’s and national honor” (Pettman 1996, p. 71). Thus armed conflicts harm women in a twofold manner: through the violence perpetrated by the aggressors, and through rejection (“secondary victimization”) by their own ethnic/national group, following their traumatic experiences. The myth that women are protected by men during armed conflicts should thus be revised (Stiehm 1983). Violence against women, especially violence of a sexual nature, can under no account be compared with men’s experiences of violence. It is thought that violence against women is higher in militarized societies and approved in patriarchal systems (through legislation, the control of women’s right to decide about their body and

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image, and through other customs). The main institution perpetuating this state of affairs and reflecting society in the micro scale is the family. “As co-operation between the family and the larger society is essential, else both would fall apart, the fate of three patriarchal institutions, the family, society, and the state are interrelated” (Millett 2005, p. 42; See Schechter 1982). Male supremacy does not lie in physical force, however, but in the acceptance of a certain value system. A large role in this is played by socialization and the universally sanctioned male superiority prejudice, which perpetuates men’s superior position. It follows from this that violence against women, which is sanctioned within the family by the superior position of men, is connected with violence as such, including public, political, and state violence, all of which are interconnected by the phenomenon of power. In this context, authority is defined by the ability to use force. Power relations refer to gender and transgress peace and security (O’Reilly 2018). The role of a man as an oppressor, and that of a woman as a victim arise from the universal acceptance of this state of affairs by both sexes, that is, perceiving power through the prism of violence management. This also manifests itself in the approach to science through the perpetuation of the dominance of men as researchers and zealous censors who have the power of interpreting and shaping reality. Elżbieta Pakszys calls this model of acquisition and constitution of knowledge through the exclusion and discrimination of the female sex the “patriarchal image of cognition” (Pakszys 1995, p. 86), who possesses power, lays out the manner in which that power is replicated, both in culture and in the psyche. The privileging of male experience as the neutral norm for culture and humanity perpetuated the androcentric vision of the world. The experience of women, being “different,” is treated not so much as an addition as much as a deviation (Lipsitz Bem 1993, Chap. 2, pp. 6–38). Sandra Harding stresses that the main challenge for cognition and science is to give it objectivity. Within the political sciences, and in other fields, most of the knowledge is dominated and created by white men in the West. Women and other minorities are consciously marginalized in this process. Control of knowledge is closely correlated with power (Harding 1986). Cynthia Cockburn argues that the decision-making function of the father has shifted to the male social right to decide. Thus his power was extended from the family (women and children) to political institutions. The hierarchical relationships of gender power systems corelate to violence, war, and peace (Cockburn 2004). Moreover, Kate Millett emphasizes that patriarchal societies generally show a tendency to combine cruelty with sexuality, as an emanation not so much of evil as of force. However, sadism is associated with the “the masculine role,” while the experience of victim with “the feminine role” (Millett 2005, p. 48). The same observations appeared in the psychoanalysis and research into the problem of pornography. Sex, as understood by Millett, carries a status that has political implications, because it entails a domination and subordination relationship and defines the phenomenon of authority as viewed by Max Weber (Herrschaft) (Millett 2005, p. 38). In the German language, the term for power/rule/dominance is die Herrschaft, which comes from the noun der Herr, meaning man, lord, ruler, and God. Die Frau in turn has three meanings: woman, wife, and lady. In connection with property

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ownership, however, the masculine term is used, but with a feminine ending (substantive with feminine gender), in order to equate the woman with the man/lord. This is an excellent example of how society’s patriarchal mentality is perpetuated by language. Relations shaped within the family and based on the man’s dominance, that is, on the discrimination of women, do not entail a lack of choice for the latter. The sexism that characterizes male supremacy is not always connected with oppression. Certain spheres of liberty for women can clearly be observed in capitalist countries. According to black feminists, these are only appearances, as these spheres concern mainly women of the middle class, for whom being a feminist is a measure of success placing them on an equal footing with men (bell hooks [Watkins. G.] 2013, pp. 34–39). Domestic violence, which affects mainly women and underage children and which occurs within a context supposedly subject to legal regulation, also exposes the weakness of the state. Women represent half of the world’s population and a third of people active on the labor market. They are responsible for two-thirds of all work hours, yet earn on average slightly more than 50% of what men earn. Women suffer more often from poverty, find it more difficult to function on the labor market and, when they are the head of the household, they transmit their poverty to their children (“the inter-generational transmission of poverty”). The position (social situation) of women is as difficult as their living conditions (material position). This puts in question the role of the state as the institution guaranteeing protection and security to all its citizens (United Nations 2017). One global initiative aiming to reinforce work on behalf of women and young girls is the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), which has been in existence since 2010. It was established on the basis of the Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action formulated 15 years earlier during the Fourth World Conference on Women. However, there is still no international database taking into account the gender variable in the study of, if only, poverty levels (Chant 2008). Under the entry “aggression” in her Dictionary of Feminist Theory (Humm 1993, p. 16), Maggie Humm mentions researchers who undertook to analyze the question while taking into consideration biological differences (Tiger 1969), as well as psychological ones (feminist psychoanalysis). Moreover, some analysts view the phenomenon of male aggression as a product of social and cultural context rather than of biology (Mitchell 1974). This is corroborated by studies in anthropology, which showed that women and men can both generate aggression (Mead 1949). In the field of feminism, however, the dispute remains unsettled. Susan Brownmiller thinks that in the case of men, aggression is rooted in genetics and is a form of expression of rage and anger (Brownmiller 1975). Ruth Bleier, on the other hand, shows that this notion has undergone a process of anthropomorphization (Bleier 1984). The premise that men are more aggressive than women was scientifically demonstrated, confirmed, and conditioned by, for example, physicality, a propensity to limit the feeling of remorse and guilt, and even culturally, through gender roles (Baron and Richardson 1994; Eagly and Steffen 1986; Frodi et al. 1977; Bandura 1973). Differences between the aggressive behavior of men and women, including their use of physical and verbal violence, have been demonstrated. It was shown that

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women are able to refrain from using force longer than men. This was ascribed to women’s greater tendency to fear consequences. Differences in the use of force are borne out by studies in all cultures, including among children (Archer 2004). In their studies, B. Ann Bettencourt and Norman Miller showed that women become aggressive in specific situations, in which the trigger could be, for example, provocation, which is a frequent element of social life. Such provocation may be more or less significant depending on its intensity, its effect (negative/positive), and on whether its impact leads to fear of danger. Negative provocations included insults, pejorative evaluations, physical attack, and frustration. Similar reactions to provocation were noted among men, thus the assumptions about gender differences were not borne out (Bettencourt and Miller 1996). Usually, men and women commit crimes against life and limb in keeping with their roles in society. A man kills strangers much more often, whereas a woman kills relatives, such as a partner or a child. They rarely take the life of their partners in a homosexual relationship, however. There even exists a common assumption that if a man was killed by a woman, it is most probably his wife. These tendencies do not generalize psychological conditions, but highlight social problems (domestic violence) (Majchrzyk 2009, pp. 62–63). Impulsive behavior was blamed on high levels of testosterone. This hormone contributes to higher levels of aggression, which can take the form of antisocial behavior (Dabbs and Morris 1990). Studies, however, have shown that the level of this hormone among children aged 1–7 is similar in both sexes. In the years that follow, the increase in testosterone levels among men can be connected with the need for domination, understood in terms of social success rather than the use of physical aggression (Mazur and Booth 1998; Goldstein 2001, pp. 144–157). Therefore, the natural tendency of men to take part in political violence is not confirmed. One additional premise may be the need for a man to prove himself as a warrior, which is connected with rivalry with other men and with upbringing. The status of a warrior—especially in traditional structures—is wrapped up in the hero ethos. Prestige and fame affects the access to specific benefits and increases the number of sexual partners (Van Vugt et al. 2007).

3.1.1

The Myth of Protection

J. Ann Tickner points out that, in most countries, citizenship is correlated with the military version of patriotism and the vision of sacrificing one’s life for the homeland. Women, excluded from armed fighting, were thus seen as second-class citizens or victims, with the simultaneous assumption that they were incapable of defending themselves. The political identity of citizens was mainly based on a protector– protected relationship, which was the culmination of gender inequality. In this sense, the definition of security was incomplete. The ever-expanding understanding of this term, including of its economic, social, cultural, and ecological aspects, has made the susceptibility of women to injury plain to many researchers (Tickner 1997b, pp. 191–192). On the other hand, criticism of the ongoing discourse

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concerning the perception of women in armed conflicts grew, particularly within the current of postcolonial feminism. Above all, it negated the view of women as beings needing specific protection from men, a protectorate and deliverance from oppression, as well as the ignorance of factors affecting women’s lives in specific world regions (Różalska 2016; Young 2003). Particularly in times of armed conflicts, the position of the woman-victim (followed by the woman-rescued) is exposed excessively and in an extremely simplified manner that perpetuates gender stereotypes even further (Stiehm 1983). The fetishization of weapons and armed conflict as a form of testing men’s courage, and of external threats presented as total wars (like the Global War on Terrorism) favors the perpetuation of ideas and attitudes about gender roles in the context of patriotic and civilizational mobilization. The discussion about the position of women in Muslim countries often fails to reach beyond the distinction between Islam as a faith with a multitude of schools and doctrines, as an ideology, as a socioreligious system, its extreme interpretations, etc. The hypocrisy of the West can be seen not only in its conviction about the superiority of its civilizational standards, but also in the duplicity of its political decision-makers who, their harsh rhetoric notwithstanding, often collaborate with states that do not meet basic human rights and rule-of-law norms (Moghissi 1991, pp. 1–11). A natural element of the protection of the defenseless (that is, women) is also their subordination (control) (Abu-Lughod 2002). No one bothers to ask those who are to be rescued (the “threatened” Muslim women) from all the ills of this world (the Taliban, Al-Qaida, Saddam Hussein, the so-called Islamic State, “dangerous Muslim”) whether they wish to be rescued, and whether this should be done by the “civilized” (European/American) liberator (Razack 2008). Lila Abu-Lughod observes that “we need to be suspicious when neat cultural icons are plastered over messier historical and political narratives” (Abu-Lughod 2002, p. 785). Efforts are being made in the postcolonial feminist current to show the cause-andeffect relationship between racism and political, economic and cultural colonialism and the non-white (non-Western) woman participating in political violence (YuvalDavis 1997; Berger and Guidroz 2009, pp. 61–80; McLeod 2010; Bulbeck 1998; Chowdhry and Nair 2002; Loomba 2005). In this, the role of women is the central dimension around which research on relations between communities and the state is focused. This approach thus stresses the importance of internal and external factors of the postcolonial world and the racial/ethnic differences that influence women’s actions and their involvement in the public sphere. Thus, this subjects to criticism the liberal feminism current, especially its tendency to promote emancipation, the arrogance inherent to its sense of infallibility and superiority, and its tendency to carry out so-called “rescue operations” extended by “us” to those “others,” who are often in a different position due to poverty and backwardness. Another problem is uniformization and generalization (like “all Arabs”) and highlighting the notion of nation. In the West, this term, like that of nationalism, is usually associated with historical facts like pro-independence forces, or forces seeking to establish a sovereign state, and create the concept of a nation-state with specific boundaries (Anthias and Yuval-Davis 1989, p. 3). “White” feminists and activists of

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aid organizations are often accused of a lack of understanding for the specific and multidimensional factors prevailing in other regions, particularly through the emphasis on the oppressiveness of traditional cultures and patriarchal systems which, in their view, subjectivize women in postcolonial regions, and “oppress” their personalities and development. The drive to “rescue” stifled and passive women by imposing western solutions bypasses the entire spectrum of diversity which affects the position of women in non-European cultures (Tripp 2002).

3.1.2

Armed Combat: The Masculinization of Militarism

Security studies are (in the United States for example) part of contemporary international relations, and are connected with national and international security, as well as with peace research. They had relatively little in common with feminism, given scholars’ great skepticism about anything postmodernist in security analyses (Walt 1991, p. 223). However, the issue of women’s peaceful disposition and the debate on the sources of pacifism in nature or culture raised by female feminist researchers has found its way into the studies of peace and war, notably in the area of criticism of male militarism (Jones 1996, pp. 417–420). Anti-war feminists consider that war is a masculine paradigm in which there is no place for women. The assumption about women’s innate peacefulness was accompanied by concern for peace. Women were credited the ability to cooperate and be caring, and with a sense of justice and equality which placed them in opposition to war and violence. Some researchers even thought that transferring these feminine traits to the public sphere and combining feminism with peace studies would bring hope for a demilitarized world order (Brock-Utne 1985; Reardon 1985). This conviction is based on the assumption that women possess an inner moral compass that is entirely different from that of men, one that mandates peaceful coexistence and, especially, care, tenderness, the need to build relations with others, and a sense of responsibility for them. In contrast, the male viewpoint calls for rules, independence, and an “ethic of justice.” The concept of the “ethic of care” emerged in the 1980s as an offshoot of maternal feminism. Its main premise was that so-called maternal practices can transform social and political systems in a way that would eliminate war (Ruddick 1980, 1989; Gilligan 1995). It held that the morality of women, based on the need to assure the survival, above all, of their offspring (ties of emotion and responsibility) ruled out the use of military instruments as these are a threat to life. In this sense, the mother–child relationship is being shifted onto social relations in general. At the same time, men’s ambition and aggressive need for domination, which reaches its apogee during armed fighting, are condemned. This viewpoint deepens traditional perceptions of women and men, however: The woman is associated with nature (and the private sphere) and, thus, with peace. In contrast, the man is associated with culture (and the public sphere) and, thus, with war. And that, despite the fact that, prior to the Enlightenment, nature was thought of as savage and unbridled in addition to life-giving and caring. Later on, an attempt was made to

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understand (study) nature and thus to harness it, which meant little else but subjugating it to men (See Hyży 2003, pp. 29–34). Nature thus was and is being treated as a lower order of existence, whereas culture, with its ability to transform (to “socialize” and “transformalize” nature), is something distinct and of a higher order (Ortner 1974, p. 73). Sara Ruddick distinguished, for example, three attitudes that can be observed in women in the context of deliberations about war: that of mater dolorosa, outsider, and peacemaker. They can overlap or collide with one other. They reflect a stereotypical understanding of these notions. The first one is connected with the image of a suffering mother, who binds the family together and has the potential to rebuild the social structure after armed operations. This is the most firmly rooted image of a woman’s attitude to war. The second attitude assumes women’s alienation from war because of its masculine nature of war and because it is by nature forced or voluntary. War is seen as a form of fanatical misogyny that favors and rewards behavior connected with violence against women. The last attitude has to do with competence in building relations and ways of resolving nonviolent conflicts. War from this standpoint is an inherent element of culture. Ruddick suggests the use of the term “war culture”. Efforts to counter this phenomenon should concentrate on the introduction of social changes and thinking based on the premise that women are able to build peaceful relations (Ruddick 1998). Also according to Ruddick, promoting maternity among men (a world without fathers but only mothers of both sexes) would contribute to greater respect for life (Ruddick 1989). This concept of good parenthood excludes: (1) the role of the father in favor of imitating female behavior and (2) situations where only a woman cares for the child or when a man has unequal access to the child (such as through divorce or economic conditions). According to C. H. Enloe, the drawbacks of this position are that a peaceful attitude reduces the ability to influence militarized masculinity and that limiting oneself to the role of the mother could replicate social norms and, therefore, reproduce gendered war roles. However, she also doubts the possibility of affecting change in the very essence of war and the army through the active participation in it of female soldiers, whose percentage would be insufficient to overcome the sexism that accompanies militarism (Enloe 1983, p. 17). Radical political feminism based on maternal thinking and caring was criticized for not taking into account the viewpoint of civic feminism. It did not explain, among other things, the high rate of support from women for military operations conducted by their own state. In drawing attention to this, Jean Bethke Elshtain spoke against the existence of women’s distinct peaceful “nature.” On the other hand, she did not exclude the possibility that culture-shaped roles concerning the social constructions of the man as a “Just Warrior” and that of the woman as “Beautiful Soul” may be manifested (Elshtain 1987). Militarism is seen as one of the forms of patriarchal social and structural violence, and is a perspective that predestines women (and children) to a passive role in armed fighting. Such an approach excludes women from the role of combatant in a military conflict, and men from that of noncombatants (Peach 1993, pp. 84–96). Those who can take part in the national security debate are also expected to be rational, a trait associated with masculinity. A woman, due to the life-giving powers inherent with

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her nature, emanates emotionality, that is, “softness.” It has thus become accepted, especially in countries where the perception of national security is based on militarized solutions, that allowing women to participate in discussions, and even in the shaping of security, requires them to defeminize. Enloe calls this phenomenon “muscular thinking” (Enloe 2007, p. 40). In contrast, Gloria Watkins (better known under the pen name bell hooks) who is a leading exponent of black feminism and espouses Marxism, thinks that it is not the patriarchy that is the basis of militarism, but imperialism, which combines the idea of building a “great nation” with the notion of “masculinity.” Socialization to the cult of violence, especially visible in the praise of military intervention in American cinema, leads to military action, which is rewarded with glory and splendor (bell hooks 2013, pp. 185–187). In the scheme established by culture and negated by feminists, one can observe a correlation between masculinity and war. Armed conflict is used to build the identity of men who “are to be heroic, brave, patriotic, play the role of protectors of the state and family. The greatest manifestation of patriotism is to die for the fatherland. The priorities of the state are reflected in its glorification of the soldier-defender of the homeland, and not of the woman homemaker. The dream of all women is to marry a hero” (Czaputowicz 2012, pp. 214–215). The influence of feminism on the analysis of armed conflicts has to do above all with the introduction of the gender factor in the emergence of militarism. It was thus proposed to widen the understanding of peace on account of the importance of gender in the shaping of social relations. By the same token, attention was drawn to cultural and social conditions which are the source of militarism and, in consequence, of wars. The feminine research perspective also included groups on the margin of society, such as that of prostitutes, which accompany armed conflicts and peace operations (Moon 1997; Whitworth 2005). Feminism widened traditional studies on armed conflict to include problems arising from social relations, especially the replication of certain gender roles. The integrative function of the practical aspects of feminism has for years been expressed in the efforts undertaken by women’s organizations on behalf of education for peace and the development of alternative visions of social structures in regions in crisis (Skjelsbæk 1997; Burguieres 1990).

3.1.3

The Armed Woman

The public debate that emerged in the early 1990s in the United States about women participating in combat was connected with events in the Persian Gulf. It was focused on a number of main problems: the nature of war and gender differences, including competence and biological inclinations. It was affected not only by world view factors such as religious belief, but also by political affiliation, perceptions of national security, social status (including ties with the military) and education, familiarity with feminist thinking and attitudes toward it. This wide range of factors informed the premises, prejudices, stereotypes, and myths connected with

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perceptions of what is masculine and what is feminine. In other words, it shaped that which was “natural” or “appropriate” gender roles and behavior (Code 1991, p. 196). The presence of women in the army does not influence effectiveness on the field of battle and does not reduce a unit’s combat readiness. Their participation in other militarized formations did not reveal any gender-based differences in questions of assuring security either (For more, see Peach 1993, pp. 32–69). According to Linda Grant De Pauw, the history of women’s involvement in armed conflict makes it possible to single out four roles. The first consists in filling traditional functions in which the woman, while being a victim, encourages the fighting. The second is connected with a type of courage considered “masculine”, in which the woman concentrates on survival and her position does not contradict the stereotypical perception of gender (woman-leader, mother, homemaker, woman employed in the defense industry). Women also play auxiliary and care-giving roles on the field of battle (such as nurses and couriers). The last category is that of a soldier, in women are allowed to play masculine functions at particular moments in history (De Pauw 1998, pp. 17–25). Liberal feminism seeks to demonstrate that equal rights for men and women also apply to their participation in military action to the same extent as men do. In this they express the hope that women’s participation in the armed forces could contribute to transform these hierarchic structures in a democratic and egalitarian direction. In turn, some radical feminists are the biggest supporters of military service for women. In a way, radical feminism tries to free women from their physicality by disseminating a vision of androgyny (bigenderism). New regulations and trends concerning women’s reproductive traits (abortion, artificial insemination, birth control) and customs (polygamy, open relationships) enable women to flourish in all areas of life, including the military sphere. Masculine and feminine traits are losing their meaning. It can be observed, however, that women gain from bigenderism as they assimilate masculine modes of behavior rather than traits. This enables them to function more effectively in a world based on male patterns, as behavior modes can be changed, while copying male traits continues to be at odds with biological sex (Miluska 1995, p. 28). Military service can be a form of liberation from patriarchy and an expression of women’s solidarity in “sisterhood.” A woman-soldier empowers women. However, in reality those assumptions turned to be an illusion. For centuries, limited access to the military ensured male domination in almost all cultures, not only strictly patriarchal ones. Modern armies continue to replicate stereotypical gender roles; they block the promotion of women and are reluctant to allow them to take active part in military action. Equality and the departure from hierarchical ossified structures replicating the bases of patriarchal systems turned out to be an illusion (D’Amico 1998). However, the issues of sexuality and stereotypes related mainly to the biological perception of women are used in conflicts. Joshua P. Goldstein points to measures stimulating men’s engagement in the struggle against opponents, as well as morale raising measures. Positive stimuli include prostitution, which accompanies war operations, inducing extreme (and, therefore, masculine) states in soldiers using images of young women (pin-up girls), pornography, perpetuating the phallic symbolism of weapons and the myth of men

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protecting women from danger. Methods and techniques used to feminize the enemy include, above all, degrading phrases and acts such as executions of the male community, castration, captivity, and rapes (perpetrated on both women and men) (Goldstein 2001, pp. 333–371).

3.2

The Male Perspective on Security

Feminism concentrates on the fate of women and their place in the world while, at the same time, discussing these issues with reference to men, and masculine and patriarchal relations. Hence, the key terms in this view will be the notions of gender and sex and those notions’ impact on social position. Jacques Derrida had an enormous influence on feminists, primarily through the notion of difference and the concept of phallogocentrism (phallocentrism + logocentrism). Derrida believed that Western science became dominated by Sigmund Freud’s phallocentric approach—based on the masculine-primordial-superior hierarchy—to the difference between the sexes, one that relegates women to the category of something that is derived and, thus, inferior. Patriarchy arises from the framework in which the penis is seen as a symbol of power, in which masculinity is a positive norm which determines the framework of discourse and, therefore, of language (Derrida 1980). Androcentrism, which has privileged the masculine sex, also granted privileged status to the masculine viewpoint and experience in narratives about the world, history, politics, and culture. The term was first used by Charlotte Perkins Gilman in her 1911 work The Man-Made World: Or, Our Androcentric Culture. She analyzed a system of thought in which the male is identified and valued as the norm and the female as a deviation from that precious criterion. Man has come to represent the human being as such. A woman’s nature, on the other hand, is “different.” In this approach, the feminine viewpoint constitutes a departure from the norm. The difference between women and men is the leading principle around which social life is organized (gender polarization), and influences many other areas of human activity, including science. Information processing, which lies at the core of scientific research, is conditioned by the division into what is masculine and feminine, with a preference for the former. The choice of research, shaped by male cognition—because in a hierarchical model of reality it is perceived as more valuable—sets the directions of development in science. Patterns encoded in culture, if only in language, impose specific patterns of interpretation of reality (Lipsitz Bem 1993). The so-called male gaze, which is encountered in analyses of the role and importance of women in the context of political violence, gives central place to processes of representation in which the male (heterosexual) viewpoint is used (privileged) before others. The term itself was formulated in 1973 by Laura Mulvey and published in the influential journal Screen in 1975. It refers primarily to the way of presenting women within the visual arts and literature as they would be perceived by a privileged heterosexual male (Mulvey 1975). This approach indicates an unequal distribution of power and the objectification of women (and other genders), but it

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works both ways, influencing—on the whole in a different or reverse way—both the observer and the one being observed (Stump and Dixit 2013, p. 58). In this approach, there is a noticeable emphasis on women as objects which are forced to act in the public sphere by social norms, religion, race, and a “sense of hopelessness.” Women are not seen as beings responsible for themselves and able to autonomously decide or create a narrative about themselves. This is often connected with the fact that it is a man who talks about these women while refusing to let them speak (his story instead of her story). In this the stress is placed on the image of injustice and suffering while specific actions in the political/public sphere made as a result of deliberate choice are negated (Wibben 2011; Shepherd 2010; Tickner 1997a). Proponents of feminist empiricism in particular stress that representations of history that exclude women as researchers and the experiences of women are incomplete. The reconstruction of any historical events should take into account the women question. The history of women and men complement each other and should not be treated separately. The study of the position, role, and relationships of women in events shaping the political sphere contributes to the development of various scientific disciplines, not only those pertaining to politics and security. Cythia Enloe proposes to use “gender impact analysis” in research on the political process (on a local and global scale). In order to be useful, this method should take into account both the state before and after the decision has been taken. This will allow the researcher to obtain answers to the questions of how political decisions affect men and how they impact women; whether within these groups it is possible to distinguish specific sets of people who will feel the effects of politics more strongly (professions, age groups, etc.), and whether this political action will affect relations between men and women by, for example reducing or deepening inequalities (Enloe 2007, p. 13). Enloe believes that, in order to understand the modern world, many decisions not only affect gender (they have gendered consequences), but also condition it (they have gendered causes).3 Using “gender lenses” one can get an entirely different perspective on international relations (Peterson and Runyan 1999, p. 21). A notable example of this is The Global Construction of Gender, written in 1999 by Elisabeth Prügl, who represents the constructivist current of feminism (Prügl 1999). The author understands cultural gender as an institution that codifies power at all levels of international relations. From the home through the state all the way to the level of the international system, she describes a certain linguistic set of rules that shape relations between states and communication between the state and its own citizens.

“To make sense of today’s complex world, we need to understand that many decisions have not only gendered consequences but gendered causes—that is, causes flowing form presumptions or fears about femininity or masculinity” (Enloe 2007, p. 17). 3

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3 Feminism and the Question of Security

Women: Political Animals or Deviants?

Power is always relational and its perception through an institutional prism ended in the nineteenth century. Feminist theories do not focus on power as such, but on the causes of the phenomenon constituting men’s domination over women. The primary aim of those theories is to break with these practices. Within the liberal current, it is popular to think that prejudices and gender stereotypes are the main culprits of harmful relations between men and women; that they are the result of ignorance and, hence, they can be overcome through rationality. Radical feminism sees in this domination strictly biological factors, seeking to control women’s activeness, and to monitor their reproduction. According to some authors, depriving women of their independence in the sexual sphere is the main goal of the male world (Humm, pp. 44–45). Assuming that gender is a social construct connected with the assignment of roles and norms, it is also connected with the identity of the individual, social identity, and way of life. It affects the distribution of power, of privileges and prestige. The system of gender roles and their mutual relations determines all aspects of human life, including security and political violence (Alison 2004). It is undeniably connected with stereotypes, which are widespread in specific cultural circles. Every culture, if only expressed in language, refers to what is feminine and masculine. These meanings also comprise expectations as to how each gender should behave. Exaggerated expectations become entrenched as gender stereotypes, which can relate to specific characteristics having to do with sex (Lolber and Farrell 1992; Basow 1992; Wharton 2007; Malinowska 2011). Women are subject to “cultural training,” and are blackmailed since childhood by opinions with which “everyone agrees” and which “cannot be questioned,” and are therefore trapped “in a network of social expectations, standards, and instructions” (Hołówka 1982, p. 17). Generally speaking, feminist studies criticize the traditional approach to women’s role in political life (including political violence), which views women’s participation as a form of deviation. Very often, any resistance given to the established patriarchal patterns is described using this exact term. All forms of deviation from the traditional roles of mother, wife, and homemaker represent a deviation from the norm, and take on various forms of linguistic stigmatization: witch, old maiden, or rebel. According to the outstanding scholar of second-wave feminism Adrienne C. Rich, patriarchy thus promotes two attitudes: heterosexuality and motherhood. All the activities of women which stand in opposition to male domination and forced heterosexuality are relegated to the sphere of deviation (Rich 1990). The current of lesbian feminist fought against the notion of deviation particularly strongly, and proposed that it be replaced by such terms as counter-culture, women’s culture, or culture of abeyance (Taylor and Rupp 1993). Feminism refers to the universal nature of justice and freedom as it undermines masculine hegemony (Hekman 1990, p. 187). bell hooks [Gloria Watkins] is critical of this approach. Firstly, because the ghettoization that hides under the notion of counter-culture represents a form of escape from that which forms the essence of the feminist movement—the struggle

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against oppression in the wide sense (sexism, racism, exploitation, etc.). The tendency to distinguish an alternative lesbian community breaks the cohesion of the women’s liberation movement. Watkins equates creating a separate space, regardless of its aims related to building a community of people who have been rejected and discriminated against, to similarly operating groups, such as churches or kitchens. In her view, separatism aiming to support individual identity and self-fulfillment, firstly deprives feminism of its political engagement, turning it into little more than a lifestyle or, rather, one of the many roles that can be assumed (bell hooks 2013, p. 62). Secondly, it recognizes the male world as diverse in terms of class and race. Hence, Watkins believes that the essence of feminism is not the conflict between the sexes, but an active fight against oppression. She sees men as comrades in a revolutionary effort, while accusing white feminists, who envy the privileges of white men, that they marginalize the issue of the oppression of men of other races and shift the problems of the middle class to other ones, which are often denied access to entitlements (bell hooks 2013, pp. 111–130). Michel Foucault is right to say that the term “woman” has as many meanings as there are ways to express it (Foucault 1984). The meaning of the term woman is therefore determined by the political context. Irrespective of the declaration of gender equality in the political sphere, limitations placed on women’s participation and the narration about this participation (even in science) will depend on the context. Assuming, after Aristotle, that man is a “political animal,” it should be stated that both men and women, as political subjects, have the ability to take steps in fulfillment of their needs and interests by participating in or influencing processes in the exercise of political power. Pursuant to his considerations about the family, the Stagyrite saw as natural law that the oldest man should rule, and then transferred these considerations to the political order. Marital law and father’s law (Book I, chapter II, points 1–2) derive from the husband/wife relationship (according to tradition the husband is older and, therefore, more experienced and mature) and the husband/children relationships. The inequality of the relationship between a man and a woman is thus rooted in the institution of the family and is different from a master–slave relationship. Authority over children and the wife (domestic authority) has as its purpose either some benefit for those subjected to it, or the common interest (Book III, chapter IV, point 5). Women, just as men, are free individuals (Book I, chapter V, points 1 and 2). Their position in the family structure is therefore connected with political acquiescence (Aristotle 2002, pp. 19, 42–43, 123). Gender does not exist without some interpretative meaning given to it in a specific relation and hierarchy. The difference arises in terms of procreation. Aristotle contrasts the active role of a man and his ability to impregnate, with the passivity of a woman, whose task is to provide matter for the development of life. In this sense, a woman’s inability to create is a drawback and makes her a maimed male. Sylviane Agaciński stresses that each gender experiences the trauma of loss (of “mutilation” in fact), and the longing for a single unity and for not being the other (Agaciński, pp. 47, 58). However, this does not change the impression that dualism, which in Aristotle’s case is the basis for his reflections on biology through its division into matter and form, is sexist (Lange 2003).

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Fundamental basic political needs include the need for coalition, representation, internal and external (international) security, and political expression. The articulation of political needs and interests, which takes the extreme form of terrorist activity, is of a conflicting nature and is a conscious choice to put forward one’s demands in order to achieve a state making it possible to satisfy one’s aspirations. In security issues, women are thus placed as fighters for women’s rights, militarized soldiers, stabilizers on the home front, proponents of traditional values, partly members, collaborators, and partisans (Sylvester 1994, p. 183). The problem, however, lies in accepting this fact.

3.2.2

The Mirage of Matriarchy

Matriarchy, as opposed to patriarchy, expresses the longing of radical feminists for a redefinition of relations between men and women. The term, introduced by Johann Jakob Bachofen in 1861 (Bachofen 1897), and popularized by Friedrich Engels in 1884 (Engels 1886), elevated mothers of family clans (matriarchal clans). Basing his research on the analysis of maternal rights in ancient India, Persia and the Mediterranean region, Bachofen concluded that the woman-ruled system (gynecocracy) based on the strict principles of marital fidelity and the hegemony of women preceded patriarchy. The earthly power of the matron is perceived in terms of the unearthly power of goddesses (theacracy, from Thea—goddess, and kratos—power). The apotheosis of power for and by women was radical political feminism, which postulated the transfer of full power to women. The notion of matriarchy is also connected, among other things, with the postulate of women writing about women’s history. This peculiar declaration of war between the sexes manifested itself in, among other ways, radical feminism, and the apotheosis of the women’s state (Dworkin 1974). Postulates were put forward to subjugate men and, in extreme cases, to exterminate them, a notable example of which was the SCUM (Society for Cutting Up Men) manifesto of Valerie Solanas, first published in 1976 (Solanas 1968). Solanas’ claim for fame, however, was to make an attempt on the life of Andy Warhol using a firearm. The illusion of matriarchy is connected with the myths about the brave Amazons. Attempts to support the thesis that women were actively engaged in armed combat in prehistoric times, if only by means of archaeological and anthropological work, do not prove that this activity was and remains viewed as the norm. The only exception is the corps of women in the Kingdom of Dahomey in West Africa. The history of “Dahomeys Amazons,” called N’Nonmiton (our mothers) dates back to the seventeenth century. Effectiveness in recruitment, the training, and strict rules made the elite women warriors equipped with Dutch muskets and machetes famous in the nineteenth century. Sir Richard F. Burton, the British diplomat and traveler who found the brutality of the N’Nonmiton and their loyalty to the King fascinating, called them “Black Sparta” (Burton 1996; Alpern 1998). Yet the studies and images of warlike women, even in popular culture, are dominated by sexist fantasies

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revolving around their physicality (Goldstein 2001, pp. 11–19). That is why feminists were reluctant to rely on those archetypes. The battleground for access to privileges and the elimination of discrimination, exploitation, and oppression was supposed to be, first and foremost, the home, that is the private sphere, and only then the public one. The aim of this “struggle” is to transform interpersonal relations in order to promote values such as closeness, reciprocity, and camaraderie. Myths about Amazons only served to replicate typically masculine traits and behaviors, such as alienation, competition, and dehumanization.

3.3

Final Remarks: Feminism in Security Studies

It can be stated that, regardless of the wide range of attitudes and currents, the aim of feminist work in research on security is: (1) to subject traditional paradigms, theories, concepts, and language to critical analysis; (2) to reveal the androcentric bias in science and public debate; (3) to introduce the gender variable into research; (4) to show the experience and influence of women on social, political, economic, and cultural life; and (5) to create a feminist conceptual grid and feminist assumptions and explanations that would be useful both for theory and social practice. Feminist lens allows to conduct research on policy and security issues and centralized the ethical questions as representation, marginalization, and discrimination of women in public and private sphere. Gender sensitivity can provide to better understanding of power relations especially in foreign policy processes (See more Aggestam et al. 2019). Feminism considers that traditional theories about the political sciences marginalize the importance of women and the role of gender as a social and political life category. This conclusion can also be applied to the sciences about security that are now emerging in Poland. Feminism’s principal aim is to awaken awareness and, thus to strive for the universalization of this approach both in theory and practice. At the same time, the role of quantitative research, perceived as a patriarchal tool sealing off science within the male vision, is marginalized. Feminism sees itself as new knowledge about existing problems. In this sense, the analysis of women’s involvement in the sphere of security, and in particular the analysis of political violence, is not meant to oppose men to women, but to broaden the knowledge of human beings and about political activity as such. Supporters of the feminist perspective note that the gender aspect is of key importance in the study of political conditions and processes, as well as overall security issues. Gender is a social construct and, as such, it creates and influences not only the identity of the individual, but also of society as a whole. The theory of feminism can be used to analyze nonhomogeneous security phenomena, including armed conflict, terrorism, and other acts related to political violence, because it focuses on research at the level of the individual, the woman and the man. The importance of gender difference as a variable constituting social reality is important to understand political behavior and security studies. It makes it possible to broaden the scope of analysis and show that specific phenomena (including

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nonmilitary threats) have a wide cultural, social, and even biological background which shapes their emergence, structure, function, and consequences. The feminist approach allows for a fuller analysis of the motives and ways in which women are politically active and thus to demonstrate the specificity of behavior related to security. Taking gender into account as a category in security research does not apply solely to women. However, given that their importance has been overlooked in traditional research, the main challenge for researchers is to fill this gap and thus to make their analyses more objective. However, the ideal of objectivity in knowledge may remain elusive, as gender also influences the researcher and may condition his or her cognitive perspective.

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Tickner, J. A. (1997b). Re-visioning security. In K. Booth & S. Smith (Eds.), International relations theory today (pp. 175–197). Cambridge: Polity Press. Tickner, J. A., & Sjoberg, L. (2007). Feminism. In T. Dunne, M. Kurki, & P. Smith (Eds.), International relations theories: Discipline and diversity (pp. 185–202). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Tiger, L. (1969). Men in groups. London: Nelson. Tripp, A. M. (2002). Challenges in transnational feminist mobilization. In M. Marx-Ferree & A. M. Tripp (Eds.), Global feminism: Transnational women’s activism, organizing and human rights (pp. 296–312). New York: New York University Press. United Nations. (1991). The world’s women: Trends and statistics 1970–1990. New York: United Nations. United Nations. (2017). The feminization of poverty, UN women. New York. Retrieved April 3, 2017, from http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/followup/session/presskit/fs1.htm Van Vugt, M., De Cremer, D., & Janssen, D. P. (2007). Gender differences in cooperation and competition: The male-warrior hypothesis. Psychological Science, 18(1), 19–23. Walt, S. M. (1991). The renaissance of security studies. International Studies Quarterly, 35(2), 219–239. Wharton, A. P. (2007). The sociology of gender: An introduction to theory and research. Oxford: Willey. Whitworth, S. (2005). Militarized masculinities and the politics of peacekeeping. In K. Booth (Ed.), Critical security studies and world politics (pp. 89–109). Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner. Wibben, A. T. R. (2011). Feminist security studies: A narrative approach. London: Routledge. Young, I. M. (2003). The logic of masculinist protection: Reflections on the current security state. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 29(1), 1–25. Yuval-Davis, N. (1997). Gender and nation. London: Sage.

Chapter 4

Feminism and the Problem of Terrorism

Once there was a certain lady. . . And she had no children and generally no happiness either. And so first she cried for a long time, and then she became wicked. Bulgakov (1997, p. 184)

This chapter seeks to analyze the assumptions of chosen elements of feminist theory in the study of terrorism (Bibard 2016). Therefore, the notion of terrorism, the challenges that the study of terrorism presents, and a catalogue of terrorist organizations, taking their motivations into account, will be presented in the first place. Such an introduction is indispensable given the need to organize the information which I will be referring to in Chaps. 5 and 6. This approach is also based on the state of gender studies and the feminist current in the political sciences and in other areas. From the gender perspective, the boundaries between scientific disciplines are debatable (Enloe 1993; Steans and Pettiford 2001, pp. 152–176; True 1996). As a specific social and statistical set, women possess a common trait, which is sex. This chapter is concerned with presenting differences and similarities in the involvement of women and men in terrorism. Drawing up a catalogue of contrasts is especially important in terms of counterterrorism policy and strategy. In this, the evolution which characterizes political violence constitutes the main challenge. The transformation of terrorism and anti-terrorism is not surprising—changes are actually expected (Martin and Weinberg 2017, p. 3). However, the marginalization in terrorism of women’s roles, seen as a comprehensive act seeking to attain specific political objectives, is characteristic of the sciences about security. Very often women’s participation in terrorist organizations is construed as emancipation freeing them of dependence and earning them a better or higher position in the social structure. While this may sound appealing to the reader, such an interpretation is not necessarily borne out in reality, especially when the motives of individual women are taken into consideration. The participation of women in terrorist incidents is not a new phenomenon, since their presence in terrorist organizations around the world, as leaders and operatives, has been noted in most terrorist currents (Gasztold 2019). Women play an increasingly diverse role in terrorist groups and networks. Their membership has been © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 A. Gasztold, Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37234-7_4

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observed in right-wing extremist movements, which have so far assigned specific roles to women, ones not connected with armed combat. Discriminatory religious and social traits may, in certain communities, favor the use of women as a source of solely ideological, logistical, or other type of support, but not as combatants. For example, radical Islamic movements are gradually legitimizing the participation of women. The problematic nature of women in the role of fighters is connected with, among other things, the issues of sexual purity and the reward for the martyred fighter. It is worth noting that the greatest number of women involved in large-scale jihadism is to be found in Palestine and Chechnya, that is, in two of the most secularized and well-educated communities of the Muslim world. The main struggle connected with these regions is of a national-liberation character, not of a strictly religious one. Nonetheless, for several years women have participated in fighting within the structures of Al-Qaida (AQ) and of its subsidiaries engendered by the civil war in Syria—the Islamic State in Iraq and Great Syria (ad-Dawlah al-Islamiyah fi’lIraq wa-sh-Shām, ISIS, Daesh). Terrorist acts committed by women attract much greater media attention than those committed by men. This, in consequence, creates an incentive for terrorist organizations to expand their personnel by including women. Counterterrorism strategies tend to ignore sex as an important factor, however, and focus exclusively on the dangers posed by men. As the fight against terrorism is concentrated on reducing terrorist activity, both terrorism and counterterrorism are generally associated with the male world. Therefore, the gender difference is very highly marked by the presence of man and absence of women. This picture is deceptive because terrorist organizations increasingly use female fighters, supporters, etc. This worrying trend is being ignored, both in national security strategies and in international counterterrorism campaigns. It is important that institutions active in counterterrorism also address gender issues at the strategic and operational levels. It is difficult to state unequivocally if an anti-terrorism strategy that distinguished between specific terrorist activities undertaken by women and by men would have a positive impact on the effectiveness of individual countries and international organizations in their fight against terrorism.

4.1

The Notion of Terrorism

The term terrorism as used in public discourse is usually heavily value-laden and its understanding is shaped by the rhetoric used by public figures, and not by that of academic experts (Gearty 1991, p. 6). The political context and thus, the lack of consistency in describing, recognizing and/or not recognizing specific acts as terrorist, is connected with specific interests and aims. Therefore, the practical lack of cohesion in the perception of terrorism in the world has affected the scholarly debate. The perception of terrorism is subordinated to the context of history and contemporary times, times of war and peace, and to competing ideologies. Terrorism and the studies about its essence and manifestations are full of contradictions, mutually

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exclusive exceptions, and incomplete presentations. The reasons for this are, among other things, differences in the appraisal of the phenomenon itself, the nature of the acts and actors generating threats, the aims and motives of terrorist organizations, the targets of their attacks, the direct and indirect victims, those who participate or do not participate in the fighting, the political and historical context, the identification of the perpetrator, etc. Creating a cohesive definition of terrorism, one that takes all of its elements into account seems very difficult, if impossible. Equally problematic is extracting—actually distinguishing—terrorism from the set of allied notions concerning political violence (partisan warfare, revolution, rebellion, coups d’état, putsches, armed conflict, civil war). In the 1960s and 1970s western political scientists attempted to define terrorism, but always saw it as deriving from political violence. Some of them stressed symbolism and the psychological effect of terrorist acts (the sense of threat) (Thornton 1964, p. 73). Brian M. Jenkins saw terrorism as the threat to use force or individual violent acts aiming primarily to instill fear among victims unconnected with the target of the terrorist act itself. Those acts are—according to him—extra-systemic acts directed at the system, while terrorism is a means of communicating, a theater of sorts (Jenkins 1975). Analyses conducted by Alex P. Schmid and Albert J. Jongman at the end of the 1980s were important for research on terrorism. Having consulted 200 experts (representing mainly academic circles), these two scholars analyzed 109 definitions. They chose 22 components from among them. The most common and oft-recurring elements in their definition of terrorism were: violence/force (83.5%), its political character (65%), fear/terror (51%), threat (47%), its psychological impact and intended effect (41.5%), and victim–target distinction (37.5%) (Schmid and Jongman 1988). The aim of the analysis was to create the bases for further research on terrorism within the framework of the political sciences. Demonstrating that terrorism amounts to politically motivated violence based on fear does not show the difference between political violence in a democratic and a totalitarian system. In a way, it merges the notion of state terrorism with that of terrorism by non-state actors, irrespective of the capabilities, means, and methods available to the state. A common feature of the many definitions of terrorism is the recognition that it is a form of political violence. Therefore, terrorism can be defined as a form of radical political violence whose aim is, by instilling fear, to force the authorities to take or refrain from taking specific actions. Martha Crenshaw thinks that terrorism is “a particular style of political violence, involving attacks on a small number of victims in order to influence a wider audience” (Crenshaw 1992, p. 71). This definition includes other forms of political violence, if only such as political extremism. In this view, the listing of elements such as violence, the object or victim of attack, the aim of the operation is typical for an understanding of terrorism as a strategy for action. The category of victims is gaining special importance in the public sphere. It is noted that the victims of terrorism are innocent people. These include civilians, persons who play no part in the fighting (as opposed to those who do, like politicians, officials, and security institutions) and those with no ties to political activity. Defining the victims as people with no role in the fighting, and especially the use

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of the adjective “innocent,” touches upon questions of morality, while the ethic of violence (including terrorism) concerns the context of this violence (Primoratz 2013), and of forcing one’s will through physical or mental violence. For these reasons, terrorism is very often synonymous with cruelty and moral abuse. Viewed in this way, the definition of terrorism has no descriptive function but a normative one. Such a view rules out objectivity. In analyzing the twentieth-century advances in the understanding of terrorism, the definitions of political terrorism that can be distinguished are those of Richard Schultz (who stresses political aims), Paul Wilkinson (the systematic use of murder and destruction to spread fear and push political demands, and the spectacular nature of the attacks), and Jan Schreiber (politically motivated violence aimed at innocent people who see terrorism as a crime, and the state authorities’ despair and countermeasures) (Shultz 1978; Wilkinson 1977; Schreiber 1978). In the Polish literature on the period under discussion, one can discern a preoccupation with the wave of anticolonial terrorism (as it would later be called by David C. Rapoport), which was viewed in terms of national-liberation struggles. This was affected by ideological considerations and the need to discredit the enemy camp and also allowed military and intelligence cooperation with chosen terrorist organizations (See more Gasztold 2017). Rapoport singled out four characteristic waves in the history of non-state terrorism, distinguished by their leitmotif or guiding idea in various countries at the same period. In his view, a wave corresponds to a cycle of activity on the international stage, covering both a period of development and one of stagnation. Rapoport saw the anarchist period (1879–1914) as the first wave; the anti-colonial period (from 1918 to the late 1960s) as the second; the neo-left period (the second half of the 1960s until the late 1980s) as the third; and the religious wave (from 1979 on) as the fourth. He drew the names of the individual waves from the guiding idea which stood out during this period (Rapoport 2004; Harrow 2008; Tomczak 2006). Many authors also stress the difference between the notions of terrorism and terror. State institutions often resort to terror, while terrorism is the use of violence by non-state actors. However, this definition does not apply to state-sponsored acts of terrorism or to terrorist tactics used by the state in combating its adversaries or even in conducting offensive/raid operations in the fight against terrorism. Igor Primoratz points out that the primary purpose of terrorism is to spread fear and anxiety and evoke horror, in contrast to other forms of violence (including terror), where fear is also desirable, but rather as a side effect (Primoratz 1990). The Latin tres, ters, tersere, and terrere, or the Greek tereo are derived from Sanskrit trasa, which meant fear or horror. But the Latin terror (fear, horror) is usually ascribed to the acts of a state, as a type of political practice based on the use of various forms and methods of violence by state structures. The term terrorism can be viewed as a method, whose psychological effect is precisely to evoke terror (Schmid 2011, p. 3). Terrorism is a form of political violence which is undertaken with premeditation to create a climate of extreme fear, which aims to influence a wider audience than the direct victims of violence—thus leading to the random choice of the place of attack (often a symbolic one) and of the victims—and which is used to oppose and protest against the community in which the attack took place. The cruelty level of the attack

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serves as the catalyst for indignation and fear (Wilkinson 1996, p. 3). In her work concerning the philosophical considerations on terrorism, Anna Schenkenbecher adopted the view that it constituted an indirect strategy of using fear or terror by means of violent attacks and force (or the threat to use them) against a group of people (the direct aim) or their property, as a means of intimidation and extortion directed at another group (the indirect aim) in order to affect its actions, so as to achieve set political aims. Acts of violence which form an element of the said strategy are called terrorist acts (Schwenkenbecher 2012, p. 2). This view is not new and is modeled primarily on the work of Igor Primoratz (1990), who set himself the goal of formulating a descriptive definition of terrorism to set it apart from other types of political violence, in contrast to Alex P. Schmid, who viewed terrorism as the equivalent of war crimes perpetrated in time of peace, thus preferring a normative valuating and penalizing definition (Schmid 2004). The difficulties in defining terrorism were reflected in the research carried out in 2004 by Leonard Weinberg, Ami Pedahzur, and Sivan Hirsch-Hoefler. In their studies on the notion of terrorism they compared 73 definitions drawn from 55 scholarly articles published in 1977–2000 in academic journals specialized in research on terrorism. They analyzed articles which had appeared in the journals Terrorism published by Crane, Russak & Company in 1977–1991 in New York and by John Scherer publishers in Minneapolis in 1982–1983 and 1986–1989; Terrorism and Political Violence published by Frank Cass in London in 1990–2001; and Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, published by Taylor and Francis in London in 1992–2001. Their studies show that the most common element is violence/use of force (71%) and political character (60%). But only 22% of the researchers in their publications saw terror or fear as an element that characterizes terrorism. On the other hand, 41% viewed threat to be a characteristic element of terrorism. A tendency to view terrorism as a strategy, a method/tactic of fighting, and not an ideology was also observed, even if most authors were in agreement that it is meant to achieve some ideological goals (Weinberg et al. 2004). The marginalization of the effect of fear is particularly interesting, especially in the IT era, when information about a terrorist attack reaches every corner of the world almost instantaneously. According to, again, A. P. Schmid, “terrorism is an anxiety-inspiring method of repeated violent action, employed by (semi) clandestine individual, group, or state actors, for idiosyncratic, criminal, or political reasons, whereby—in contrast to assassination—the direct targets of violence are not the main targets. The immediate human targets of violence are generally chosen randomly (targets of opportunity) or selectively (representative or symbolic targets) from a target population, and serve as message generators. Threat- and violence-based communication processes between terrorist (organisation), (imperilled) victims, and main targets are used to manipulate the main target (audience(s)), turning it into a target of terror, a target of demands, or a target of attention, depending on whether intimidation, coercion, or propaganda is primarily sought” (Schmid 1992, p. 13). There is still no consensus about how to define terrorism. Scholars, experts, and practitioners have limited the discourse on terrorism to four areas: (1) academic discourse which seeks objective intellectual definitions and which was accused of

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sympathizing with terrorists; (2) the position of the state, the political climate, and domestic legal regulations; (3) the public debate on terrorism, often stimulated by the media and not by social discourse; and (4) discussions in opposition/extra-systemic circles supporting the use of violence (including terrorism as a method) against a repressive state (Schmid 1992, pp. 7–13). For the purposes of the present reflections, terrorism may be viewed as a form of radical political violence—carried out by groups and individuals—which is (a) committed with premeditation, (b) is aimed at influencing a wider community than the direct victims of violence or the threat to use it by instilling fear, (c) is used to oppose the community in which the attack took place was carried out, and (d) aims to influence political decision-makers by forcing them to take, or refraining from, specific political behavior.

4.2

Studies on Terrorism

The history of terrorism is not limited to the present times. Groups and individuals had engaged in radical political violence for centuries. Some researchers of terrorism look to the religious terrorism of the Zealots, a Jewish organization active in the Roman Empire (66–77 A.D.) and to the Nizari Assassins led by Hassan-e Sabbāh (late eleventh century) as the precursors of the religiously motivated suicide attacks of modern times. Most, however, are in agreement that modern terrorism is connected with the Narodnaya Volya, an organization of Russian revolutionaries seeking to topple the Tsarist regime by means of individual suicide attacks (1878–1881). Modern terrorism began with the hijacking of an El AL Israeli Airlines flight by Palestinians on July 23, 1968 (Chaliand and Blin 2007; Laqueur 1987). Walter Laqueur’s book The Age of Terrorism, first published in 1977, inaugurated a discussion among scholars about the definition of terrorism and the use of force by non-state actors to force society to embark on specific political steps. Laqueur, referring back to the Zealots of ancient Palestine, the Thugs of India (with instances of ritual murders peaking in the seventeenth century), the Russian Revolution and the Ku Klux Klan in the United States, concluded that “all specific definitions of terrorism have their shortcomings simply because reality is always richer (or more complicated) than any generalization” (Laqueur 1987, p. 11). In characterizing the phenomenon of terrorism, he concentrated on three common elements: (1) the use of tactics based on violence by (2) non-state actors (3) for political ends. These elements would come to constitute the basis for later studies on terrorism (Laqueur 1987, p. 145), and would serve to separate terrorism from studies on revolution and armed conflict. In Poland, Krzysztof Karolczak tied terrorism with extremism. In his view, political extremism constitutes a preliminary stage of deliberations on terrorism. This view differs from that of American researchers, who prefer separate studies on terrorism (Karolczak 1995, pp. 7–18). Numerous works concerning terrorism as a method of action began precisely with an attempt to define terrorism. The definitions adopted differed depending on the

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specific issues (such as national-liberation or religion), organizations (such as ETA, IRA, or Hamas), or type of terrorism (unconventional/conventional) addressed by any given current. Nonetheless, most experts dealing with the subject of terrorism and efforts to combat it are concordant in that terrorists wish to be heard and to attract the attention of a larger audience. In the 1970s and 1980s it was also thought that the terrorists’ aim was not so much a large number of fatalities as such (Jenkins 1975). This viewpoint changed after September 11, 2001 and the radicalization of the attitudes and behavior shown by the global Salafite jihad movement. The conviction that a religious worldview could escalate into violence became the new dogma. Mark Jurgensmeyer in his studies on religious violence, published in 2000, referred to historical research into terrorist organizations and to the sociological theory of religion. He came to the conclusion that real acts of violence take on a sanctified meaning when: (1) the struggle is perceived as a defense of basic identity and dignity, (2) failure is seen as unacceptable, in keeping with the Manichean principle of good against evil (hence the moral obligation to take on and continue the struggle), (3) the struggle cannot be won in real time and measures in real terms, as it relates to eternity (Jurgensmeyer 2000). John Esposito in turn claims that religion justifies depriving others of their rights only in the rhetorical sphere, and does not generate violence in itself. However, the mixture of religion, nationalism, and ethnicity affects the emergence of conflicts, as events—if only those in the Balkans in the 1990s—incontrovertibly bear out. The image that the western world has of Islam has equated this religion with a religion of the sword and jihad. In turn Muslims see Christianity as the religion of the Crusades and hegemonic ambitions (Esposito 2003, pp. 75 and 126). The Iranian Revolution in 1979 and the ensuing emergence of Hezbollah (Party of God) in Lebanon in 1982 made the then US administration of President Ronald Reagan conscious of the threat of terrorism in the military dimension, made more real by the attack on the barracks of the US Marines in Beirut (241 American soldiers were killed) and the main headquarters of the French peacekeepers (58 French soldiers were killed). Academe did not react to these events. David C. Rapoport noted the marginalization of the problem of terrorism toward the end of the 1980s in the introduction to his book Inside Terrorist Organizations, published in 1988 (Rapoport 1988, p. 1). The situation is different today, when the number of publications on terrorism exceeds a scholar’s ability to become acquainted with them during one lifetime. In his work, Rapoport claimed that researchers underestimate the essence of terrorism, focusing instead on motives and evolving tactics. He proposed to look on the actions of terrorist organizations through the prism of the theory of rational choice. Terrorist organizations operate as long as the costs of the alternative are too high. When a terrorist organization ceases to exist as a consequence of the activities of the State, it is because all possible rewards for terrorist violence—material (financial support) and spiritual (legendary status) rewards obtained from the reference community—have been removed. Martha Crenshaw observed that the behavioral patterns of terrorist groups should be viewed in terms of organizational continuity and survival. She thinks it a mistake to separate the motives influencing participation in an organization of its individual

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members (membership ensures a reward) from the ability of the group to achieve a political aim. The structure has an impact on the organizational model and the functioning of the organization. The group’s leaders do not have to be interested in achieving the set aim, because the usefulness and thus the sense of the organization’s continued existence would thus be undermined. They may offer a reward of sorts that would be sufficient to sustain the morale of the group, but they may not fully influence the members’ commitment to the organization (See Crenshaw 1988; Gupta 2005). An important element may also be to gaining a position in the underground, when various splinter organizations appear. Sociologist Donatella Della Porta interviewed 1200 Italian Red Brigade members, focusing on their terrorist activities from 1970 to 1983. She concluded that the escalation of violence in the form of terrorist attacks was not intended to intensify the conflict with the authorities, but was a form of competition with other underground organizations for new members and for their support (Della Porta 2001). The response to Rapoport’s book came in the form of Origins of Terrorism: Psychologies, Ideologies, Theologies, State of Mind, a collective work edited by psychologist Walter Reich.1 Reich invited outstanding specialists from various fields to take part in the publication, including social psychologist Albert Bandura (the chapter entitled Mechanisms of Moral Disengagement, pp. 161–191), the historian Martin Kramer (The Moral Logic of Hezbollah, pp. 131–157), the psychiatrist and psychologist of politics and international relations Jerrrold M. Post (Terrorist Psycho-Logic: Terrorist Behavior as a Product of Psychological Forces, pp. 25–58), and the advisor to Israeli prime minister Itzhak Rabin, Ehud Sprinzak (The Psychopolitical Formation of Extreme Left Terrorism in a Democracy: The Case of the Weatherman, pp. 65–85). These authors represented the return of research on terrorism to its roots, which have to do with political violence. Sources for the study of terrorism should therefore be sought in research about revolution and civil war, because terrorism is connected to a legitimacy crisis. Terrorists reject the legitimacy of the government/authorities through the challenge represented by the use of unconventional (in the sense of unpredictable) violence. “However, terrorism never occurs overnight, however, this crisis of legitimacy develops through a longer process of de-legalization of a given society or regime” (Sprinzak 1991, p. 52). Sprinzak also criticized the academic community’s received wisdom, which held terrorists to be a group of “misfits,” isolated from the beliefs and concerns of the rest of the population. In his view, terrorists are issued from a wider radical movement (Sprinzak 1991, p. 52). This thesis is presently being tested as we grapple with the problem of religious terrorism, not only in its Salafite and Wahabi variants, but including Christian currents, such as the antiabortion terrorism in the United States associated with the Army of God and, more broadly, with the Bible Belt (Jefferis 2011; Baird-Windle and Bader 2001). Focus on root causes and catalysts of terrorism

1

Reich (1990). This volume also includes articles by, among other authors, Martha Crenshaw. The Logic of Terrorism: Terrorist Behavior as a Product of Strategic Choice (pp. 7–24); and Question to be Answered, Research to be Done, Knowledge to be Applied (pp. 247–260).

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has become the basis for the perspective of treating this kind of political violence as a symptom of disease. In this approach the success of counterterrorism efforts can be achieved by long-term strategies (Sederberg 1995). Tore Bjørgo concluded that it is possible to mention certain preconditions affecting the development of terrorism (Bjørgo 2005; Ganor 2008, p. 278). He stated that social interactions, rather than individual motives, make it possible to obtain a more comprehensive image of why people engage in terrorist activities. However, when considering the radicalization of attitudes and behaviors leading to terrorism, one should take into account not only the macro level—the socioeconomic and political environment—but also the pressure of the closest environment, social networks, emotional relations, the role of family and friends as well as an individual’s particular predispositions to become fascinated by political violence. In Table 4.1 are set out factors and initiative events which create an open catalogue of premises conducive to radicalization and escalation of terrorism. While attempts to define terrorism continue to cause problems and are still incomplete, the following inherent traits, forming an open catalogue of criteria favoring the emergence and escalation of terrorism, have gained some measure of support among scholars of terrorism: 1. A unified form (separating terrorism from other acts of political violence) 2. Objectivism (they are not free of moral judgment) 3. Means of action (they do not contain all forms of violence used by contemporary terrorist organizations) 4. Object (they focus on terrorism of non-state actors) (Zięba 2014, p. 236) The purpose of defining phenomena is to determine the meaning of the term used by defining its content and specifying its meaning by reference to the set of characteristics that are proper to it. Given the multiplicity of forms and currents, the constant evolution of the organizational structures and means of expression, the formulation of such a definition is complicated and will always depend on context. This does not mean, however, that it is impossible to characterize a given phenomenon and to study the patterns, correlations, trends, and evolution of its occurrence. These tasks form the main area of studies on terrorism. However, they are of minimal importance to political decision-makers. The phenomenon of terrorism will thus be characterized by the way terrorists function (modus operandi), that is, through murder, the use of weapons and explosives (often of their own design), and the use of unconventional weapons (biological, chemical, electromagnetic impulse, cyberattacks, attempts to construct a dirty bomb of radioactive materials). A classic division into currents, taking into account the main motive of the organization’s activity, distinguishes the following groups: • • • • •

Anarchic-revolutionary Separatist-national Right-wing Religious So-called single-issue terrorist groups

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Table 4.1 Factors favoring terrorism Background conditions • Lack of democracy, civil rights and the rule of law • Failed or weak state • Ethnic tensions • Territorial disputes • Extremist ideology (religious or secular) • Past history—tradition of political violence, civil war, revolutions, dictatorship and occupation • Hegemony and inequality in power relationships • Illegitimate or corrupt governments • Strong position of external actors supporting governments without social legitimacy • Repression by occupier or colonial state • Experience of discrimination on the basis of ethnic or religious identity • Failure or unwillingness of the state to integrate dissident groups or emerging social classes, leading to their exclusion • Experience of social injustice • Level of poverty • Social stratification • Rapid modernization • Presence of a charismatic ideological leader

Catalysts/initiating events • Lost war • Police brutality • Contested electoral results • Initiation of peace talks • Foreign policy • Alliance with a specific entity on the international stage • Drastic worsening of the economic situation • Abrogation/curtailment of privileges/civic rights and freedoms • Detention/expulsion from the country/death of person significant for a specific social movement • Domino effect (most often in the case of border states) • Migration processes

Favorable and perpetuating factors • Vengeance and retaliation cycles • Solidarity among members (like when some are incarcerated) • Profits from criminal activity connected with financing of terrorism (the nexus interactions of organized crime and terrorism) • No possibility of withdrawing from terrorist activity • Close personal relationships with other members of the group • The international situation • Effectiveness of action • Tradition • Anger (image of the enemy) • Human and military resources • Sufficient financial and training resources • Influx of new recruits • Loop holes in the antiterrorist systems of states under attack • Propaganda

Source: Table prepared by the author

Distinguishing those motives as fuelling terrorist activity does not contradict the main premise, that terrorism is political in nature. Irrespective of the banner behind which it hides (extreme environmentalism, jihadism, anarcho-syndicalism, or neo-Nazism) it has to do with power relationships. The aim of terrorism is to undermine this relation, to alter it or to eliminate it altogether. It is in this context that its political nature manifests itself. This typology is applicable to non-state actors, but remains problematic in the case of states which resort to terrorism. In order to monitor terrorist activity, there are open databases which gather information mostly from open sources, so that incidents recorded there are not always truly terrorist in nature. Such records do not, thus far, take into account the gender of the perpetrators. The RAND Database of Worldwide Terrorism Incidents

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(RDWTI) contains information on more than 40,000 incidents for the period 1968–2009. In this database, the Rand Corporation shows not only the evolution of, but also that of partisan and piracy.2 Also popular presently is the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) with its continually updated database kept by the University of Maryland—the Global Terrorism Database (GTD). It is worthwhile to note that the START system is directly connected with the US Department of Homeland Security.3 The Institute for Economics & Peace, in collaboration with START, publishes a yearly report concerning international terrorism (the Global Terrorism Index—GTI).4 The Country Reports on Terrorism published by the United States Department of State since 2005 can be useful. They replaced the previous Patterns of Global Terrorism. They take into account not only terrorist incidents, but also systemic projects related to counteracting terrorism in specific countries.5 In the European Union, EUROPOL is responsible for collecting information on terrorist incidents from member states and from institutions playing a leading role in counteracting terrorism and, in collaboration with EUROJUST, the number of arrests and detentions. This report is entitled TE-SAT: Terrorism Situation and Trend Report.6 An internationally accessible list of terrorists and terrorist organizations, the Al-Qaida Sanctions List, has been published by the United Nations since 1999. It includes persons and organizations associated with Osama bin Laden, Al-Qaida, and the Taliban. In 2015 it was expanded to include the Islamic State (Daesh) (SIL (Da’esh) and Al-Qaida Sanction List 2019). The European Union has been drawing up a list of organizations and persons connected with terrorism since 2001. This list is based on precise information indicating that the decision to place a given person, group, or entity on the list has been taken by a judicial authority or an equivalent competent organ. The list includes organizations with the capacity to act internationally (See ST/11408/2019/INIT 2019). After September 11, 2011, in the European Union the activeness of the following organizations have been noted above all: national-liberation and separatist groups, mainly Basque Homeland and Liberty (Euskadi Ta Askatasuna, ETA) until 2011, the Galician Resistance (Resistência Galega, RG), the National Liberation Front of Corsica (Fronte di Liberazione Naziunale di a Corsica, FLNC), the National Liberation Front of Provence (Front de Libération Nationale de Provence, FLNP), the New Irish Republican Army (NIRA, earlier the Real Irish Republican Army, RIRA), the Continuity Irish Republican Army (CIRA), and the Irish Volunteers 2

Database of Worldwide Terrorism Incidents RAND website: http://smapp.rand.org/rwtid/search_ form.php. Accessed on 26 September 2019. 3 The National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism website: http:// www.start.umd.edu/gtd. Accessed on 26 January 2019. 4 Global Terrorism Index Reports: http://economicsandpeace.org/reports. Accessed on 26 January 2019. 5 Country Reports on Terrorism: https://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/crt. Accessed on 26 January 2019. 6 Te-Sat: Terrorism Situation and Trend Reports 2007–2019 prepared by Europol available: https:// www.europol.europa.eu. Accessed on 28 August 2019.

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(Óglaigh na hÉireann, ÓÉ). It is also worthwhile to note the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan, PKK/KONGRA GEL), which is also active in those European countries with a Kurdish minority (Austria, Germany, Luxembourg, France, Spain, and Greece).7 Another far-left group originating in Turkey also has illegal structures in those countries—the Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party/ Front (Devrimci Halk Kurtuluş Partisi-Cephesi, DHKP-C). In Europe, these organizations are mainly concerned with logistics and fund raising. In second place in terms of the number of terrorist incidents in the EU prior to 2016 are anarcho-revolutionary groups, like the Informal Anarchic Federation (Federazione Anarchica Informale, FAI) in Italy, the Conspiracy of Fire Nuclei (Synomosía Pyrínon Tis Fotiás, SPF) in Greece, and the anti-capitalist Group of Popular Rebels (Omada Laikon Agoniston, OLA) also in Greece. These organizations specialize in placing explosives in financial institutions and in those “symbolically,” hostile to their ideology. The third category is made up of extremist right-wing organizations, having a neo-Nazi ideological profile, seeking the supremacy of the white race, and voicing anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim slogans. They include the English groups Old-School Society (OSS), English Defense League (EDL), and Blood & Honour and its military arm Combat 18; and the German group Hooligans Against Salafites (Hooligans gegen Salafisten, HoGeSa). Their activities often involve hate crimes. However, with the Ukrainian crises new problem emerged: far-right and neo-Nazi foreign fighters. Ukrainian’s war has been used as a training ground. Another category of terrorism in the EU is that of single-issue terrorism, which is primarily connected in the EU with environmental and animal rights terrorism. Such groups include the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), and the Anti-Animal Testing Coalition (Anti-Dierproeven Coalitie, ADC) in the Netherlands. Members of these loose structures based on the principle of leaderless resistance in their actions most often use methods characteristic for protest groups like political harassment and monkeywrenching. These activities most often take the form of picketing, demonstrations, destruction of property, arson, intrusions and obstinate harassment, and actions to free animals from fur farms, animal testing centers, cosmetics companies, circuses, etc. Such groups are active in Austria, Great Britain, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, the United States, as well as Belgium, Finland, and Poland (Gasztold 2018a, p. 47). However, due to the unpredictability and effectiveness of terrorist attacks, including the number of fatal casualties, religious terrorism, until recently referred to as Islamic terrorism, now called jihadist terrorism, is considered as the greatest challenge to European and global security. This current includes such groups as Al-Qaida and the Islamic State. It should be stressed that the term religious terrorism is also used with respect to the activities of organizations other than Islamic ones,

7

TE-SAT 2007–2019: Terrorism Situation and Trend Report. Available: Europol website: https:// www.europol.europa.eu. Accessed on 28 August 2019.

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such as active in the United States the Army of God (AG)—a Christian group, and the Jewish Defense League (JDL)—of Judaic inspiration. However, jihadist terrorism constitutes the largest militant movement worldwide. It poses a threat trough terrorist organisations, policentric groups, networks and solo-terrorists. This type of the new terrorism is endorsed by a massive supporter movement on every continent, among them active and sleeper jihadist cells (See more, Goertz and Streitparth 2019).

4.3

Feminist Concepts and Terrorism

Gender is also an important element of terrorism research. Understanding the motives leading women to participate in this form of radical violence makes it easier to understand the very process of becoming a terrorist. In the public debate concerning female terrorism, women are repeatedly depicted as being weak and defeated. “The average depiction of women terrorists draws on the notion that they are (a) extremist feminists; (b) only brought into terrorism via a relationship with a man; (c) only acting in supporting roles within terrorist organizations; (d) mentally inept; (e) unfeminine in some way; or (f) any combination of the above” (Talbot 2000, p. 165). Gender as a social construct with the roles and norms assigned to it has an impact on the identity of the individual and on its social and political life. It would be worthwhile to discuss—as did Jacob L. Stump and Priya Dixit—selected feminist notions and their possible application to research on terrorism (Table 4.2) (Stump and Dixit 2013, p. 58). It should be stressed that feminist theories are varied (Withworth 2012, pp. 107–111). However, they have a common feature in that they increase or seek to increase the social role of women, assuming that inequality is a characteristic feature of society and that there men are dominant (Wollstonecraft 1891; Friedan 1963; Millett 1970; Daly 1978). Researchers emphasize, first and foremost, the role of patriarchal systems which encourage and sometimes force women to join terrorist organizations and take part in terrorist acts. Patriarchy can be viewed as a structure based on certain beliefs about how people should behave and the values attributed to such behavior. According to Cynthia Enloe, in those beliefs one can distinguish the conviction that women and men are different from one another. This difference is “intrinsic and unalterable” and assigns everyone to set social roles. In keeping with this view, men are naturally called upon, among other things, to earn an income, be responsible for safety, be active in public life, etc., because of their traits: superior rationality, sex drive, and physical strength. In contrast, women fulfill their destiny in the private sphere, while being grateful (and dependent) on men. In such systems one can note, firstly, that masculinity is privileged and, secondly, that women and things feminine are marginalized. These two important features of the system gain legitimacy through the perpetuation in everyday attitudes and practice, and become part of tradition (Enloe 2007, pp. 67–68). Studies do not bear out, however, that the coercion mechanism is a factor of decisive importance leading to participation in terrorist activities. The social environment can play an important role in introducing women to terrorism, but just as

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Table 4.2 Some concepts of feminism and their possible uses in research on terrorism Concept Patriarchy

Use A social system in which the male is centralized and privileged.

The male gazea

Centralizes the processes of representation wherein the (heterosexual) male gaze’s point of view is foregrounded. Indicates an unequal power relationship and the objectification of females (and other genders).

Empowerment and emancipation

Often presented as goals for feminist analysis, these are contested terms. Emancipation can mean allowing space for women to present their standpoint when analyzing terrorism. The view that standpoints should be taken into account when discussing particular situations and that difference with equality is possible (such as roles and diversity within the framework of a single group). Methodology where race, class, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, age are seen as interlocking factors in contributing to systems of domination and subordination. Associated with value judgments in which masculine traits are praised and seen as desirable while feminine traits (and feminization) are seen as weak. Groups of traits can be allocated to both men and women, but they manifest themselves as positive or negative depending on sex. Whether they are positive or negative is decided an assessment whose aim is to maintain the patriarchal order.

Transversal politics

Intersectionality

Masculinization and feminization

a

Examples in studying terrorism “Women terrorists” are seen as a product of a gendered social system and their agency is subsumed into a larger patriarchal framework. Research may question this identity of women. Research may include analysis of visual culture wherein representations of terrorism are presented. The focus on women as objects—whether as suicide bombers compelled by race, social norms, religion, “hopelessness,” martyrs—and the invisibility of women in crafting narratives about themselves. Allowing women to present their version of their terrorist activeness and actions.

Not only one but many equal points of view are taken into account. This principle also applies to the vertical axis (time). Showing the process and change. Postcolonial feminism.

Usually in representations of terrorists as masculinized and a “bunch of young guys,” while females are seen as manipulated by the patriarchal society of men. Important in terms of agency as feminization leads to a lack of agency. Feminization is perceived as undesirable because it deprives women of the right to speak out and pushes them downward on the social hierarchy.

Frequently, racial and social relations are perceived as the reflection of the West-European, white, androcentric order, which is imposed on other cultures. This “order” is also referred to as the “male gaze.” After Stump and Dixit (2013, p. 58)

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often earlier political activeness can be the factor of decisive importance (Jacques and Taylor 2013). This approach is connected with culturally shaped beliefs about what is masculine and what is feminine (for example, each language encompasses such aspects), and which entail expectations about how each sex should behave. Exaggerated expectations are perpetuated as a stereotype, which may refer to individual traits connected with sex (Lolber and Farrell 1991; Basow 1992; Wharton 2011). The patriarchal approach may be connected with the so-called male gaze, which objectifies the woman by robbing her of the narrative about herself. This often accentuates the sense of injustice and suffering by denying her rational choice (For more, see Shepherd 2010; Tickner 1997; Cloud 2004; Riley et al. 2008; Weber 2011; Wibben 2011). Attempts to explain cases of women’s suicide and the function of the legend and prestige of women suicide bombers and their families provide an excellent example (Narozhna and Knight 2016; Brym and Araj 2012; Victor 2003; El Sarraj 2002). Presenting terrorist acts involving women as acts of despair relativizes the crime by arousing compassion. This can be seen, for example, in the euphemistic term of “black widows” used to refer of the North Caucasus women suicide bombers (See Stack 2011; Petrusenko 2011). Karla J. Cunningham considers that the phenomenon of Chechnyan women terrorists consists in the combination of three ingredients—fear, sympathy, and publicity—making them into perfect terrorists (Cunningham 2012, pp. 443–446). Women’s passivity and honesty, family loyalty and silent acquiescence implicate them in criminal behavior (Smart 1976, p. 15). In other words, the view prevails that the behavior of women are the consequence of men’s dominance in social life. Women’s involvement in terrorism can also be viewed through the prism of emancipation, and seen as a break with the existent (patriarchal) order and with masculinization. In analyses of militarized and hierarchized groups, such as the Columbian FARC and the Tamil LTTE for example, such factors were seen as being causative and decisive in the perpetuation of terrorist motivations (Nordstorm 1999). But equally often they were seen as a deviation (de Cataldo Neuburger and Valentini 1996, p. 36). The term “emancipation” is used by some experts behind the scenes in connection with the very presence of women dealing with security issues, especially in countries where disciplines such as defense and the security and all police and military research are dominated by men who have practical experience. The term has a discrediting function in the scientific community and in the eyes of the general public. Some women dealing with security research have therefore adopted a “bi-sexual” role, in reference to Virginia Wolf’s A Room of One’s Own (1929), that is, to admit that one is a woman barely tolerated by the male group is seen as a failure. Hence, women add attractiveness to themselves by adopting the male viewpoint and standing by their side (Iwasiów 2008, p. 63). This is connected with the abovementioned “male gaze,” the exclusively valid and appropriate one. Women’s emancipation to terrorist activity is seen as a revolutionary trend to break with the often inhumane treatment (For more, see Tétreault 1994; Viterna 2013). A more neutral form seems to be to present women’s involvement in political violence through the prism of gender equality in political expression, even in form of equal access to suicide attacks, as in the case of the Tamil Tigers (For more, see Herath 2012).

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In contrast, the transversal policy view in studies on terrorism places an emphasis on the diversification of roles played by women in terrorist organizations (YuvalDavis 1999). In it, differences in individual functions and tasks are connected not so much with gender within the organization as with its very nature and with interactions within the group. The analysis of women’s involvement in political violence does not serve to oppose men to women but increases knowledge about human beings and political activity as such (For more, see Wesley 2006; O’Gorman and Jabri 1999). Another approach is presented by researchers of the so-called postcolonial feminist current (Guidroz and Berger 2009; McLeod 2010; YuvalDavis 1997). In this current, efforts are being made to show the cause-and-effect relationship between racism and political, economic and cultural colonialism and the non-white (non-Western) woman taking part in political violence in the postcolonial world (Bulbeck 1998; Chowdhry and Nair 2002; Charrad 2002; See also Loomba 2005). Thus this approach highlights the role of internal and external conditions as well as the racial and ethnic differences influencing the course of action and commitment to terrorism. Gender is one of many interacting identities—besides disability, social class, sexual orientation, and religion—which combine to form the experiences in a woman’s life. Within these experiences, there may be many instances of violence against women, as well as of violence perpetrated by women (Poloni-Staudigner and Ortbals 2012, pp. 5–6).

4.4

Final Remarks: The Dominance of the Male-Centered Approach in Studies on Terrorism

The achievements of criminology proved predominant in the perception of women’s criminal activities, including terrorism (Gasztold 2018b; Nowicka 2017, pp. 13–44). In the nineteenth century, it concerned above all crimes such as abortion, infanticide, child abandonment, theft, fraud, fencing, unintentional arson, defamation, giving false testimony, sometimes murder, mainly through poisoning. Criminology became dominated for several decades by the “male gaze” as proposed by Cesare Lombroso. Cesare Lombroso and Guglielmo Ferrero attributed the lower proportion of women in crime to their higher morality, pure mores, restraint, and religiousness. The two authors stressed the positive and stereotypical features of women commonly replicated by culture. But Lombroso, guided by biological determinism, did not exclude the existence of female criminals. A woman could be a born criminal in this sense, as an individual’s development is determined by gender and race. The white man came highest in this hierarchy, the colored woman lowest. Generally, the woman, showing many features of the savage and the child (low weight, moderate height, sparser hair cover, “anomalies” of the skull and physiognomy) is not far removed from the criminal. A woman being at the stage of child development (physically and mentally) is not predestined to commit crimes of a magnitude equal to those committed by men. Her area of criminal activity is mainly prostitution, theft, deception,

4.4 Final Remarks: The Dominance of the Male-Centered Approach in Studies on. . .

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infanticide, and poisoning. Female criminality, when it appears, is characterized by cruelty, high sex drive (eroticism), and a tendency toward debauchery, passion, emotionality, excessive tenderness, vengefulness, hatred, greed and stinginess, vanity, religiousness, instability of character, intelligence, stubbornness, and resourcefulness. In addition, women have the ability to manipulate and provoke, making them perfect at incitement to commit crimes (Lombroso and Ferrero 1893). Another concept which gained many supporters among academic researchers and practitioners was psychoanalysis. Sigmund Freud attempted to subject women’s participation in crime to psychological analysis, which influenced criminology until the 1960s. He concluded that jealousy and penis envy was a source of maladjustment, which could lead to crime, understood as a form of deviation. A woman-criminal (deviant) tries to be a man. Every such attempt ends in failure and, therefore, becomes neurotic. The personality of a woman who suffers while being a castrato is characterized by passivity, masochism and narcissism, a low moral consciousness, jealousy, a sense of inferiority, and an unstable sense of justice dependent on emotional state. Given an undisturbed development, penis envy has natural consequences: (1) the girl becomes aware of the wound inflicted on her narcissism, and develops a scar in the form of a sense of inferiority, (2) when the girl begins to realize that the lack of a penis does not only concern her, but an entire group of girls, she starts to feel contempt for women as do men, (3) penis envy does not concern solely genitals, (4) the rupture of emotional contacts with the mother is due to jealousy, because she is blamed for the absence of the penis, (5) the girls’ transformation into a woman comes when she ceases to crave the penis, and starts craving for a child, preferably male. Passivity is the path to a normal femininity, but sometimes a girl’s self-esteem is stifled through comparison with boys and the denial of her sexual desires, leading to inhibitions and neurosis or to the emergence of a strong masculinity complex. The latter consists in the refusal to accept castration and attachment to the belief that she has a penis, and this takes the form of male behavior. Freud held the view that woman has an undeveloped sense of justice and this is influenced by a sense of jealousy. The desire to be a man makes being a woman a failure. The experience of a little girl who discovers the fact that she does not possess a large and evident penis stigmatizes her entire further psychological development (Freud 1920). These assumptions were sharply criticized in later years. According to Juliet Mitchell, for example, Freud carried out the analysis of a patriarchal model of entering society (Mitchell 1974). Otto Pollak changed the anti-feminist approach in criminology. He concluded that the share of crimes perpetrated by women was proportional to their share of the general population and to the frequency of crimes perpetrated by men. The lesser frequency with which women appeared in crime statistics could be done to the fact that the crimes they commit are either of a certain type or the acts they commit are more difficult to uncover, more seldom brought to the attention of law enforcement organs or more leniently treated by the courts. This latter hypothesis is connected with dominant stereotype of women as a gentle being and, therefore, incapable of committing crimes. Also problematic are the masked roles of women in the preparation and committing of crime. According to Pollak, women’s negative traits, such

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as manipulativeness, vengefulness, deceitfulness, and insincerity are conducive to crime in this group. He believed that negative experiences of menstruation caused trauma associated with not becoming a man. Women having access to food to a great degree steal and poison, and the scale of such crimes is usually undetectable (Pollak 1980). Women’s roles sanctioned in tradition and law provide an ideal cover for this type of activity. Biological predispositions have no effect on the crimes committed, however. Personal traits such as instability of character and emotional excitability may favor forbidden actions, but these factors are psychological by nature. Freda Adler has advanced a rather controversial thesis by stating that the US feminist movement, which has popularized emancipation in the struggle for social position has also had an impact on women’s use of violence. The desire for success and power is connected with a demonstration of force, with the rejection of weakness, passivity, and subordination (Adler 1975). It is difficult, however, to prove the contention that equalization has an impact on the rise of criminality. The variable that is the social situation does not determine participation in terrorism or in other forms of crime. Another representative of feminism, Rita J. Simon claims that the rising number of women who are employed outside the home leads affects the range of crimes they commit. The number of murders is decreasing, while nonviolent economic, so called white-collar crimes, are rising. The causes of violent crimes are women’s traditional roles which push them into the meanders of frustration, dependence, and submissiveness. Better education and, hence, better opportunities on the labor market, free women from being exploited and humiliated (Simon 1975, p. 41). Another original premise was the oft-repeated claim that Premenstrual Syndrome (PMS) as a stress-generating factor and has a negative impact on resistance to stress. A sudden drop in progesterone leads to mood swings and generates irritation and, at times, aggressive behavior. The extreme form of PMS is not characteristic for all women. Studies have not confirmed that women who commit crimes do so just before the onset of menstruation. This is a factor that indirectly affects specific responses to conflict and crisis situations and the ability to adapt to them. For example, journalists Anne Moir and David Jessel found that only 44% of those convicted of violent crimes committed them just prior to the onset of menstruation. In general, the authors who favor the thesis of mutual interactions between hormones, the psyche, and gender differences, have concluded that women were more likely to comply with the law, even if in cases of a law–individual conflict, they exhibit redoubled strength in their efforts to protect the individual and life (Moir and Jessel 1992, 1995; Dalton 1990). The use of neurobiological research to support stereotypes about the abilities and talents of women and men is referred to as neurosexism (Fine 2010). A misappropriated claim is that the brains of women and men differ in weight. It is accompanied by the overinterpretation of numerous other anatomical divergences and resulting different predispositions. Brain mass, however, varies between individuals, not between the sexes. Larger women have proportionally larger brains and smaller men have smaller brains. On the basis of anatomical analysis alone, it is not possible to determine whom a given brain belongs to.

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In addition, there is a widespread belief that the hormones of testosterone and estrogen play a role in the formation of the female and male brain. It is worthwhile to remember that those hormones affect not only a person’s sexual functions, but also the other organs and systems in the body. The sex of the brain supposedly corresponds to typically male and female behavior, but for some scholars of culture, playing with dolls may be a feminine behavior, while for others it will be protectiveness. Aggressive behavior, on the other hand, is associated with testosterone, which supposedly shapes masculinity, despite the absence of unequivocal scientific evidence (Jordan-Young 2010). The lack of objective and universal criteria leads to generalizations and to the perpetuation of stereotypes. It is pointless to seek to answer the question about whether terrorism has gender, because the question is wrongly formulated (See Köppert 2009). Terrorism as a method serves to attain political aims through the use of violence. Indisputably, it is mainly used by men, but women also play an active part in terrorist activities. This is why experts tend to adopt a male terrorist as a model when they compare male and female members of terrorist organizations. The nonhomogeneous nature of terrorism—manifested in the great diversity of concepts, objectives, means and methods, structure and activities, and territorial reach—provides another obstacle. The participation of men and women in terrorist groups is due to a combination of personal and political reasons. Efforts to introduce sexual equality in organizations of this type are quite difficult to demonstrate in objective scientific research. This would require detailed quantitative research, yet access to data is difficult at times. Thus, estimates and, unfortunately, incomplete presentations prevail. Emancipationdriven motives as the source of women’s participation in terrorism can be found in the nineteenth century anarchist, neo-left-wing and a number of national-liberation organizations of the twentieth and twenty-first century. However, they are an expression of anarchist and revolutionary concepts, without being a goal in themselves. The purpose of terrorist activity is to force a state, or political decisionmakers, or the international community, to take certain steps or to refrain from taking them. In this sense, the participation of women, also in the role of active fighters, is supposed to further the realization of the basic task lying at the source of the establishment of the organization or terrorist movement. It is therefore erroneous to believe that the milieu of political violence is hostile to the membership of women. There has been a noted increase in women’s involvement in terrorism. Their roles in terrorist organizations are also subject to continual diversification. These organizations themselves also see opportunities to use women in operations on account of their effectiveness and the publicity this affords in the media. Of course, biological differences can have an impact on the functioning of terrorist organizations. Given how they are stereotyped and given the aspect of physicality, women can be used by an organization as lures or for the provision of certain services, including sexual and logistic services. In such cases, a woman is seen being hostage of a group and of the conditions which forced her to take part in terrorist activity. The influence of stereotypes on how women are perceived can also be felt outside of terrorist organizations and is skillfully used in propaganda and while recruiting new members. The dominant image of a wounded and suffering woman, especially one

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from regions affected by armed conflict or national crises, mitigates how this womanterrorist will later be judged, and serves to justifying her from a moral viewpoint by means of such “passkey” concepts as retaliation and revenge. Moreover, failure to perceive danger coming from a woman reduces the effectiveness of anti-terrorist systems. Among other things, it is wrongly assumed that women tend to act through an organized group rather than alone. While this has been, with a few exceptions, the rule until now, this does not mean that the progressive radicalization of societies—if only in Europe, as can be witnessed today—will not make cases of women “lone wolves” more frequent. In conclusion one may consider Laurent Bibard’s reflection about whether contemporary terrorism is not a perverted form of the masculine existence in the world, one that forces women to resort to violence. Such an approach can only be another manifestation of the “male gaze,” robbing women of their rational justification for involvement in political violence.

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Jurgensmeyer, M. (2000). Terror in the mind of god: The global rise of religious violence. Berkley: California University Press. Karolczak, K. (1995). Encyklopedia Terroryzmu. Warsaw: Oficyna Wydawnicza Spar. Köppert, K. (2009, October 28). Hat Terrorismus ein Geschlecht? Berlin: Gunda-Werner-Institut in der Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung. Retrieved September 4, 2019, from http://www.gwi-boell.de/de/ 2009/10/28/hat-terrorismus-ein-geschlecht Laqueur, W. (1987). The age of terrorism (2nd ed.). Boston: Little Brown and Company. Lolber, J., & Farrell, S. A. (Eds.). (1991). The social construction of gender. Newbury Park: Sage. Lombroso, C., & Ferrero, G. (1893). La donna delinquente, la prostituta e la donna normale. Turin: Rome L. Roux e c. Loomba, A. (2005). Colonialism/postcolonialism. New York: Routledge. Martin, S., & Weinberg, L. (2017). The role of terrorism in twenty-first-century warfare. Manchester: Manchester University Press. McLeod, J. (2010). Beginning postcolonialism. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Millett, K. (1970). Sexual politics. New York: Doubleday. Mitchell, J. (1974). Psychoanalysis and feminism. New York: Penguin. Moir, A., & Jessel, D. (1992). Brain sex: The real difference between men and women. New York: Dell. Moir, A., & Jessel, D. (1995). A mind to crime. London: Michael Joseph. Narozhna, T., & Knight, A. W. (2016). Female suicide bombings: A critical gender approach. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Nordstorm, C. (1999). Visible wars and invisible girls. International Feminist Journal of Politics, 1 (1), 14–33. Nowicka, A. (2017). Partycypacja kobiet w wybranych organizacjach przestępczych. Warsaw: Dom Wydawniczy Elipsa. O’Gorman, E., & Jabri, V. (1999). Locating differences in feminist international relations. In V. Jabri & E. O’Gorman (Eds.), Women, culture, international relations (pp. 1–16). London: Lynne Rienner. Petrusenko, N. (2011). Women in the world of gender stereotypes: The case of the Russian female terrorists at the beginning of the 20th century. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science, 1(4), 135–146. Pollak, O. (1980). The criminality of women. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Poloni-Staudigner, L., & Ortbals, C. D. (2012). Terrorism and violent conflict: Women’s agency. leadership, and responses. New York: Springer. Primoratz, I. (1990). What is terrorism? Journal of Applied Philosophy, 7(2), 129–138. Primoratz, I. (2013). Terrorism: A philosophical investigation. Cambridge: Polity. Rapoport, D. C. (Ed.). (1988). Inside terroristic organizations. New York: Psychology Press. Rapoport, D. C. (2004). The four waves of modern terrorism. In A. K. Cronin & J. M. Ludes (Eds.), Attacking terrorism: Elements of a grand strategy (pp. 48–73). Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press. Reich, W. (1990). Origins of terrorism: Psychologies, ideologies, theologies, state of mind. Cambridge: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Riley, R. L., Talpade Mohanty, C., & Pratt, M. B. (Eds.). (2008). Feminism and war: Confronting US imperialism. London: Zed Books. Schmid, A. P. (1992). The response problem as a definition problem? Terrorism and Political Violence, 4(4), 7–13. Schmid, A. P. (2004, Summer). Frameworks for conceptualizing terrorism. Terrorism and Political Violence, 16(2), 197–221. Schmid, A. P. (Ed.). (2011). The Routledge handbook of terrorism research. London: Routledge. Schmid, A. P., & Jongman, A. J. (1988). Political terrorism: A new guide to actors, authors, concepts, data basis, theories and literature. New Brunswick: Transaction Books. Schreiber, J. (1978). The ultimate weapon. Terrorists and world order. New York: Morrow. Schwenkenbecher, A. (2012). Terrorism: A philosophical enquiry. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

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Chapter 5

The Specificity of Female Terrorism

A terrorist does not simply weigh risks against the likelihood of success, as is normally the case, but adds into the equation the abstract value of the cause for which he or she is fighting. de Cataldo Neuburger and Valentini (1996, p. 66)

Literature, film, and the media have created the image of armed conflict as a “struggle,” but a struggle in which roles are usually allocated to men-soldiers. Such an image is incomplete, however, because a territory on which armed operations take place is also inhabited by people trying to pursue their normal life, and who must survive—eat, sleep, work, and care for their loved ones. Given such a setting, what is the position of a woman in relation to man, who has for centuries personified the brave warrior—that of a victim, or that of a fighter? (Nordstrom 2008, p. 75) Is she a passive player condemned to victimhood and requiring protection, or does she take an active part in armed operations? What initial impulse leads her to become involved, and what triggers it? If there were an unequivocal answer to these questions, there would be less of a problem with the phenomenon of terrorism. Factors favoring political violence do not necessarily predestine persons operating within its framework to become terrorists. The sources of terrorism are sought in circumstances at the individual (micro) or the systemic (macro) levels and in factors that may trigger or accelerate the process of becoming a terrorist. Various factors at the individual, group, or systemic levels may push toward or and pull away from a terrorist group. At an individual level, initiating factors may include an identity crisis connected with discrimination or humiliation—real or imagined—exacerbating a sense of exclusion and frustration. Moreover, a “terrorist career” may be furthered by motives like a desire for revenge rooted in traumatic events experienced by the individual in question, that person’s loved ones, or the group with which this person identifies. It is presumed that in the case of women, emotional circumstances may be enormously important. However, the impact of one’s surroundings and the pressures connected with them are historical, that is, systemic factors. Terrorism may involve persons who are well-educated, who are citizens (or legal residents) of highly developed countries, who are often of the middle-class and who enjoy a measure of success in life. What brings them © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 A. Gasztold, Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37234-7_5

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together is a cause. This factor is particularly important in the case of ethnic–national aims. A commitment to, for example, a pro-independence cause need not entail a commitment to use force but creates conditions that favor its development, like raising funds, etc. The diaspora plays an important role in supporting the aims of national liberation organizations. Telling examples of how the support of minorities living outside the territory of the “cause” is used are the activities of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (Kongra-Gel) in Germany, that of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in Canada, that of the Irish Republican Army in the United States, and that of the proselytizing activities of Hamas through various associations and organizations in the United Kingdom. Despite the fact that minorities are encouraged by economic indicators to join the rest of society in “normal” life, they support or sometimes even embark on political violence. Such support may be limited to approval of the aim itself, but not necessarily with the means and methods used to attain it. On the other hand, factors leading to a fascination with political violence include events that have mental and/or psychological consequences (such as imprisonment, or the death of a friend or family member), the economic situation (such as deprivation due to lack of prospects), the cultural situation (such as culture shock, discrimination), as well as the political environment (reaction to the policies of the host country, military intervention, or even media coverage of a conflict in a specific region). In this context, religion is of secondary importance and serves to build a narrative and manipulative layer (Rabasa and Benard 2015; Zięba and Szlachter 2015). The religious component is replaced by social mechanisms, like ties of friendship, peer pressure, following examples of a new lifestyle and even looking for adventure. These factors are used in the recruitment of fighters—including women and young girls from all corners of the world—to organizations that have a global reach, like Al-Qaida or the Islamic State. The state-building component (caliphate) also encourages young girls and women to join jihadist groups. Mere fascination, however, does not presuppose active participation in terrorist operations (Hlouchova 2018, p. 46). The causes of the personality changes and radicalization that leads a person to terrorism are an individual matter. For this reason countering the threat of terrorism is a very difficult problem for democratic states. On the one hand, doing so in a rapid and effective manner is necessary and, on the other, overly harsh methods can lead to even greater radicalization and to the proliferation of terrorist organizations. My aim in this chapter is to bring a feminist approach to the analysis of the radicalization process leading to terrorism. I will thus examine the following questions: the premises of women’s fascination with brutal extremism and the motives leading them to take part in it. This feminist perspective will make it possible to analyze the complex background affecting women’s decisions and lives in the public sphere, particularly in regions subject to armed conflict. In this I will bring a critical view of the objectification and politicization of women and to the perception of their role in brutal extremism as a form of emancipation.

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5.1 5.1.1

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The Radicalization of Women Leading to Violent Extremism and Terrorism Radicalization Factors

In the literature, radicalization is defined as a process leading to the adoption of an extremist value system accompanied by approval, support for, or the use of violence and fear tactics as methods to affect change in society. This process may lead individuals or groups to acts of violence that are directly related to their social, political, or religious motives and to the simultaneous rejection of the dominant political, social, or cultural order. The attainment of specific aims justifies resorting to violence. Radicalization is a mental and emotional process that inclines the individual to use violence. It is thus related to the sphere of attitudes and behavior (Khosrokhavar 2016, p. 29; Wilner and Dubouloz 2011). An often cited definition of radicalization leading to violence is the one drawn up by the European Commission. It defines it as a “complex phenomenon of individuals or groups becoming intolerant with regard to basic democratic values like equality and diversity, as well as a rising propensity towards using means of force to reach political goals that negate and/or undermine democracy” (Radicalisation 2019). In turn the experts of the Dutch intelligence service (Algemene Inlichtingen- en Veiligheidsdienst—AIVD) describe the process of radicalization as a person’s “increasing willingness to pursue and/or support fundamental changes in society, possibly by undemocratic means, which are in conflict with or could pose a threat to the democratic legal order” (AIVD 2008). Thus radicalization is a process which entails a turnaround in thinking toward fundamentalist ideas, and a greater readiness to act on behalf of a specific aim (Veldhuis and Bakker 2009, p. 84). An often mentioned concept of “step-by-step” radicalization is Fatahli M. Maghaddam’s metaphor of a staircase to terrorism. In this sense, radicalization is a process of climbing stairs to ever higher levels. An increasingly narrow staircase over five levels symbolizes a psychological process and the ever shrinking possibility of retreat. The top of the staircase represents participation in a terrorist act (Maghaddam 2005). The issue of the radicalization of women toward terrorism and extremism is presently becoming one of the greatest challenges for counterterrorism systems. Terrorism is not solely the terrorist act itself, but the entirety of the illegal activities undertaken by terrorist organizations and by their approving and supporting environment. In the latter context, the role of women is increasingly visible—as recruiters, as eulogists/proselytizers providing logistical support, as spies, planners, plotters, and even attackers. This phenomenon emerges and spreads irrespective of terrorist currents and geographical location. Criminality among women began to increase in the 1960s and 1970s, especially for those crimes which had earlier been typical of men. A new type of woman criminal appeared—that of the “woman terrorist,” whose role and tasks were no different from those of men. Thanks to such groups as the Rote Armee Faction, the Action Dirécte, the Brigate Rosse, the Black Panthers, the IRA, and the ETA, the change in the perception of prohibited

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acts carried out by women constituted a quantitative and qualitative leap. This change remained insufficiently noticed by counterterrorism systems and terrorist research. Women are less visible in comparison with men engaged in terrorism, despite the fact that they are fully fledged terrorist actors. The view about their passivity is ably exploited by terrorist organizations. The socialization of men and women toward political violence can be studied by taking into account susceptibility, means of recruitment, and methods of indoctrination and action, while considering their psychological, social, economic, and political context (Schmid 2013, pp. 3–5). This is the more important as the premises that may constitute the conditions and catalysts should be examined as part of systemic approach at different levels affecting each other. For example, Alex P. Schmid proposes to study the problem of radicalization on the micro, mezzo, and macro levels. The first of these concerns the question of the individual’s identity and of the role of factors leading to frustration, which can in turn lead to aggression (anger release) or the need for action/change, and vengeance or retaliatory action. Mia Bloom, who studies women carrying out suicide bombings, singles out several motives driving this type of terrorist acts. They are the “Four Rs plus One,” from the terms “revenge,” “redemption,” “respect,” and “relationship,” with the addition of a fifth—“rape,” as a traumatic experience that may reinforce the initial four (Bloom 2011, pp. 234–236). The said Four Rs can just as well characterize the motives of men, although in the case of gender-specific analyses of female terrorists women can be exposed to radicalization differently. This is the case above all for traditional standards of behavior and for the patriarchal culture. A good example of this is the guiltinducing mechanism which I call the “purity trap.” Susceptibility to radicalization can be related to sexuality, and with behavior norms and patterns that exist in a given culture/religion. Sexual purity as a motive can arise from sexual violence. In many patriarchal cultures, the female body and its purity are symbolically related to the honor of family, clan, and nation. Thus in such cultures, highly gendered public opinion (Chechnya—Black widows, Turkey—PKK, Sri Lanka—LTTE, Iraq—AQI etc.) may accept that women commit an act of suicide bombing. A woman who is victim of a sexual violence is dishonored and forever branded. Her involvement in a terrorist group, and especially in armed combat leading to martyrdom, creates for her a new sense of purpose and a source of physical and mental strength. It frees her from ostracism, exclusion, and judgment and makes her part of a greater cause and a community.1 In some palpable way she becomes equal with her male counterparts—especially in secular movements (LTTE, PKK), but not necessarily as valuable in groups with a strong religious identity. One indication of the latter may be the theological promise for a female martyr of lesser posthumous rewards connected with the forgiveness of her sins, or of an eternal husband, but not necessarily of partaking in the joys of the heavenly garden (Quazi 2011, p. 35). It would, therefore, be worthwhile to consider if her decision is not

1

About LTTE and female suicide bombers, see Herath (2012) and Alison (2009, pp. 128–156).

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due to a gender perception discriminating against female self-determination. One can observe, particularly in the case of women suicide bombings, a form of gender schizophrenia arising from a useful need—existing in a historical context—for acceptance of specific behavior. “The female martyr is constructed as embracing culturally accepted gender norms at the same time that she steps outside of them—she is modest, chaste and purveyor of family honor in her personal life, whereas she is fierce, courageous, and the equal of men in the name of the cause” (Ness 2005, p. 362). All debates in this sphere are rooted in gender considerations. A woman’s choice is not the same as a man’s choice. It is “so foreign and unnatural to women that there must be an explanation beyond simply that women want to fight for their respective causes” (Cunningham 2003, p. 186). Questions about female identity, sensuality, and physicality can be passed over in silence or inconvenient to mention within the family. Thus, for example, ISIS/Daesh, when recruiting young women and girls in Europe, made it possible for them to have sexual contacts, through informal marriage for example, by filling the forbidden sphere with consent of sorts. But once they lost their virginity, the girls found themselves in a stressful situation—fearing that they might be disowned by their families on the one hand and becoming increasingly isolated and radicalized on the other (de Leede et al. 2017, p. 62). A similar mechanism may arise in situations of forced sexual contacts, like rape. Other scholars studying the motives behind women’s involvement in terrorism also stress personal factors such as the experience of death in the family, infertility, or unmarried status—brands that mark a woman in patriarchal societies. But personal factors (the individual’s subjective aims/motives) may be irrational, incoherent, and senseless (compulsive behavior, emotional immaturity, identity disorders, an internally conflicted personality, etc.). The rationality of the very aim of the terrorist organization or movement with which the individual identifies should therefore be taken into account. The mezzo level refers to the environment in which the individual functions. Friends, including family, colleagues, neighbors, and social networks may awaken fascination with the political activity of an organization/movement/cause, but they will also indoctrinate her (personal models, social benefits, the role of authority) and monitor the process of becoming and being a terrorist. According to the social identity theory of Henri Tajfel and John Turner, the group becomes a reference point, based on the contrast between allies (within the group), the hostile environment created by members of other structures, and interpersonal relationships (outside the group). This explains the favoring of one’s own group and the debasing of other ones (See Tajfel and Turner 1979). A sense of loyalty and solidarity, as well as group conformity and obedience, can affect progressive radicalization toward terrorism. An analysis of 242 jihadists (including 5 women) from Europe since 2001 by Edwin Bakker shows that individuals tend to engage in terrorism through networks of friends or relatives and that there usually is no formal relationship with global Salafist networks. The radicalization process took place independently of efforts, for example, of a specific Al-Qaida recruiter (Bakker 2006). According to the German scholar Roland Eckert, the path of radicalization leading to terrorism can be divided into seven stages: (1) cultural definition of collectivity; (2) perceived deprivation; (3) unity of collective identity and recruitment; (4) impact of violent events; (5) meaning given by a historical narrative;

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(6) victimization through opposition and solidarity with the collectivity; and (7) consolidation of fear and hatred (which may pass on to further generations, in the case of unresolved national-liberation issues, for example) (Eckert 2009). The first stage, the point of reference to a greater collectivity—ethnic, religious, or cultural—is of utmost importance. It is worthwhile to note that the individual does not always identify with the group from which he/she arises. Identification can refer to great and abstract imagined communities, such as nation, class, race, and denomination. Along with the escalation of a given conflict, these collectivities clearly become objects of history with a clear distinction and delimitation between ours–theirs/we–they and with a bond of solidarity. In addition, the ideas of a “liberated nation,” of a “classless society” or of a “Muslim community,” for example, become not only points of reference for the individual but also a project for the future (Eckert 2016, pp. 4–6; For more, see Anderson 2006). For example, second- and third-generation Muslims in the Netherlands do not feel any emotional and cultural connection with their parents or with Dutch society, and seek patterns in the notion of the community of the faithful (Ummah). Hybrid identities (such as Dutch-Moroccan) that are characteristic for the children of emigrants is not accepted by either of the two groups within which the individual functions and accelerates the process of self-definition in religious terms (See Buijs et al. 2006). Social networks other than the family, especially the influence of acquaintances, as well as the multitude of social portals with a profile focused on a specific theme favor this process. Women are much quicker to become radicalized in a group, especially if it offers them guidance, friendship, security, and purpose, that is, everything usually provided by the family. Other factors worth mentioning include strong indoctrination often bordering on emotional manipulation and intimidation and using as a model predecessors, that is, myths and legends underpinning the propaganda activities of terrorist groups and their sympathizers. The images of the female and male terrorist (as well as that of any other person involved in fighting for the cause from the organization’s viewpoint) can refer to an entirely different ethos and symbolism, depending on the given cultural circle, the aims of the organization and the reference society. At the macro level, trends in public attitudes and behavior should be considered. This model takes into account the external and internal policies of the state in which the individual lives. Factors that may trigger fascination with violence and lead to its use do not necessarily give a comprehensive answer to the question of who will become a terrorist. Events that exacerbate frustration affect the entire population, and only a few individuals carry out acts of terror. This form of analysis can be applied to the radicalization leading to involvement in terrorist groups, but not necessarily in relation to the activities of so-called “lone wolves.” These are mostly men (Timothy McVeigh, Theodore Kaczynski, Anders Breivik, Nidal Malik Hasan, Mohhamed Merah etc.), although there are some exceptions to this rule. For example, Rachella Shannon, associated with the US antiabortion movement, attempted to kill Dr. Georg Tiller on August 19, 1993 in front of his clinic in Wichita, Kansas. Another example is Roshonara Choudhry, a British woman of Bengali origin who became radicalized with the help of the Internet and, on May 14, 2010, stabbed Labour Party member Stephen Timms. She was condemned to life in prison for attempted murder and for membership in Al-Qaida, as the first woman-jihadist in Great Britain (Pearson 2016).

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Tinka Veldhuis and Jørgen Staun proposed a radicalization study model made up of (1) factors that create conditions and defining susceptibility, and (2) catalysts, which lead to the acceleration of the radicalization process (Veldhuis and Staun 2009). In such an approach, as in the case of A. P. Schmid, the reason for radicalization is the array of premises and initiating factors located in time and space in various systemic dimensions within which the individual functions. Individual categories should be considered together, without omitting their interdependence, interactions, and correlations. At the core of these processes, which the actors have divided into macro (political, economic, cultural) and micro (social, individual), is the individual (Veldhuis and Staun 2009, pp. 23–24). The push and pull factors model is often used in shaping strategies for counteracting the radicalization of attitudes and behaviors leading to terrorism. Table 5.1 presents some chosen factors (it is not an exhaustive list) which may influence the process of radicalization among women and young girls. Personal factors affecting an individual’s susceptibility to radicalization undoubtedly intensify this process, irrespective of the push and pull factors. Personal factors include mental health (depression, mourning); personality traits (impulsivity, narcissism, Table 5.1 Push and pull factors of female radicalization to terrorism Push factors • A sense of social and/or cultural isolation • Seeking one’s identity and a sense of belonging • Experience of discrimination and/or social injustice • A sense of threat to one’s community or to the community with which the individual identifies • Hatred, resentment, and/or frustration often arising from a lack of reaction to imagined threat • Experience of trauma • A trouble childhood • Pressure of peers, colleagues, and/or a need for uniqueness through provocation or aggression • Seeking a purpose in life and/or a need for involvement • Sexuality issues, which can be of particular importance for young girls brought up in a conservative environment. The imperative for sexual purity in conflict with the liberal stance found, for example, in liberal democracies • Experience of political violence by the State • Armed conflict

Source: Author’s own compilation

Pull factors • A sense of belonging, group identification (need to feel important/empowerment) • A sense of emotional ties • The role of the family, including the involvement of other family members • Incarceration • Peer pressure and group dynamics • Exposure to content and materials arising sympathy for the cause and for political violence (in the internet, for example) • Exposure to the propaganda of a specific group • Perception of effectiveness in reaching political goals through political violence • Participation in the construction of a new tomorrow and/or an obligation with regard to the reference group (nation, community of faithful, etc.) • Direct participation in fighting on account of historical necessity of the moment (shortage of men) • Romanticizing of the terrorist ideology, faith in promises of equal status with men, liberation, marriage, education, afterlife, etc. • Activities of recruiters and/or the presense of mentor • Role of the leaders and moral authorities in the local community • Material and emotional rewards

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compulsivity), and individually specific indicators (for example, age, gender, education, country of birth, marital status, occupation) (Vergani 2018).

5.1.2

The Radicalization of the Individual and Group Pressure

Clark McCauley and Sophia Moskalenko proposed to divide the radicalization process into three types: individual, group, and mass (McCauley and Moskalenko 2008). In terms of the individual type, they identified the following factors as favoring radicalization potentially leading to terrorism: • Political victimization. The experience of trauma (victimization), which can push the individual to commit acts of terror, understood by the individual as acts of vengeance, particularly suicide attacks (the phenomenon of the so-called “black widows” of Chechnyan organizations) (See Crenshaw 2012, pp. 106–111; Silke 2003). • Political grievance. Failure to meet political needs, resentment, and objections to the policy in place are a frequent motivation for the so-called lone-wolves. The history of terrorism mainly provides examples of male lone terrorists. Women occur less frequently (Rachella Shannon, mentioned above, comes to mind) (See Phillips 2013). • Joining a radical group—a slippery slope. According to McCauley and Moskalenko, this mechanism is rare because, as a rule, joining an organization is a gradual, step-by-step process, requiring preparation and testing of the recruit before he/she is entrusted with a task in an armed combat setting. In such a case, the individual decision is very quick and is preceded by “self-radicalization” and the desire to engage in violent acts. It is worthwhile to note that the model developed by the New York City Police Department (NYPD) could be of use here. It distinguishes four stages of this process in connection with radicalization leading to participation in world jihad: (1) Pre-radicalization, (2) autoidentification, (3) indoctrination, and (4) jihadization and, in consequence, the use of violence (Silber and Bhatt 2007). The model is in large measure applicable to the phenomenon of “foreign fighters.” An excellent example is the global situation related to the massive involvement of recruits, including women, in the activities (in both strictly military operations and in propaganda) of the so-called Islamic State (For more, see Spencer 2016). The participation of women, especially those from western countries, grew on a large scale along with the emergence of the Al-Khansaa Brigade in 2014. This parapolice unit, which functioned until the fall of 2017 was primarily responsible for maintaining order and the observance of religious law in Raqqa and Mosul. • Joining a radical organization for emotional reasons (power of love) (McCauley and Moskalenko 2008, pp. 421–422; See also, for example, Reinares 2004). Peer relations and acceptance from an important person (a moral authority) may also

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be important. One should consider whether the sudden fascination with violence should not be included in this category. The effect of experiences and emotions engendered by events on the political stage (provoked reaction) can be a catalyst on the road to terrorism, and even suicide attacks. Pressure from close persons (husband and lover, who were local Hamas commanders) could have influenced the behavior of Reem Saleh Riyashi, who on January 14, 2004 detonated a two-kilo explosive at a Gaza crossing point. It was the first suicide attack by a woman for Hamas, as well as the first perpetrator to leave behind children—a 3-year-old boy and an 18-month-old daughter. Most probably her deed served to restore her honor, which had been tainted by her affair. Her actions were reinforced to various degrees by redemption, respect, and relationship (Bloom 2011, pp. 234–236; See O’Rourke 2009). The family has an enormous impact on shaping political views and on the transmission of models, attitudes, and convictions. Ties with relatives reinforce engagement, especially when the aim is entrenched in tradition and history. This is especially visible in the case of ethnic and national organizations and aims, where the legacy of the forebears is perpetuated by the daughters.2 Gender expectations determine behavior and actions. The Price family from Northern Ireland can serve as a good example. The activeness of Albert Price and his wife from Belfast in the Irish Republican Army (IRA) was continued by their daughters Dolours and Marian in the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA). The wife’s sister Bridget “Bridie” Dolan was a legend of the Cumann na mBan (The Women’s Council). The women’s IRA inspired her nieces to become engaged militarily. We can find such examples also within the rival logistical Ulster Defense Association. Elizabeth “Lily” Douglas, a women’s unit leader, drew her daughter to terrorist activeness (Kiely 2005). Gendered stereotypes favor the perpetuation in all cultures of the notion of women as mothers, wives, sisters, daughters of fighting men, with a strong emphasis on domestic chores and child-rearing. Even if, more often than not, women only play a supporting role, they cannot be disassociated from armed fighting. Terrorism is not limited to the terrorist act itself, but encompasses all the activities that make up the organization. Statistics concerning women and girls who have joined various jihadist organizations in Iraq and Syria show that, for example, 54% of the women who went there from Germany from January 2014 to June 2016 did so in the company of their family or as a group of friends. In the case of men, this figure amounted to 22%. Of all the 784 persons from Germany who joined Jabhat Fath al-Sham, Jabhat an-Nusra, the Islamic State, of the Free Syrian Army, 21% were women. The largest number of them left during the first year of the existence of the Caliphate, since June 2014. Interestingly, the radicalization process in the case of those women was faster than that of the men. Fifty-six percent of the women left within 1 year from the first signs of radicalization, while for the men it was 43%.

2

For the ETA, see Hamilton (2007).

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Social network interactions, especially those involving family and partners, thus represent a greater danger for women (Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz 2016, p. 40). Elizabeth Pearson and Emily Winterbotham in turn have shown that gender norms and expectations hinder women’s access to the public space, and thus influence the radicalization process. While gender differences make it much harder for women to establish face-to-face contacts with an unknown person, they make this easier on the Internet (Pearson and Winterbotham 2017). As C. MaCauley and S. Moskalenko note (McCauley and Moskalenko 2008, pp. 422–236), group radicalization can be affected by: • Extremity shift in like-minded groups: shifting the emphasis of the political struggle to terrorism in organizations/associations of a similar ideological profile. A polarization process that leads persons with extreme views in relation to the “average” opinion within a group to be more admired and perceived as devoted to the cause, thus earning them a special status. In time, others join them so as to avoid exclusion and in this way the entire group’s opinion about the use of violence becomes radicalized. An excellent example of this process is the history of the Weather Underground (Weatherman) which arose from the Students of Democratic Society (SDS) organization, and the radicalization of Karen Ashley and Bernardine R. Dorhn, among others (Tsintsadze-Maass and Maass 2014). Dohrn led the Women’s Brigade of Weather Underground, a fighter organization that in 1974 changed its name to “Proud Eagle Tribe.” • Extreme cohesion under isolation and threat. Such a phenomenon may take place in groups of a military character which are based on mutual trust, devotion, selflessness, and the struggle against a common enemy. Extreme circumstances lead to an extreme sense of unity and brotherhood. This would explain, for example, the involvement of women’s brigades in the suicide operations organized by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and the Kurdish Workers’ Party. The charisma of the leader as well as affectionate devotion and a need for recognition in the eyes of authority may have been equally important. The magical personalities of Velupillai Prabhakaran (LTTE) and Abdullah Öcalan (PKK) and the ably promoted concepts of civil rights harnessed support. Feminist slogans encouraged women to take an active part in the fight, (re)constructing gender identity in an appropriate ethnic–national context (Herath 2012; Alison 2009, pp. 175–179; Öcalan 2017). This does not mean, however, that the status of a woman was proportional to her role in a terrorist group. For example, in the Shining Path women accounted for between 30% and 45% of all members in various periods, yet this did not affect in any feminist way the structure of the organization, which remained strictly patriarchal with Abimael Guzmán at the helm (Kirk 1997). At the basic survival level, belonging to a rebel force in regions such as Latin America can provide food and a safe haven. Such groups often give women the chance to acquire certain abilities that prove useful in civilian life. In addition to armed struggle, terrorist activities may include a whole range of training courses, not only of a military, but also political, economic, and linguistic nature. Women gain a measure of self-confidence that they would not be able to

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•

•

•

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acquire in civilian life. In societies where tradition is important, the temporary status of a fighter can bring higher prestige and temper the mechanisms that characterize a woman’s status. The spell of left-wing ideology, encouraging women to use violence against the ossified, hierarchical and misogynous state (and church structures in some countries) triumphed in the 1970s. The wave of neo-leftist terrorism spread across the world. Gisela Kaplan described the terrorism of those years in Italy as “an extraordinary spectacle of gender-warfare” (Kaplan 2013, p. 249). Competition for the same base of support—rivalry in attracting attention and support from the reference community (the one in whose name the group claims to act). The use of violence or its diversification and the maximization of the number of victims is meant to further the cause, and to attract the attention of, for example, the international community. This is intended to ensure the dominant position of the organization in the community it supposedly represents (for example Rote Zora vs. Red Army Faction, Al-Fatah vs. Hamas, Irish Republican Army vs. Ulster Defense Association, the so-called Islamic State vs. Jabhat an-Nusra and Al-Qaida Central Command). This concerns mainly national liberation-type organizations which compete with one another by escalating violence. The roles and tasks of women are used differently by these groups. National liberation organizations of a secular type tend to accept women in active military roles. Organizations with a religious base have been slow in evolving toward increasing the group’s effectiveness by including women in armed operations and setting up women’s committees and commandos (Daesh, Fatah, Hamas). Women’s participation in such groups’ military operations is nevertheless much lower than in secular groups. Competition with state power—condensation. Groups with weak social support often make use of civil disobedience forms such as marches, occupation of government buildings, etc. In response the authorities use means of direct coercion that lead to criticism and, therefore, to greater support for the “repressed groups.” Stricter anti-terrorism legislation, restrictions on civil rights and freedoms in favor of security, the violation of human rights in the fight against terrorism can also be skillfully used by terrorist organizations in the propaganda of the struggle against the state. An excellent example of this is the increase of terrorist activities pursuant to the Second Chechen War (1999–2009) and the rise of the “black widows” and the mythology surrounding them (Jusik 2006). Within-group competition—fissioning. Interpersonal conflicts can lead to the fragmentation of an organization into smaller militias. An obvious example is the IRA and its successors—the Official IRA, the Temporary IRA, the True IRA, and the Continuation IRA. Rote Zora, a women’s organization which arose during the surge of leftist sentiment in West Germany in 1977 was the autonomous arm of the Revolutionary Cells (Revolutionäre Zellen—RZ). It was opposed to the brutal methods employed by the organization and separated from RZ in 1986 (Karcher 2016). In many cases the public (the masses) may be subject to radicalization. This occurs firstly when the counterterrorist policy being conducted has a strong

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military component. An external threat leads to greater cohesion within the state or among allies, greater regard for leaders and standards, and acceptance for offensive action. In the short term, such actions may increase the sense of security but, paradoxically, they may lead to a rise in terrorist activity and in the number of terrorist organizations. An excellent example of this is the so-called Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), including the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. These campaigns have led to increased support for radical Islam in the region and thus to the growth of the terrorist threat. The presence of Western troops on the land of Islam (Dar al-Islam) has led to the radicalization of persons who were otherwise politically uninvolved and undecided, both in areas subject to military operations, but also in countries which were members of the anti-terrorist coalition. The civil war in Syria, which has been going on since 2011, has exacerbated and spread the phenomenon of organizations being joined by foreign men and women fighters from all continents. The sexual aspect is also exploited for propaganda and recruitment purposes. Despite the misogynous nature of the so-called Islamic State, women join this organization (Kneip 2016). Secondly, an inflammatory role is often played by hatred, that is, by the perception of the adversary as a total and diabolical foe. An important element of the rhetoric of terror (psychological war) is the dehumanization and demonization of the enemy and the use of the principle of contrast. An aggressive policy is justified by the opponent’s aggression (physical or spiritual). The manipulation of language (“sons of Satan,” “pigs,” “infidels”) makes it easier to influence how public opinion, groups and individuals perceive the opponent. Hatred plays a central role in the process of radicalization, indoctrination (becoming a terrorist) and, at a later stage, on remaining in the group (the process of being a terrorist), and binds the group together (Koomen and van der Pligt 2016, pp. 65–66). Martyrdom is also used by organizations to accuse and blame their adversaries for not respecting life. Two phenomena, in reference to Albert Bandura, can be observed in this context: the transfer of responsibility onto enemy forces and its dispersion by means of the moral justification for terrorist acts seen as having been provoked and, at times, as being defensive in nature, and the blaming of victims, or rather their devaluation, dehumanization and, often demonization (See Bandura 2002). Women can play a great role in the promotion of hatred. Their active efforts in this sphere can be seen in every terrorist current, including the ones which make reference to Christian traditions. The woman considered to be the chief exponent of “hate narration” in the United States is Elisha Strom, also known as Angry White Female, who is associated with the World Church of the Creator—WCOTC (proliferation of banned content and promotion of racial hatred). Other names mentioned in this regard are Lisa Turner, who is also associated with WCOTC and who founded Women’s Frontier, and Rachel Pendergraft of the Ku Klux Klan. In these organizations, women rather play a legitimizing and promoting role than one of active participation in acts of terrorism themselves (Cunningham 2012, p. 440; For more, see Blee 2002). Similar tendencies can be observed in the antiabortion movement, notably in the extremist Army of God, where women are above all involved in protest actions (so-called

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“rescue operations”), sabotage, media campaigns, and political lobbying. Strictly speaking, these activities are not terrorist activities but are more akin to political harassment and intimidation. However, elements of popular scientific explanations of terrorism that single out the direct and indirect target as well as the achieved psychological effect place some antiabortionist groups well within the scientific definition of terrorism. These activities are composed of repeated acts carried out by organized groups, which use verbal and often physical means of influencing other people by instilling fear. Such acts most often come down to harassing physicians (through court action for malpractice, for example) and clinic staff, as well as to demonstrating before the entrances to abortion clinics (so-called sidewalk counseling).3 During its history, the pro-life movement has also gained notoriety for attacks with the use of explosives (more often than not it only threatened to commit such acts), butyric acid or the threat of anthrax contamination (sending letters with the bacteria). It has been responsible for 11 murders since 1993 (NARAL Pro-choice America Foundation 2017, p. 5). Appropriately tailored propaganda with an adequate dose of hatred is important at the indoctrination phase. Individuals in particular can be supported to engage in terrorist activities by means of a narrative that leads to the neutralization of mechanisms usually repressing aggression toward others. This may contribute to the development of a moral relativism of sorts, favoring the attainment of the group’s goals and gives certain messianic traits to its members. However, the radicalization of women toward terrorism is usually viewed as something of an aberration. Thus, at the level of terrorist activities women are presented mainly as victims of violence, heroines dedicated to the cause, or extreme monsters (Åhäll 2015). A comprehensive identification of sources of radicalization threats seems possible through the harnessing of research instruments from the entire spectrum of scholarly disciplines, such as economics, psychology, sociology, political science, international relations, or anthropology (Veldhuis and Staun 2009, p. 4). Among the factors that favor radicalization of Muslims in the West one can name a range of different conditions and impulses, such as shallow political, economic, and sociocultural integration; an identity crisis made worse by a sense of humiliation, inferiority, and discrimination (real or imagined—depending upon the individual in question); the foreign policy of the host country (supporting governments considered by Muslims to be unjust and harmful to the so-called “Islamic world”) (Meines 2007, pp. 35–36). In the analysis of the phenomenon of radicalization to jihadism, the root cause model is useful. It presupposes the existence of causes and catalysts which accelerate the radicalization process. At the center of the model in question is the human individual (the individual dimension), which is subject to the influence of various internal and external factors. Even though each of those factors may become the main reason for the radicalization of a given person’s views, usually the process is

3 An instruction manual for such activity, entitled Closed: 99 Ways to Stop Abortion, was drawn up in 1985 by Jospeh M. Sheidler. It is freely available on the Internet.

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triggered by a combination of several. The premises and catalysts of socialization toward extremism are most often related to the initiating factor (trigger event) can be analyzed on two intersecting levels—macro and micro. The macro-factors (conflicts, integration, globalization) also include other categories, such as demographic, political, social, economic, and cultural changes or activeness on the labor market (Veldhuis and Staun 2009, pp. 22–24). The risk of dissatisfaction, frustration and, ultimately, the process of radicalization of an individual or group (for example, young Muslims unable to compete on the labor market, falling into the spiral of poverty and self-doubt) depend on this array of conditions. However, the macro category alone is not enough to explain the phenomenon of radicalization. The micro dimension of the model in question, focusing on the direct characteristics of the person and his or her social relations, is helpful here. The division of the micro category into social and a more personal—individual—areas has as its aim to emphasize the role of each individual and its internal (usually unique) motivations. It is possible to consider the personality traits, views, and temperament of a specific person, as well as the other components of his/her psychological profile (Mellis 2007). In contrast to other forms of criminality, a cost–benefit analysis does not seem very appropriate. Four approaches can be used in the study of terrorism: the multicausal approach, the political/structural approach, the organizational approach, and the psychological approach. The first is the broadest, covering a wide range of psychological, economic, political, and sociological factors. The second stresses the influence of the immediate environment in the shape of political events on the national and international stage. The third considers terrorism to be a conscious strategy for achieving political ends, that is, a stage when other available means of political struggle have been exhausted. The last approach focuses on individual motivations of the people subject to the risk of radicalization (Zięba and Szlachter 2015, pp. 130–131). Economic factors are important with regard to the problem of radicalization. In times of economic slowdown, when the standard of living of the inhabitants is declining rapidly, one can speak of the so-called negative association. In short, it can be described as an increased probability of the occurrence of cases of terrorist attacks precisely during periods of bad economic situation in the country. The threat of pauperization is not a decisive factor, but along with economic differences and, for example, discrimination on the labor market, it creates favorable conditions. In the case of unfavorable economic conditions, such as poverty and the risk of social marginalization that it entails, extremism is chosen by individuals as a “rational way out” of the situation. In the organization, they often obtain what they previously lacked, that is, a sense of community with like people, a unified and clear aim (fighting against the Western enemy), and financial resources. One could even say that they gain a form of prestige and recognition, in their own eyes as well (Veldhuis and Staun 2009, p. 14). This is not only the case for Islamic terrorism but also for leftist movements, a good example of which is Greece after 2008, which saw the activation of anarchic movements accusing, first and foremost, western capital of responsibility for the bad state of the country’s finances.

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It can be said that there are two dimensions to the issue of the factors which favor radicalization and which are linked to globalization and modernization processes. The first of them is technical and scientific progress, which is attained through the dissemination of modern means of communication like the Internet (Clutterbuck 2007). Through global mass media, radical groups can easily disseminate extremist content that incites, directly or indirectly to hatred and/or to acts of violence. A telling example is the community known as Digital Umm (from the Arab word for “mother”), which targets mothers or future mothers and encourages them to bring up their offspring in keeping with the premises of jihadist ideology. Women who participate in this type of radicalization identify with one another and form an online sisterhood of sorts, based on the same violent narrative. The second dimension is that of the western models that form the main ideological current shaping the globalization process (democracy, the liberalization of sociocultural norms, etc.). Such an image has become particularly strong in the consciousness of groups, some of whom perceive this situation as a threat to their religion, values, or culture (Berger 2007, p. 16). According to the social identity theory, the group becomes a point of reference that defines itself in terms of contrast between its allies (the in-group) and a hostile environment made up of representatives of other interpersonal structures or associations (the out-groups). Some researchers go so far as to state that group identification is the main factor responsible for the radicalization of, for example, Muslim communities in Western countries. Research carried out in 2006–2008 in the Netherlands clearly shows that Moroccan youths living and growing up in the Netherlands are acutely affected by lack of acceptance and alienation (de Mas 2007). Causal factors as such need not have a radicalizing effect. They are also easier to diagnose and predict than incidents or stimuli referred to as catalysts. The latter are not capable of initiating the radicalization process themselves. This is only possible with a specific combination of a catalyst with factors coming from the macro, micro, or individual dimension. The publication of Mohammed’s cartoons in Denmark, for example, can be said to have been a key catalyst. Their reprint in many other EU countries triggered the current wave of radicalization of individuals or groups, whether in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, France, Germany, Sweden, Belgium, Italy, or in Denmark itself. The first newspaper to publish them was the Danish Jyllands-Posten in 2006. The local Swedish newspaper Nerikes Allehanda published a drawing of the prophet’s head on a dog’s body on August 19, 2007, and other European newspapers followed suit. This caused a number of protests in Muslim countries. Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, a representative of the terrorist organization Al-Qa’ida in Iraq, has offered a $100,000 reward for the murder of cartoonist Lars Vilks. The life of Ulf Johansson, editor-in-chief of the Swedish newspaper Nerikes Allehanda, was valued at $50,000. A special example in this context is that of Coleen R. LaRose, hailed by the media as Jihad Jane. She became famous through her efforts to promote the idea of jihad on the Internet as Fatima La Rosa (YouTube, MySpace) and her involvement in the matter of the mentioned above cartoons. She was arrested in 2009 and sentenced in early 2014 to 10 years in prison being part of an illegal conspiracy seeking to murder

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Lars Vilks. Tellingly, LaRose apologized for her behavior and declared that she would no longer take part in holy war. Proponents of the theory that personality is the decisive factor in radicalization believe that questions of faith can be a secondary stimulus. In keeping with this assumption, LaRose’s drift toward extremist views may not have been in direct connection with her faith, as evidenced by her repentant stance after her arrest. The radical interpretation of Islam was presumably an additional factor in her radicalization, but not its root cause, because she had experienced a series of traumatic experiences in the period preceding the attack. As a child, she was sexually abused by her biological father, she made a living from prostitution having fled her family home at 13, and had a miscarriage after which she could no longer have children, and her two marriages fell apart. On the verge of mental exhaustion following the death of her father and brother, she attempted to commit suicide in 2005. Her traumatic life and emotional state were skillfully exploited by a recruiter she had met by accident in a bar and then by her Islamist overseers named Eagle Eye and Black Flag (Ali Charaf Damache) (Shiffman 2012).

5.2 5.2.1

Women in Terrorist Organizations Participation and Roles of Female Terrorists

The membership of women in terrorist movements has a long tradition, despite the existence of myths holding that they reject violence and aggression as a mechanism of oppression (often patriarchal), and that they do not commit crimes but are only subjected to them. Women’s membership in terrorist groups is a global phenomenon that is independent of those groups’ ideological makeup (Zięba 2015). Women played an important role in the first wave of terrorism, defined by David C. Rapoport as the anarchist one.4 They made up a quarter of the members of Narodnaya Volya, whose outstanding female members included Vera Nikolayevna Figner and Sophia Lvovna Perovskaya. Women’s membership in anarchist and revolutionary movements from the early twentieth century was part of the emancipatory trend carried by this wave. Women’s activeness decreased during the second wave, and increased again at the turn of the 1960s to the 1970s in secular organizations, primarily leftist ones, but also in national-liberation and separatist movements. In those groups, women were co-leaders and formed the ideological avantgarde. It is worthwhile in this context to recall such names as: Ulrike Meinhof and Gudrun Ensslin from the Red Army Faction (Rote Armee Fraktion—RAF), Juliane Plambeck and Brigitte Mohnhaupt from the Movement of June 2 (Bewegung 2. Juni—B2J), Fusako Shingenobu from the Japanese Red Army (Nihon Sekigu— JRA), Adriana Faranda from the Italian Red Brigades (Brigate Rosse—BR), Susanna Ronconi, Gulia Borelli and Silviera Russo from the Italian Front Line

4

The waves of terrorism are discussed in Chap. 4.

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(Prima Linea—PL), and Leila Khaled from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine—PFLP. It is also worthwhile to mention the West-German urban guerilla group Red Zora (Rote Zora—RZ), a group which accepted only women. This organization gave a very extreme interpretation to the slogans of feminism and called for active armed struggle to transform the structures of dominance and brutal strategies which undermined the sexual equality project. In the days of the so-called German Autumn (Deutscher Herbst) and the pinnacle of RAF activities, terrorism began to be associated with the second wave of feminism. The rapid rise in women’s participation in terrorist acts made it fashionable to equate feminism and terrorism (Feminismus ¼ Terrorismus). The involvement of women in political violence was misinterpreted as a form of emancipation. Despite the fact that West-German feminists condemned the use of force, the German authorities continued to view women’s terrorism as an extreme form of the feminism (For more, see Melzer 2015; Third 2014a). The Federal Republic of Germany failed to see what motivated women involved in extreme left-wing groups. The perverse exposure given to their womanhood, sexuality, and rapaciousness made women terrorists into cultural icons. “The RAF was not a woman’s movement, but it is remarkable how many artists and writers have recast the group’s legacy within a feminist imaginary” (Scribner 2015, p. 11). In the United States of the 1970s terrorism also had a feminine face, including, among others that of black feminist Angela Davis (Communist Party, Black Panthers) (Davis 1981), who carried out an attack on Judge Harold Haley on August 7, 1970, or Bernardine Dohrn from the women faction of Weathermen. The case of Patricia (Patty) Hearst, who was abducted in 1974 by the far-left Symbionese Liberation Army, provided ideal fodder for analyses of this sort. The kidnapping was carried out in order to force her father to pay a ransom to be distributed among the needy. Despite the family’s donation of $2 million to provide food for the poor, Hearst was not released, but joined the SLA. The reasons that influenced her decision and her subsequent criminal career remain controversial. She was arrested in the autumn of 1975 and sentenced to 35 years’ imprisonment for, among other things, her part in a bank robbery. The sentence was commuted by President Jimmy Carter and Hearst was fully pardoned by President Bill Clinton in 2001. The image of this woman terrorist was thus due to unfavorable conditions or to the will of others with respect to her (coercion, captivity, pressure). This particular example shows how stereotypical traits ascribed to women’s behavior and attitudes toward terrorism are replicated and manifested as hyper-feminity. Hyper-feminity is an excess of femininity and, as such, it is unnatural, other and different. A woman-terrorist represents a hyper-feminine and emotionally unstable form of extremism, a deviation, and a hyper-terrorist, whose evaluation framework extends beyond the logic of men’s behavior (Third 2014b, p. 160; See more Gasztold 2019). Left-wing and national liberation groups of a secular nature were more open to the participation of women because their ideology sought to break with the past. In contrast, right-wing movements, especially religious ones, viewed a return to the past as a priority. This trend has continued to our day, with women’s activeness in secular movements being the prevalent trend (Nacos 2005, p. 436). In her

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2005 analysis of American racist and white supremacist movements, Kathleen M. Blee showed that over 25% of the members of such organizations, and half of their new recruits, are women (Blee 2005). In his studies of US organizations from the 1960s and 1970s, Jeffrey S. A. Handler showed that the women-to-men ratio in left and right-wing organizations was 46.2% and 11.2%, respectively (Handler 1990). Right-wing organizations—both secular (mainly neo-fascist and racist) ones and those who draw on warped religious interpretations—the approach to women is patriarchal. This leads to differences in the roles they fill. For example, they carry out logistical tasks, such as courier services, that of protector providing a safe haven, visiting prisoners to transmit information, entrapment, escorting attackers, and their equipment to their destination. In addition, they play an important role as recruitment and propaganda facilitators by using social networks for the purpose of identifying and recruiting new members for the organization. They monitor websites (the “consciousness” function) and look after the image of the organization. The division of roles is not necessarily due to discrimination against women, but rather because they are more effective in the roles assigned to them. This does not preclude women’s participation in attacks. An example is the figure of Beate Zschäpe from the German right-wing organization National-Socialist Underground (Nationalsozialistischer Untergrund—NSU). This terrorist supported the group’s efforts to establish the Fourth German Reich, took active part in attacks targeted mainly against immigrants of Turkish descent, and was involved in 10 murders between 2000 and 2007 (Der Spiegel 2018). Today, women take part in political violence in every terrorist current. They play various roles, such as logistics and recruiting; they take part in armed combat; carry out suicide attacks; and draw up the organization’s political program. Their participation can also be observed in other areas connected with political violence (partisans, uprisings, revolutions, civil wars, armed conflicts). They are mainly active at the logistical level. Women play the leading role in recruitment and in moderation of the organization’s information policy (propaganda), they are used, for example, in protest actions, sabotage, media campaigns, and political lobbying. The functions and the tasks carried out by women in terrorist organizations can be divided into the following: (a) support (basic logistics, fundraising), information (intelligence and counter-espionage), (b) sabotage (entrapment role), military and (c) political leadership. The progressive mobilization of women in the new media (especially managing websites, social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, VKontakte, Telegram, Tumblr, instant messengers, chat rooms, etc.) shows the complexity of the radicalization process. But it also reveals a lack of flexibility on the part of security institutions, which may not be prepared to respond to the threat posed by the “fair sex,” due to the dominant stereotypes that terrorism is a masculine world. This has to do with the common wisdom, repeated by the media, that a typical terrorist is a young, fanatical, and frustrated Muslim man, most often from North Africa or the Middle East. On the other hand, the connotation of an extremist (this term is most often used in connection with the extreme right), for example in Europe and the United States, is associated with a white, burly, head-shaven man with a vulgar, xenophobic, and racist manner. Thus, in both cases, it is HE, not SHE. But

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reality is a bit more complex. Today we have to deal with HIM and HER, both of whom may often be transparent in a crowd, yet have extensive skills and competence in making use of information technology and other technological novelties. Creating a specific profile of a female terrorist and a male terrorist is impossible due to the nonhomogenous nature of terrorism itself, and to numerous other conditions and catalysts leading to this form of political activity (Horgan 2005; Victoroff and Kruglanski 2009; Silke 2011). It is presumed that, due to the predominant stereotyping of the role and importance of women in right-wing organizations, both secular and religious, there are differences in the tasks carried out by both sexes. However, the efficiency of a female attacker evolves. This is why there has been an increase in women suicide bombers. The martyrdom of women is used by terrorist groups as proof of the enemy’s bestiality. In a perverse way, this promotes the harm and suffering sustained by the female attacker, supposedly brought to the last resort by the “enemy.” She takes her life in the name of the idea for which the organization fights. In this manner, the image of the martyred woman triumphs over the soulless apparatus of oppression/ state/international community, because it arouses compassion. This strategy can be characterized as devaluing attacked persons/systems by shifting and dispersing responsibility and by blaming the victims. Shaping such an image of the world is of decisive importance in the indoctrination of new members and potential sympathizers. Individuals can be supported in undertaking terrorist activities by a narrative that leads to the neutralization of mechanisms preventing aggression toward others and favors the emergence of a dual morality standard (Bolechów 2010, pp. 108–125). The traditional roles of women in other contexts related to political violence (rebellions, putsches, revolutions, civil wars, armed conflicts) take place as logistics operations. Today, the women members of a majority of right-wing organizations have specialized in tasks related to recruitment and moderation of the group’s information policy (propaganda), including protest actions, sabotage, media campaigns, and political lobbying. In general, the functions and tasks performed by the female members of the organization can be divided into support activity (such as providing basic logistical support); intelligence and counterespionage; the role of a bait; military activities; political leadership (Mahan and Griset 2008, p. 15). The analysis of the life of 222 women and 269 men involved in terrorist activities conducted by Karen Jacques and Paul J. Taylor did not reveal anything exceptional about women’s participation in political violence. The study took into account criteria such as age, education, occupation, civil status, origin, religious conversion, earlier ties to some other form of criminal activity, and political or social activism. The commonly held view that women terrorists are uneducated and socially dysfunctional outsiders was not borne out. The analysis focused on the lives of women and men connected with, among other organizations, Al-Qaida, Basque Homeland and Liberty (ETA), the Irish Republican Army (IRA), the neo-Left wave in Europe (RAF, BR, Front Line), the Aum Supreme Truth (Aum Shinrikyo), Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (FARC), LTTE, PFLP, Al-Fatah, the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) and the US-based Stop Huntington Animal Cruelty

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(US-SHAC), Animal Liberation Front (ALF), Earth Liberation Front (ELF) and Earth First! (EF). Most of the women in the study had at least a high-school education, had joined the organization before they were 35 year old, had no prior experience of a criminal milieu, and 50% were professionally active. Tellingly, almost 1/3 had been introduced to terrorism through their family or circle of friends (Jacques and Taylor 2013). In a way, this confirms that one of the factors leading to greater interest in a career as a terrorist is interpersonal ties. It should therefore be assumed that the participation of women in terrorism is no different than that of men. It should be stressed that, regardless of the motives and factors leading to it, such behavior is rational and, thus, has a dual dimension manifested in the determined pursuit of the goal and the adjustment of means to attain it (including committing crimes against life and limb). The assumption that women are less aggressive than men and resort to committing crimes less often than men was borne out in studies. Psychological studies in particular stressed men’s lesser likelihood to feel remorse and guilt and their mechanism turning frustration into aggression more frequently than in women. Such processes among women were not ruled out entirely, however, especially when external factors produced a tense situation. But studies have shown that women are able to refrain from physical violence longer than men (Eagly and Steffen 1986; Hyde 1984; Frodi et al. 1977; Archer 2004). It is possible that women attach greater importance to social interaction and show antisocial behavior less often. As a result they are less likely to kill another person. Peter J. Phillips thinks, based on US police statistics from 2012 (8514 homicides), that men commit brutal crimes significantly more often than women. Only 11% (965) of homicides were committed by women. As this was a study of individual cases (Phillips 2013, p. 4), it does not mean that, as part of a group, women do not commit crimes against life and limb. The aggressive behavior of men was at times explained by hormonal factors and a high level of testosterone. It was presumed that, in women, this organic compound could lead to the “masculinization of behavior,” including aggression (Dabbs and Morris 1990). Such an approach provided a simplified explanation for why men are predominant in terrorism. The function of stimulating individual involvement could be played by gender-related meanings and stereotypes. The role of the warrior in primary societies had to do with the status of the individual in the community, and thus with the number of female partners and with access to goods (See Van Vugt et al. 2007). Yet the problem is more complex, even if these reflections continued, for example, controversial statements that women’s lack of involvement in terrorism has to do with the need to preserve male dominance. Excluding women from active armed struggle is a way to return to the “natural order,” especially if religious organizations are considered. Bartosz Bolechów emphasizes that religious groups cherish “the archetype of the man-warrior, the hero who restores the world’s upset balance and recovers his previously challenged status in the world” (Bolechów 2010, pp. 197–198). One could jokingly conclude that terrorism is due to a crisis of masculinity. However, the growing number of women recruited and trained for terrorism, also by organizations that have until then been hostile to them, does not

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bear this out. Cindy Ness, comparing women in secular and religious organizations notes that “Despite their importance to the cause, whether in traditional or non-traditional societies, the position of females engaged in political struggle is compromised due to their gender”(Ness 2005, p. 259).

5.2.2

Women as Terrorists Worldwide

There is a universally held belief that terrorist organizations are a hostile milieu for women, and that if women are members of such organizations, they are perceived as being enslaved and coerced by the organization (by means of blackmail, the need to restore honor, threat, or kidnapping) or by the circumstances (occupation, loss of family member, childlessness, handicap, redemption of guilt, family honor), and not as beings acting rationally. This view is borne out in the case of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), over half of whose members are women and children. LRA recruits to its units through abductions and by raiding villages and schools in Uganda, Congo, the Central African Republic, and South Sudan. Most girls and women in it serve as sexual slaves. Presumably, another African organization—Boko Haram, which kidnapped 276 girls from a boarding school in Chibok during the night on April 14–15, 2014, will also integrate some of the girls into its structures and coerced to Islam. Four years later, on February 19, 2018, the same organization abducted another 110 girls from their school in Depchi (For more, see Uwakwe and Miapyen 2018, pp. 141–163). Beliefs that a woman is a hostage of terrorism are perpetuated by examples such as that of Samira Ahmed Jassim al-Azzawi, called the “mother of the believers” (Umm al-Muminin), who was responsible for recruiting and training for the organization Ansar Al-Sunna in Iraq of over 80 women for suicide attacks. She was arrested by Iraqi police on January 21, 2009 and admitted to organizing 28 such attacks. During a videotaped interview for Associated Press, she described in detail the manner of recruiting and training using, among other methods, raping of women and using blackmail for the purpose of “redeeming oneself through a suicide attack” (The Guardian 2009). The influence of stereotypes connected with gender on the portrait of women in the media and in scholarly research perpetuates such beliefs. According to Brigtte L. Nacos, there are six dominant media frames on female involvement in terrorism: (1) physical appearance, (2) family connection, (3) engaging in terrorism out of love, (4) fighting for women’s liberty/equality, (5) being tough-as-males/tougher-than-men, and last but not least (6) the bored, naïve, and out-of-touch-with reality frame (Nacos 2005). Media representation of female terrorists oscillates between justification and emotional explanation of the women’s behavior and it is steeped in gender stereotypes. Depriving women of political agency preserves the male history of political violence. For example, Mia Bloom, the well-known American scholar studying women suicide terrorists, in her abovementioned concept of the “Four R’s plus One” (revenge, redemption, respect, relationship + rape) (Bloom 2011, pp. 234–236), draws attention to the traumatic situation of women who are unwilling to accept their fate or who are torn with

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emotions (love, hatred, despair), and who carry out an act of heroic self-sacrifice. In light of these circumstances, who is responsible for their decision to do so? Is it the geopolitical situation, the dysfunction of the state, that of the social system, or they themselves? A mystical fatum or, perhaps, females who break gender norms? The search for motives leading a woman to engage in terrorist activities does not necessarily bring us any closer to counteracting this phenomenon. The fight against stereotypes does not always produce the desired effect. The involvement of the researcher, his/her value system, and the culture in which he/she was brought up and functions have an influence on his/her argumentation. The perspective they broaden is usually the one about cultural roles and ideas about ourselves and about those who threaten us. This does not broaden our knowledge about how these women build relations with their external environment and why a terrorist organization recruits women. But it may provide a hint about how such organizations search for candidates, among other means, by manipulating susceptibilities arising from the motives presented by Bloom. But the narrowing of women’s motives to the proposed 4R + 1 need not be applicable in all cases. Attempts to justify the involvement of women deprive them of the real role that they play in a terrorist organization. The formulation of general categories and assumptions with respect to terrorist activeness and the motives of men and women terrorists cannot apply to all terrorist forms and currents. Terrorism is not a homogeneous phenomenon, and this is often due to the different social context in which a given organization operates (Crenshaw 2000, p. 405). Moreover, and this is something that Karla J. Cunningham drew attention to as she analyzed the role of women in terrorist organizations, it is important to be aware of “first, the implications of limited date; second, the possibility of denial and deception; third, that invisibility does not necessarily equate with passivity or powerlessness; and fourth, organizational versus societal imperatives” (Cunningham 2003, p. 187). The conspiratorial nature of terrorist groups makes it virtually impossible to obtain reliable information concerning sex and gender differences. On the other hand, the terrorists’ narrative about themselves may be deliberately twisted or distorted by a need for rationalization. It is worthwhile to remember that the place of women in terrorism and in the struggle for the cause should be seen as their role in war/conflict. Thus, traditional communities in this exceptional situation are able to accept their participation on an equal footing with male fighters. This does not mean that once the intended goals are achieved or the group is dissolved, they will retain the same status. More likely, as the exceptional conditions disappear, women will be forced back into the stereotypical roles of wives, mothers, and daughters. Gender differences in times of war and peace in the eyes of the public differ only in the rhetorical sphere. That is why it is so difficult to separate gender relations from the understanding of war, peace, violence, and security. An additional challenge for the researcher is to decide whose experience of conflict/violence/armed struggle is privileged (Pettman 1996, pp. 83, 85). In the twentieth century and the beginning of the twenty-first century, women were/are connected to terrorist organizations of the following types: • National-liberation or separatist groups, such as:

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– Basque Homeland and Liberty (Euskadi Ta Askatasuna—ETA), which has suspended its armed activities in the fall of 2011, and in May 2018 published the letter dated April 16, 2018 with declaration of completely dissolving its structures and political activity. – The Irish Republican Army—IRA, whose continuator, the Provisional Irish Republican Army—PIRA has officially laid down its arms in July 2005, yet a splinter group, the Real Irish Republican Army—RIRA, remains active. – The Kurdish Workers’ Party (Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan—PKK), presently under the name Kongra-Gel—KGK. – The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam—LTTE, which was defeated in 2008, but whose structures located beyond Sri Lanka and India are presumably reactivating the group. – The Palestinian National Liberation Movement (Harakat al-Tahrir al-Watani al-Filastini—Al-Fatah). – Chechnyan separatists mainly associated with the idea of the Caucasian Emirate (Kavkazskiy Emirat—EK). • Religious groups, such as: – – – –

The Party of God (Hizb-Allah—Hezbollah) The Islamic Group (Jeemaah Islamyyah—JI) The Armed Islamic Group (Groupe Islamique Armé—GIA) Al-Qaidą Central—AQC and its branches in, among other places, Al-Qaida of the Arabic Peninsula (AQAP) and Al-Qaida in Iraq (AQI) – The Islamic State (ad-Dawlah al-Islamiyah-Daesh) In this context it is worth mentioning groups making reference to Islam in the Palestinian national-liberation struggle, such as: – The Islamic Resistance Movement (Harakat al-Muqaqamah al-Islamiya— Hamas) – The Palestinian Islamic Jihad (Harakat al-Jihad al-Islami fi Filastin/Palestinian Islamic Jihad—PIJ) – The Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades (Kata’ib Shuhada’ al-Aqsa—AAMB) This category also includes millenary/apocalyptic terrorism. The presence of women has been observed in various sects, such as: – The Supreme Truth (Aum Shinrikyo, presently named Aleph), which carried out, among other attacks, the sarin gas attack in the Tokyo metro in 1995 – The Rajneesh Movement, which used the salmonella bacteria to carry out a bio-terrorist attack on a number of salad bars and restaurants in Dallas, OR in 1984

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5 The Specificity of Female Terrorism

The participation of women has been noted in organizations making reference to Christianity, such as: – The Army of God—AG, part of the antiabortion terrorist current – The Lord’s Resistance Army—LRA5 • Far-right groups, such as: – – – –

Aryan Nations—AN Ku Klux Klan—KKK Blood & Honour—BH The National-Socialist Underground (Nationalsozialistischer Untergrund— NSU)

• Revolutionary and anarchist such as: – Red Brigades (Brigate Rosse—BR) – Front Line (Primea Linea/PL) – The Red Army Faction (called Baader-Meinhof Group, Rote Armee Fraktion—RAF) – The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia—FARC) – The Sandinista National Liberation Front (Fronte Sandinista de Liberación Nacional—FSLN) – The Zapatista Army of National Liberation (El Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional—EZLN) – The Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso—SL) • Environmental, such as: – – – –

The Animal Liberation Front—ALF The Earth Liberation Front—ELF Earth First!—EF Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty—SHAC

It is worth noting that in radical environmentalist groups there is no clear division of tasks between the movement’s active members and sympathizers. In groups which act on the basis of informal network structures it is difficult to clearly separate roles entrusted to individual members. These will depend on the specific nature of the task. 5 The Lord’s Resistance Army is a partisan unit acting under the leadership of Joseph Kony on the territory of Uganda, the Central African Republic, Congo and South Sudan. Ideologically, it refers to the Catholic faith, mysticism, folk beliefs, and the prophecies of the group’s leader. The organization recruits (frequently through abduction) to its military structures mainly children, including girls, whose functions include logistics connected, among other things, with espionage, cooking, providing sexual services, and entering into forced marriages with fighters. From July 2009 to February 2012, 591 cases of forced recruiting of children, including 258 girls, to the LRA have been noted. See UN Security Council (2012).

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Studying the role of women in terrorism requires detailed knowledge of psychology, sociology, culture, anthropology, and security. Moreover, knowledge of criminology and forensics with a gender-oriented approach is necessary to provide any theoretical assumptions and recommendations which could be applied in practice. This may prove important in cases of a response to threats, for example, when dealing with a hostage situation and an attempt is made to contact the kidnappers. A hostage situation entails the unlawful deprivation of liberty of persons, whether incidental of selected, for the purpose of forcing the authorities to meet the perpetrators’ demands. Hostage taking situations can be defined according to type: abduction of persons (kidnapping), seizure of means of transport (hijacking, skyjacking, carjacking), a barricade situation, and size—small (up to 10 hostages), medium (10–100), and large (over 100). Defusing a hostage situation is possible through negotiation or by assault conducted by a counterterrorist unit (Jałoszyński 2008, pp. 46–47). Determining who the abductors are and whether there are any women among them (and among the hostages) can affect the further course of events and the negotiations in a substantial manner. An analysis of the perpetrators’ cultural background would make it possible to understand the situation fully. In other words, elements of the counterterrorism policy could be adapted to a specific area and problem. Would this be of any significance when the hostages have been freed by an assault team? This is doubtful. Trained anti-terrorist personnel should not be misled by the image of women being weaker. This problem was clearly emphasized in the recollections gathered by Eileen MacDonald and the interviews she conducted with women terrorists from various world regions and with anti-terrorist officials, from the German Grenzschutzgruppe 9 (GSG 9), among other formations. Her book, first published in 1991 under the telling title of Shoot the Women First, provided guidance of sorts to security institutions to take the gender factor into account during offensive action (MacDonald 1992). If gender is a social construct connected with the assignment of roles and norms, it is also associated with the individual’s identity, social identity, and way of life. In other words, it affects the distribution of power, privileges, and prestige. The system of gender roles and their mutual relations influences all aspects of human life, including security and political violence. Along with this construct come stereotypes which are common in various individual cultural circles. Every culture, even if only expressed in language, refers to what is feminine and masculine. Moreover, these meanings include expectations about how each gender should behave. Exaggerated expectations are perpetuated as gender stereotypes, which can refer back to specific gender traits. Such stereotypes appear in the image of female terrorists propagated by the media and suggest a certain aberration. Although, as the comparative study conducted by Karen Jacques and Paul J. Taylor have shown, there is no peculiarity among women as compared to men. The image of a woman who is humiliated, uneducated, and psychologically and socially disturbed, and who joins a terrorist organization to gain acceptance does not stand up to scrutiny. Analyses have confirmed that the social environment can play a significant role in bringing a woman to a terrorist organization or to para-terrorist activity, but her earlier

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involvement in political life can just as well be the motivating factor (Jacques and Taylor 2013). While only chosen terrorist organizations were mentioned as examples, those that were represent various ideological currents, from leftist national-liberation movements to religious ones, including Sunni (like Al-Qaida and Daesh), Shiite (Hezbollah), and apocalyptic (Aum Shinrikio/Aleph) organizations. Groups in which women play various roles, be it in logistics, or as recruiters, fighters taking part in armed combat, martyrs, leaders, or in an ideological capacity (see Table 5.2), are to be found in almost all corners of the world. According to R. Kim Cragin and Sara A. Daly, the basic tasks making up logistics activities involve providing courier services, protection connected with providing a safe haven, visiting accused persons and prisoners in arrest houses and prisons (to transmit information), entrapment (for example, by distracting the attention of security services—baiting), and escorting attackers and their equipment (for example, concealed in strollers or by feigning pregnancy) to their destination. The role of the recruitment facilitator consists of direct personal contacts to identify and recruit new members to the organization, as well as dissemination of propaganda, for example by creating and monitoring websites and messages on the Internet, and the function of the reference community’s “conscience,” which seeks to sustain the intensity of violence by maintaining the memory of it. The role of the martyr has to do with the preparation and execution of a suicide bombing. Participation in armed struggle based on urban warfare (guerilla) tactics is another distinguishing feature within the organization. The role of an operational leader has to do primarily with deciding about the nature of the strategy and tactics of the fight and with implementing the organization’s policy. On the other hand, the role of women as a political avant-garde has to do with setting out the organization’s directions of development (vision) and its ideological outline (Cragin and Daly 2009). The four latter categories are usually reserved for men. Sue Mahan and Pamala L. Griset divided the roles that women play in terrorist organizations into four categories. The first comprises activities of sympathizing activities, which include providing basic logistical support (funds, food, provisions, lodging), providing a safe haven, and sexual services. The second category encompasses spying, which includes the gathering and transmission of information (intelligence and counterintelligence functions) and the role of bait. The third category is the warrior. This role is connected with preparing and carrying out terrorist attacks, using weapons, and building bombs. The fourth and last category is that of the leader and entails the possession of an important position within the organization, being in a leadership role, and being responsible for creating the policy and strategy of the organization (Mahan and Griset 2008, p. 15). Individual categories are connected with the importance of the activities and the rank of the given person in the organization. Presumably, however, these categories are not incremental and do not arise through promotion. Today, the participation of women is observed in each terrorist current. Taking into account the territorial extent of the organizations, in which women are present, it should be said that they cover almost the entire world. Movements and groups of a leftist character continue to be

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Table 5.2 The role of women in chosen terrorist organizations Group Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades AQC Al-Qaida Central AQI Al-Qaida in Iraq BR Red Brigades EK Caucasian Emirat (Chechnen Separatists) ETA Basque Homeland and Liberty EZLN Zapatista Army of National Liberation FARC Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia FSLN Sandinista National Liberation Front GIA Armed Islamic Group HAMAS Islamic Resistance Movement Hezballah Party of God IJ Islamic Group ISIS/Daeshe Islamic State in Iraq and Greater Syria/Islamic State JRA Japanese Red Army LTTE Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam PKK Kurdish Workers Party PIJ Palestinian Islamic Jihad

Logistician X

Recruiter X

Martyr X

X

X

Xa

X X X

Xb

X

X

X

Guerilla

X X X

Operational leader

Political vanguard

X

X

X

X

X X

X

X

X

X

X

X X

Xc

X

X

X

Xd

Xd

Xd

X X

X

X

X X

X

X

X

X

X

Xf

X

X

X

X

X

(continued)

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Table 5.2 (continued) Group PFLP Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine PL Front Line PIRA Provisional Irish Republican Army RAF Red Army Faction SL Shining Path

Logistician X

X X

Recruiter

Martyr X

Guerilla

X

X X

X

X

Operational leader X

Political vanguard

X X

X X

X

X

X

X

This list was updated using data presented by Cragin and Daly (2009, p. 106) a Cragin and Daly (2009) found that Al-Qaida does not use women for suicide attacks. Yet, the magazine Al-Khansaa, distributed since 2004 by the Women’s Information Bureau of the Arabian Peninsula, has been calling upon women to take part in armed operations, including suicide attacks. Since 2005, cases of suicide attacks by women belonging to groups with direct ties to AQC in Pakistan, Uzbekistan, and Afghanistan have been noted. Some organizations which are/were AQC branches in Africa also make use of women in suicide attacks (Ash-Shabaab—the first such attack took place on August 24, 2010; and Boko Haram—on July 27, 2014) (Bloom 2014; Davis 2006) b The authors did not include this function as an important one, but the case of Samira Ahmed Jassim al-Azzawi, detained by the Iraqi authorities in January 2009, confirmed that women were active within AQI and organizations associated with it for the purpose of recruiting new members c While the authors omit this question, it is worthwhile to mention the role of mothers as moral authorities in radicalization and recruitment. It is difficult to separate the process of socialization and the influence of upbringing in a culture of combat/war on the real process of becoming a terrorist. A figure deserving of mention in this context is Mariam Farahat, called Umm Nidal (the mother of struggle) who proudly displays her pride in her sons who are fighting Israel d In Craign and Daly work there is no indications for female recruitment, martyrdom and political leadership within Hezbollah. However, especially in 1980s of the previous century Hezbollah conducted female suicide bombings alone and under ubrella of allied Syrian Socialist Nationalist Party. Although it later gave up this tactics. Morover, there are special bodies, which recuit women and girls through social networks (Rinehart 2019, pp. 89–90, 133). Furthermore, in January 2005, the first woman—Rima Fahri, 39 at the time—was elected to the Hezbollah’s Political Council, followed by the leader of the Hezbollah women’s group—Afaf al-Hakim—who gained the right to participate in the work of the Executive Committee. Until then, women in Hezbollah played an auxiliary role in armed combat, but this is expected to change in the nearest future e The study by Cragin and Daly was published in 2009 and, was thus not concerned with the role of women in the Islamic State f Female guerrilla tactics have been used in fight with Islamic State during the civil war in Syria, which still last

popular among women. A high degree of participation of women, reaching 40% at times, has been observed in organizations of the anarchic (New Red Brigades/NBR, Synomosia Pyrinin tis Fotias/SPF), revolutionary (FARC) and eco-terrorist currents (Animal Liberation Front/ALF, Earth Liberation Front/ELF). Women actively support and get involved in activities connected with political violence or organizations and national-liberation movements. In addition to the abovementioned women, those involved in active combat as fighters of the Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK), the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the

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Chechnyan separatist groups connected with the idea of the Caucasian Emirate (EK) should also be mentioned. In terrorist organizations classified as religious, one can observe a rising participation of women, including their greater access to roles and tasks previously reserved for men (military training, armed operations, setting of the organization’s policy). Women in the role of attackers have been noted, among other organizations, in Al-Qaida and its regional branches, the so-called Islamic State (ISIS), Boko Haram (BH), the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades/ Yasser Arafat’s Brigades, and in the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) and used to in Hezbollah. Women members of some of these organizations are also active in Europe.6 Only rarely are women given access to the political avant-garde connected with the setting of the general directions of the organization’s development and its ideological makeup, the abovementioned examples of Rima Fahri and Afaf al-Hakim notwithstanding. Even though women played an auxiliary role in the organization’s activities, it is expected that this will change in the near future (Worrall et al. 2015, pp. 80–82). Women’s involvement in terrorist organizations also serves to “warm up” the group’s image. For example, in recent years this method has been used by Daesh (the Islamic State) on the Internet to attract new women recruits, especially young girls. Photos of women in the ranks of terrorists are addressed to potential supporters. This favors the image of a normal lifestyle choice and serves as one of the factors legitimizing Daesh’s existence and aims (See Klausen 2014). The effectiveness of the “jihadi bride” strategy is borne out by the data of the International Center for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT). It shows that 3922–4294 persons from the EU served as foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq until the spring of 2016, and that about 17% of them, from 666 to 730 persons, were probably women. Presumably, the vast majority of them came from urban areas of Belgium, Germany, and the United Kingdom (Van Ginkel and Entenmann 2016, pp. 4–5). But in the United States as well a drastic increase in the involvement in young women (of an estimated average age of 27) in jihad has been observed in recent years (Alexander 2016). Most probably, the majority of them have been inclined in this direction by the establishment in early February 2014 of the women’s Al-Khansaa brigade, colloquially referred to as “Jihadi Girl Power.” It would seem that the fact that Daesh established a system of sexual slavery was not sufficient to effectively deter them, despite the publication of accounts by women who had managed to escape from the terrorist camps (See, for example, Jinan and Oberlé 2015; Khalaf and Hoffman 2016). Women sustained and propagated the ideology of the Islamic State. Their key role was that of the wife and mother. They supported their husbands who were involved in the activities of this organization by bringing up children in keeping with the jihadist rules and thus ensured the survival of the organization. They also recruited new persons, took an active part in the so-called arranged marriages, and also served as couriers who conveyed not only information but also arms and explosives. On a

6

For more, see the case of the Netherlands: Groen and Kranenberg (2010).

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smaller scale, they were also allowed to be fighters and to plan and carry out attacks, including suicide ones (de Leede 2018). Their pathways to radicalization included (de Leede et al. 2017, pp. 23–24): • The need to belong and define their identity, a factor of particular importance for children of immigrants • The desire for purity and respectability (hence their criticism and rejection of western feminism), sustained by the idealistic vision of the Caliphate • The need to participate in a cosmic war, in which a binary division of the world is transformed into a total war between good and evil • Self-identification with the Islamic community (Ummah) • The desire for adventure • Marriage prospects • The desire to take part in the realization of a divine plan, the rejection of western materialism and superficiality (as an alternative to the western feminism)7 in exchange for something bigger and divine Today, the modus operandi used exclusively by women is important. Given the style of their dress, their anatomy and the characteristics attributed to them, they possess greater possibilities for camouflage, to penetrate certain environments, for passing through check-points, and crossing a border unnoticed. Women are able to hide explosives-filled vests and “shahid belts” under traditional clothing, making detection more difficult. In many cultures, men are not allowed to carry out body searches of women. This has to do with woman’s reputation and purity, making a thorough search difficult. The security forces often lack female officers. Given the specific nature of actions taken by women in terms of tactics (feigned pregnancies, explosives carried on one’s person, in strollers or children’s knapsacks, etc.), recruiting and propaganda, one can single out interrelated trends showing the phenomenon of women’s participation in domestic and international terrorism (See Zedalis 2008, p. 59). The participation of women in organizations which have so far been closed to them, a hitherto untapped resource, also leads to the liberalization of those groups’ internal rules. In this way, institutions combating a given form of terrorism may not be ready to mitigate the threat it represents. Especially when this concerns terrorist organizations’ search for converts among young women of a different civilization (“blue-eyed shahidat”). The first such instance was the recruitment and training of Muriel Degauque, a Belgian woman, who blew herself up in Baghdad on November 9, 2005. Such an event is usually associated with the image of a young male attacker, a religious fanatic driven by frustration, who is most often a Muslim from the Middle or Far East—in other words, an image of Him. The problem is that we are now dealing with Her—one who was not born in the Karachi slums and who is entirely invisible in the crowd of a western metropolis.

7

The Women in Daesh: Deconstructing Complex Gender Dynamics in Daesh Recruitment and Propaganda, The Carter Center: May 2017, https://www.cartercenter.org/resources/pdfs/peace/ conflict_resolution/countering-isis/women-in-daesh.pdf. Accessed on 3 September 2018.

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Attackers

Killed

Wounded

0

10000

20000

30000

40000

Unknown

Female

50000

60000

70000

80000

Male

Fig. 5.1 Suicide attackers and causalities by gender 1985–2016. The results include all attacks in which attackers of the selected gender were involved—attacks committed by multiple attackers of both (or “unknown”) genders will result in multiple genders being reported, not just those that have been selected. Source: Suicide Attack Database Chicago Project on Security and Threats, http:// cpostdata.uchicago.edu/search_new.php Accessed on 8 October 2018

There are no reliable analyses of women’s vulnerabilities and capabilities at the government administration level, apart from scholarly deliberations on this subject. This causes a lesser degree of suspicion toward women and female terrorists than toward men and thus to a greater interest on the part of terrorist organizations in using women, to carry out suicide bombings, for example (Bloom 2005). It is assumed that since the mid-1980s more than 30% of the attacks have been prepared by women. Yoram Schweitzer reports that between 1985 and 2006 there were 220 suicide attacks by women. This figure represents 15% of all attacks on record until then (Schweitzer 2006, p. 8). The data released by the University of Chicago as part of the Chicago Project on Security and Terrorism (CPOST) is different. The total number of suicide attacks during that period was 1244, 79 of which were carried out by women. This amounts to 6.2% rather than 15%, but it should be noted that in more than 40% of cases, the attackers have not been identified. According to CPOST, 5421 suicide attacks were carried out between the beginning of 1985 and the end of October 2016. The estimated number of attackers was 6616, of which 335 were women (5.1%) and 2878 men (43.5%) were identified. The remaining attackers could not be identified (51.4%). As a result of attacks carried out by women 2960 people were killed and 6185 injured (see Fig. 5.1). The total number of fatalities in the period in question was 54,450 people, with almost 13,500 injured.8 During the period in question, the highpoints of women’s participation in suicide bombings was the peak of the Iraqi conflict in 2008 (35 attacks) and the drastic

8

A Suicide Attack Database (SAD) is being drawn up, taking into account the attacker’s gender, education, occupation, and religion. See CPOST-SAD: http://cpostdata.uchicago.edu/search_new. php. Accessed on 8 October 2018.

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increase in 2015 (52 attacks) under the auspices of Boko Haram in Nigeria and Chad. The main method used in women’s attacks was the use of belt bombs (83.3%). Data concerning the education, religion, and occupation of female suicide bombers are incomplete and do not allow for the construction of a credible and replicable model of the woman-terrorist. However, one can deduce that the involvement of women in the preparation and execution of suicide bombings stems from the tactical motives of terrorist groups. The effectiveness of female terrorists is connected with perceptions of woman’s nature and for this reason “women, by the merit of their gender, are and remain operationally superior to men” (Alakoc 2018). Studies on terrorism indicate that it is precisely the gender category that undermines the myth of an exclusively peaceful, fragile, and vulnerable woman. The first woman who probably carried out a suicide attack was 16-year-old Sana’a Mehaidli, a Christian girl from southern Lebanon. It took place on April 9, 1985. Mehaidli was a member of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP) (Bloom 2007). It is also worthwhile to mention the Tamil Tigers, who since their very beginnings in 1976, set up women’s commando (the Birds of Freedom) and suicide (Black Tigers) units, in which the suicide missions were mostly carried out by women. In 1991, a member of the Black Tigers murdered Rajiv Gandhi, the prime minister of India. Two years later, another murdered Ranasinghe Premadasa, the president of Sri Lanka. Today, not only secular groups use this tactics, but as well Islamic organizations send women as live bombs. Noteworthy examples include the suicide bombings carried out at the end of July 2014 in Kano (Nigeria) by Boko Haram. One of its would-be attackers was 10! The effectiveness of suicide bombings carried out by women has led this organization to use women, ¾ of whom were minors, for more than 50% such missions (Davies 2017, p. 109; Warner and Matfess 2017). Other than Boko Haram, Chechnyan women terrorists are the most active group of women suicide bombers. It is estimated that women carried out 42% of Chechnyan suicide attacks in 2008 (Speckhard and Akhmedowa 2008, p. 100), and between 28% and 31% in 2017 (Davies 2017, p. 56). It is worthwhile to note that organizations using women suicide bombers tend to come from collectivist cultures (Palestine, Lebanon, Turkey, Sri Lanka). In these cultures, the role of the community, hierarchy, position in the group and the need for protection are enormous. Values connected with the clan, tribe, and family are also important there. An individual’s identity in these cultures is very closely tied to the division of the world into their own (a community forming a given social system) and communities beyond the system. Within the framework of such a distinction, consent to the use of extreme political violence against outsiders may arise. This represents a system of moral duality: one toward one’s own, and another for the others (Peterka-Benton and Benton 2014).

5.3 Final Remarks: “Adding Women” to the Studies on Terrorism

5.3

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Final Remarks: “Adding Women” to the Studies on Terrorism

The involvement of women in political violence and the shaping of security are phenomena of a global reach. Women play an important role in supporting all types of groups resorting to political violence, carry out terrorist attacks, and participate in countering those threats. Given the functions they play in extremist and terrorist groups the gender factor cannot be marginalized in today’s anti-terrorist strategies. Especially as in recent years the military training of women in organizations of a profile heretofore hostile to women fighters (such as Al-Qaida and the Islamic State) is increasing. Despite this, men and women involved in political violence are perceived differently. Women are ascribed certain defensive mechanisms connected with selflessness and suffering, as if violence had a different impact on women or as if it was not fully understood or rationalized, as in the case for men. Women are associated with the culture of life. The media image of the woman terrorist is decidedly rarer than the figure of a masked man with an AK-47. When a woman takes part in a terrorist attack, the outrage of the international community is often interspersed with a search for justification in that woman’s life experiences, some trauma or suffering. It is difficult to believe that a woman, as symbol of life, takes someone’s life away on behalf of a cause. Psychological factors are sought, like repeated wrongs sustained in childhood, lack of identity, being belittled, political factors such as occupation and discrimination, and economic ones such as poverty and lack of work. However, the search for specific traits of a terrorist personality, including mental disorders, has not been successful. From the point of view of a terrorist organization, people with mental disorders are also not desirable for most assignments. They are difficult to control. This means that a rationally thinking person may become a terrorist. The overwhelming majority of terrorist organization members are men. Gender, along with age is the basic criteria for identifying and profiling terrorists (CotaMcKinley et al. 2001). The number of young men actively engaged in political violence in comparison with women is disproportionally large. This is due especially to the highlighting of biological (sex) differences, but also of gender differences. The gender category can be of key significance as a factor in the process of becoming a terrorist (Silke 2008, p. 107), but very misleading in profiling terrorist threats and estimating risk. The dominant stereotypes connected with the perception of women’s nature and their social role can reduce the effectiveness of the counterterrorism system and strengthen organizations through the recruitment of women, who are seen as less suspect and less visible. For decades terrorist organizations have taken advantage of the norms assigned to the behavior of each gender in any given culture. The patriarchal view of the tasks and behavior of women, such as care, child-rearing, and homemaking, were useful in the appropriate indoctrination of families. For this reason, women were and are used for the realization of tasks connected with recruiting and political agitation and support propaganda efforts which often drive commitment, bravery and the cult of martyrdom for the cause. Moreover, they raise funds, provide lodging and food, sexual services (voluntarily or not) and store weapons and other items. Due to their

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greater anonymity and the strategic advantage that this entails, they are charged with gathering information, passing through checkpoints, and smuggling explosives. Today, more and more groups, for example religious groups, are looking for recruits among women who are often born, raised and living in a different cultural milieu (such as Muriel Degauque—a Belgian; Colleen LaRose, Heather Elizabeth Coffman, Nicole Lynn Mansfield and Ariel Bradley—Americans; Maria Giulia Sergio aka Fatima—Italy and Roshonara Choudhry and Mina Dich—Britons). Invisibility is a woman’s greatest advantage. The results of research conducted until now on individual and personality factors favoring radicalization may now contribute to support counterterrorism efforts and tactics. This was not always the case, as in the past it was not uncommon to think that terrorists were mentally ill, and this led to the assumption that they were unable to think rationally and to plan their actions. The modern approach to terrorism—involving the use of a number of specialized scientific subdisciplines, such as the psychology of terrorism—provides more comprehensive research instruments in this area. Taking into account the difficulty in adequately defining social groups susceptible to radicalization slogans, one can draw a general conclusion that those most threatened by the problem in question are members of minorities who feel discrimination against their community. Such minorities certainly include Muslims living in countries such as Great Britain, France, Italy, Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, the United States, Canada, and the Russian Federation. In this context, of key significance is the individual’s social identity, whose analysis may make it possible to predict its future behavior with a greater degree of probability. At this point we should take note that the great diversity observed within the Muslim minority and the diversity of the radicalization factors that affect it (from low economic status to international conflicts which will remain unresolved in the foreseeable future), makes the terrorist risk extremely difficult to alleviate. The issue of converts and their rapid radicalization—including the notion that teenage girls have about Islam and what “offerings” extreme organizations hold for them—remains a problematic issue. The challenge does not lie in the religious sphere, but in the entirety of individual factors and social relations that are conducive to the emergence of hostile and aggressive attitudes. The source of terrorism in both men and women is not an innate predisposition manifested as anger at reality. The multidimensional nature of the factors and catalysts leading to the decision to take part in terrorist activities (assuming that such decisions are voluntary) makes it impossible to discern which woman is, in fact, Hekate.

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Chapter 6

Feminist Approaches to Counterterrorism

The use of reason is to justify the obscure desires that move our conduct, impulses, passions, prejudices and follies, and also our fears. Conrad, J. (2004, p. 66).

The effectiveness of women terrorists clearly indicates that female terrorism should be analyzed by scholars, analysts, and other experts for the purpose of increasing the operational efficiency of counterterrorism institutions. Ignoring women fighters, recruiters, trainers, bomb constructors, etc., benefits terrorist organizations. This ignorance is not necessarily intentional, but can be affected by psychological traps at the threat assessment stage. At each stage of the activities of counterterrorist institutions there is a set sequence of steps: gathering, stockpiling, and ordering of information; their assessment; and decision-making. Fundamental errors, especially at the assessment and decision-making stages include human errors made under the influence of emotions, public pressure, the sociopolitical context, initial assumptions and the search for their confirmation, errors in the appraisal of one’s own knowledge, and trust of the source. In a group analysis, there is an excessive tendency toward consensus, and a lack of original ideas. In hierarchical institutions disturbances frequently occur at the structural level and mainly concern the flow of information. This may be due to insufficient coordination, dislike/rivalry between the various institutions, entities or departments involved in counterterrorism, and the politicization and radicalization of the public (Heuer 1999). The structure of security institutions may also perpetuate stereotypes resulting from sex socialization, thus intensifying the gender gap and marginalizing the threat posed by female fighters. It is, therefore, a mistake for security agencies to underestimate the role women play in terrorism as sympathizers or active participants and those women who are at the core of communities susceptible to radicalization. The role of women in fighting against the radicalization of attitudes and behaviors of their loved ones seems to be especially crucial. Women are seen as the “bearers of the community’s future generation—crudely, nationalist wombs” (Enloe 2000, p. 54), and as carriers of religious, cultural, and traditional values. For this reason, more and more frequently CVE (Countering Violent Extremism) programs are beginning to © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 A. Gasztold, Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37234-7_6

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recognize the position of women in the local community and their ability to influence it. In this chapter I will address concepts and good practices related with the inclusion of women as the object and subject of anti-terrorism. My aim is to show how the potential role of women can be used to counteract radicalization processes leading to political violence. The essence of de-radicalization measures and chosen programs targeted at women in this area will be discussed. The position of a woman in the public sphere reveals her strength for the purpose of strengthening, restoring, or ensuring safety. However, it does not make her unique in contrast to the man’s role, but complementary.

6.1

The Role of Women in the De-radicalization Process

De-radicalization as a process is the reverse of radicalization and should not be confused with disengagement, which is walking away from terrorism or leaving the terrorist group. The first terms refers to cognitive functions (values, attitudes, views) and to a changing way of thinking. The second is behavioral in nature, and refers to a departure from the use of violence or a withdrawal from radical groups. De-radicalization is more desirable in terms of state security, it cannot arise without the prior physical withdrawal from terrorist activity (Horgan 2008), while disengagement may by psychological and/or physical, voluntary or involuntary at its source, and the individual may be either repentant or not (Horgan 2009, pp. 264–265). Radicalization prevention methods and other steps taken by states to “defuse” their citizens’ fascination with political violence can be divided into two groups: negative and positive. The negative include all sorts of repressive measures, such as shutting down organizations inciting violence (criminalization, penalization), curtailing or monitoring places of residence, exclusion from a given area (such as restricted access), limiting use of funds to a preset amount, banning access to certain means of transportation making some occupations and public functions off-limits, enforcing compulsory schooling, isolation (criminalization, penalization), censorship, and blocking specific content in the media (Internet, TV, press). These measures may also be extended to people resorting to violence, inciting to hatred (so-called hate speech), recruiting, collecting funds, or travelling to areas engulfed in armed conflict for the purpose of obtaining military training. Some of these activities are crimes under the domestic laws of many countries, while others fall under the provisions of international conventions drawn up by the UN and various regional organizations to which a given state is a party. Positive measures and methods include amnesty, reconciliation, reprogramming, dialog (intercultural and religious), demobilization, dissuasion, reintegration, individual de-radicalization programs, meetings, workshops, courses on civil rights and freedoms, job creation, social assistance, health benefits, internships for high-risk groups and integration events (such as joint sports events, including football matches with the police), awareness raising campaigns. Working on self-esteem and

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nonviolent conflict resolution with a psychologist and dealing with pressure from the immediate environment, including peers also play an important role. Of those positive methods, those especially important are the programs Preventing Violent Extremism (PVE) and Countering Violent Extremism (CVE), which will be dealt with further on in this chapter. It is also worthwhile to mention the Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) program. It sometimes appears under the name of DDR+R, where the additional R stands for Reinsertion. Programs of this type are implemented first and foremost in regions subject to civil war (as part of peacebuilding efforts) and tensions of a national or ethnic background, including for members of national-liberation-type terrorist organizations (Report of the Secretary General 2010). Their main goal is to restore former fighters, partisans or terrorists to normal civilian life. The program was extended, among other people, to members of FARC (Columbia), ETA (Spain and France), LTTE (Sri Lanka), and the IRA (Great Britain). Given the large activity of women in these organizations, the gender factor is also taken into account in the DDR program implementation process. In the effectiveness of such programs, the problem of social reintegration and a return to normal life has proven to be a challenge. Social and economic reintegration is also of key importance for the entirety of de-radicalization undertakings. “Following the theoretical design and the goals of DDR programs, it was suggested that success would be achieved if the participant has severed all ties to the former group, become economically self-sustaining, developed trust in the democratic processes and its institutions, and reconciled with family, friends, and community” (Koehler 2017, p. 41). De-radicalization is not the same thing as preventing radicalization, as it is not concerned with fostering resistance to propaganda, or with identifying fertile ground for the growth of extremist ideology. For this reason, there is a wide range of factors leading an individual to give up terrorist activity. All steps aimed at altering someone’s way of thinking (deprogramming) are effective only if they are voluntary, planned over time, based on trust between the participant and the operator, when former extremists or terrorists are engaged in this process (a matter of credibility), and when such processes meet the expectations of the individuals involved and include their family ties and circle of friends (Bjørgo and Horgan 2009; Altier et al. 2014). Alex P. Schmid’s radicalization model based on the micro, mezzo, and macro levels is helpful in this respect. The mezzo level in particular concerns an individual’s identification with a group and how this affects more extreme views and behaviors (Schmid 2013; Koomen and van der Pligt 2016). However, the process of de-radicalization and a return to “normal life” gives rise to certain controversies of an ethical nature. This concerns, in particular, the problem of redress for victims if a radicalized person has committed offences against third parties, and the discretionary nature of the very notion of “normality.” In the case of women, this may involve children who were born during their mother’s terrorist activities and/or have participated in it. The “Children of the Caliphate” are a telling example of the latter. It is estimated that about 4761 women and minors (infants aged 0–4, children 5–14, and teenagers 15–17) joined the Islamic State active in Iraq and Syria in 2014–2017. There are at least 730 recorded births to international parents in Daesh. The Islamic State trained children as young as they could be, and even

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5 years-olds have participated in violent acts. Girls became the object of violence and exploitation, and could be married off at the age of 9. It is estimated that, by early January 2018, 256 women and 1180 underage children had returned to their country (Cook and Vale 2018). The experience of being a child, orphan, wife, mother, slave, fighter, etc., under the Islamic State could have catastrophic consequences for those who survived and returned to their home country, but also for those countries’ security systems. Only appropriate de-radicalization programs lasting many years, aimed at specific groups, and taking into account the gender and age of returnees could be effective. However, it is difficult to ascertain to what degree it is possible to eradicate terrorism in the hearts and minds of former extremists, and to what degree it only remains muted. As in the case of radicalization, which may concern attitudes and behavior, the reverse process can take place in the behavioral sphere but not the ideological one, or the departure from the use of violence may be connected with the breakup of the terrorist group (Ashour 2009). In most European countries that have for many years been struggling with the problem of radicalization toward terrorism and brutal extremism, both negative and positive measures are being implemented. Initially they concentrated on prosecuting perpetrators (negative measures), then they embarked on long-term radicalization prevention and countering plans. The 2005 EU Strategy for Combating Radicalization and Recruitment to Terrorism—revised in 2008 and 2014—became the pillar of those plans (Council of the European Union 2014). This document focused above all on preventing the emergence of fertile grounds for radicalization, shaping resistance, reversing radicalization processes among those persons who had crossed the ideological divide, but who had not yet embarked on the path leading to crime. The establishment of the Radicalization Awareness Network Centre of Excellence in 2011 was a step leading to the exchange of good practices. These and other similar initiatives were strengthened in 2016 by the EU-Trust Fund Program’s Strengthening Resilience to Violence and Extremism (STRIVE) package, which also took women into account as a new target group for extremist slogans. Initiatives and programs implemented as part of STRIVE and STRIVE II have a global reach.1 Given their historical experience, individual EU-member states are working on their own solutions on top of EU efforts (See Gasztold 2019; Zięba 2016). For example, in Great Britain the Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act from 2011 makes it possible for the Secretary of State to impose, by notice, most of the abovementioned negative measures on an individual, if a well-founded belief arises that society needs to be protected from a given threat (Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act 2011). However, one of that country’s most effective anti-terrorist strategy programs, in terms of preventing brutal extremism and terrorism, is the Channel program established in the fall of 2012.2

1

About STRIVE: https://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/projects/strengthening-resilience-violent-extrem ism-ii-strive-ii-0_en. Accessed on 3 November 2019. 2 The United Kingdom’s Strategy for Countering Terrorism, CONTEST lists 4 elements of combating terrorism, the so-called “4 Ps”: Pursue—the pursuit and punishment of terrorists and persons

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It is aimed mostly at identifying persons susceptible to radicalization and helping them at the local level through the efforts of many collaborating agencies from the spheres of education, health care, social services, police, and other social partners (Channel 2012). In addition to promoting good practices, the program extends real support, protection and care to persons susceptible to radicalization and as well as assistance to partners who play a key role in the detection of individuals and groups fascinated with brutal extremism and terrorism. The realization of the premises of the Channel program takes place over several stages: identification, followed by the submission by the entities involved (the police, local authorities, educational centers, etc.) of a report concerning a given person in danger of radicalization, a preliminary assessment and a statement about the applicability of specific support and risk mechanisms. This stage is followed by a decision about whether any measures should be implemented and which (a support plan and the identification and procurement of appropriate aid packages). They may concentrate on the development of social skills, such as dealing with aggression or environmental pressure; on labor market advice, educational programs and work with a psychologist; but also on health care and social benefits for the purpose of improving living conditions and improving the chances of success for the person participating in the program. It is worthwhile to note that participation in the program is voluntary and does not target detained or incarcerated persons. A given case may also be rejected at the verification and preliminary assessment stage. However, if the existence of a specific threat to security is detected during the first stages, the case is referred to the Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA) (Marsden 2017, pp. 120–122).3 And so, the Channel program’s main purpose is to reinforce and perpetuate cooperation between local authorities, statutory partners (above all from the education and health care spheres), the police and the local community to facilitate the identification of persons susceptible to be drawn to terrorism. The leading role is that of the Police Channel Coordinator who relies on a multi-agency team. Good practices are introduced by the establishment at the local level of child and youth protection commissions and adult protection commissions. In specific cases support plans are drawn up for chosen individuals, both children and adults. This early intervention in the form of advice may contribute to reduce the chances that a person, especially a minor, will become a terrorist. The selection of a person for the program is focused on three aspects above all: (1) ties to terrorist organizations and extremist ideology, (2) the intention of causing harm and using violence, and (3) the ability to

who support any terrorist activity, Prevent—countering the processes leading one to become a terrorist and their sources; Protect—protection of citizens, state interests, critical infrastructure and state boundaries; and Prepare—preparation for the consequences of possible terrorist attacks, building-up rapid reaction capabilities for times of crisis and eliminating aftermath of the attacks. It was introduced in 2003 and amended multiple times. The version now in force is that of July 11, 2011 (CONTEST 2011). 3 MAPPA reports from 2015 to 2016, available online: https://www.gov.uk/government/publica tions/multi-agency-public-protection-arrangements-mappa-annual-reports-2015-to-2016. Accessed on 8 September 2019.

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cause harm to third parties. These aspects are conditioned by factors which constitute a non-exhaustive list and which are considered at the risk identification and assessment stage (See Channel 2012). Other large-scale British projects—mainly aimed at Muslim communities— include Operation Nicole, as part of which workshops for people over 14 years old have been organized since 2009. They are mainly of an informational nature and concern police counterterrorism work, although the aim is to build a community and integrate residents. The Unity Initiative (TUI) has been in place since August 2009. It deals solely with persons detained or incarcerated under anti-terrorism laws, and promotes the view of Islam as a religion whose message is compassion and not aggression, trains police and prison staff in this area, but also about the meaning of gender in extremism. It has been noted, for example, that between March 31, 2002 and March 31, 2016, 36 women suspected of terrorist offences, mainly linked to international terrorism, were arrested. This figure represents 14% of all persons detained during this period. Due to the activeness of extreme religious organizations such as the Islamic State and Al-Qaida, the participation of women in terrorist crimes and auxiliary crimes has also increased in the last few years (Home Office 2016). The group Task Force on Tackling Radicalisation and Extremism has been in operation since May 2013 and is focusing primarily on monitoring and counteracting hate speech in universities, mosques, schools, and prisons. Due to the intensification of religiously motivated terrorist activity, a new unit was established in April 2017 to combat extremist ideology in penitentiaries (Home Office 2017). The Department for Children, Schools and Families also conducts activities aimed at reaching out to children and young people outside the school setting. Along with the Department for Communities and Local Government, projects such as the Islam and Citizenship Education, Young Muslims Advisory Group and the National Muslim Women’s Advisory Group (NMWAG) are also being implemented. It is also worthwhile to name Women Against Radicalization Network (WARN), an initiative which emerged in the fall of 2015. After 2011, the Netherlands ceased working on social campaigns and promoting counterterrorism to out of concern that such undertakings could have the opposite effect, that is, lead to an unhealthy fascination with violence. Instead, it began to support information systems and good practices among local security institutions and social partners. The Comprehensive Program of Action on Combating Jihadism has been implemented since 2014. Its main premises concern the use of preventive measures and the identification of the early signs of radicalization (especially among young people), developing sensitivity to propaganda, supporting families and collaboration with Muslim milieus (For more, see Ministry of Security and Justice, National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism, Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment 2014). A greater emphasis has definitely been placed on the prosecution of perpetrators of terrorist attacks and detection of persons posing a potential threat to state security. Examples of the proposed steps are depriving persons who underwent military training as foreign fighters of citizenship, sharper legal sanctions for terrorist activity, inclusion of a person suspected of being a terrorist organizations member on the national list of terrorists, access to air

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passenger lists for police and special services to detect potential Islamic extremists, etc. In addition, a national radicalization contact point has been set up. NGOs, among them the Moroccan Dutch Group of Experts (Samenwerkingsverband van Marokkaanse Nederlanders—SMN), which manages a website and a Radicalization Hotline (Hulplijn Radicalisering), among other initiatives, have come out in support of these initiatives (Hulplijn Radicalisering Website n.d.). Organizations and associations such as the Foundation for Intercultural Participation and Integration (De Stichting voor Interculturele Participatie en Integratie—SIPI) have also supported the state in its fight against jihadism. SIPI drew up the DIAMANT method, which is focused on prevention (resilience, self-image, awareness) and intervention and de-radicalization programs (24/7 intensive personal support and guidance). The latter is conducted with the participation of qualified trainers-educators (DIAMANT-PLUS). These programs and trainings take into account the gender factor. Gender focus combined with knowledge of problematic issues related to sexuality and Islam is of great importance in the de-radicalization processes of young girls (De Stichting voor Interculturele Participatie en Integratie n.d.). Targeted actions aimed at strengthening the resistance of women and young girls with a migration background are conducted by nonprofit organizations such as Nisa for Nisa (Women for Women) and Steupunt SABR (the SABR Support Point). The participation of “authentic” trainers who have managed to “leave” and reintegrate into society in the de-radicalization campaigns and programs is especially positive. For example, the figure of Soumay Sahla who became radicalized in the Netherlands as a teenager should be mentioned in this respect. In June 2005, she became the first woman to be detained on charges of having links to international terrorism and of weapons possession. Today, she is the President of the Stichting Organization for Reconciliation, Rehabilitation and Reintegration (ORRR) and is actively engaged in fighting hate speech. In Norway, Sweden, and Germany, EXIT anti-Nazi organizations supporting people in leaving right-wing extremist groups have been active for over a decade. Various other social initiatives aimed at deepening knowledge of democratic values also take place in the EXIT framework. The purpose of the programs is more risk reduction than full de-radicalization, which may never take place on the level of beliefs (Horgan 2013). The Women/Gender in violent Extremism (WomEx) project has been conducted since 2013 by the Berlin-based Intercultural Association for Education and Prevention of Violence (Cultures Interactives e.V.) and is dedicated to women (Baer et al. 2015; Glaser 2017). Other programs conducted in Germany by the Violence Prevention Network (VPN) are the Taking Responsibility program and the Life (HAYAT) program, aimed at counteracting Muslim fundamentalism. The VPN initiative is aimed at right-wing and religious extremists, including prisoners.4 In response to the phenomenon of foreign fighters, the Hesse Advice Centre was set up in July 2014 in Frankfurt-am-Main. It brings assistance not only to persons who wish to undergo military training in areas of armed conflict, but also to those who

4

Violence Prevention Network Website: https://violence-prevention-network.de/. Accesed on 7 October 2019.

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return from there. The Centre’s task is to prevent such departures, reintegrate those who return and to advise parents and relatives of people fascinated by jihadism. A similar program, named Disengagement and Critical Aftercare began to operate a year earlier in Denmark. The gender aspect is not singled out in them although some workshops are dedicated especially to parents and their principal participants are women. The family is the framework within which radicalization and its escalation toward violence can be discovered and prevented earliest. In the United States in particular, de-radicalization programs have been expanded to include women, in recognition that deprogramming must reflect the importance and specificity of gender. Appropriate projects targeted to women complements counterterrorism efforts. The flagship Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) program is conducted by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). As part of the CVE, various social initiatives aimed at young people and prisoners are undertaken. In addition, solutions are being implemented that involve women in the safety of local communities and which include identifying the first signs of radicalization.5 Similarly, the European Radicalization Awareness Network and the German WomEx have also included the gender factor into their terrorism-prevention efforts. They are the result of long years of research into radical right-wing (religious and secular) political violence and the experiences of EU member states, and can be brought down to a few observations: • Brutal extremism and terrorism today are manifested through sexist and homophobic issues. • Conflicts connected with gender often turn out to be of key importance in the psychological analysis of perpetrators. • Sexual minorities are the main victims of all manner of brutal extremism, be it from right-wing secular, Christian fundamentalist, or jihadist terrorist groups. • In practice and ideology, the majority of extremist and terrorists organizations makes reference to sexual inequality, ridicule the emancipation of women while, at the same time, subordinating them to men. • The above trends are not in conflict with the active involvement of women in the activities of specific groups. • Young men and women join extremist groups far more often on account of social conditions and circumstances related to gender status (social networks, peer pressure, behavioral models and moral authorities) than out of ideological or religious motivation. • Terrorist organizations draw up recruiting campaigns dedicated especially for women and young girls with the use of specific ideals referring manliness and femininity. • Women and young girls are often overlooked by law enforcement agencies as possible offenders involving hate and terrorist crimes (Weilnbӧck 2015; See also Baer et al. 2015, p. 9). 5 See more Website of Department of Homeland Security Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention http://www.dhs.gov/countering-violent-extremism. Accessed on 1 September 2019.

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Long before that, on October 30, 2000, the UN Security Council had adopted Resolution 1325—the first one concerning women in armed conflicts and their role in peace-building and security. It called for women to be able to participate in conflict prevention and resolution and in the reconstruction of the country once armed operations had stopped. The document was to be based on the application of the gender perspective and thus on increasing women’s participation in all areas of peace and security (S/RES/1325 2000; More see: White 2018, pp. 168–176). Resolution 1325 should be seen as a milestone in the efforts of all movements and organizations acting on behalf of gender equality. The revolutionary nature of this resolution is connected with the premise that quality between men and women has a positive impact on the economy, social and political stability, and lasting peace. The Women, Peace, and Security Agenda (WPS) established prior to the adoption of the resolution is positioned on the borderline of several areas: ensuring peace and international security; human rights protection; cooperation for development; and equal treatment policies. Its implementation oscillates between four pillars: (1) prevention, (2) participation, (3) protection, (4) relief and recovery (Women, Peace and Security n.d.). Based on the experience, among others initiatives, of the CVE programs implemented in the United States in mid-2016, the World Bank launched a program aimed at reinforcing resistance to radicalism and dedicated to women from the regions of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). One of the program’s objectives is to support entrepreneurship through which the position of women as leaders in a given local community will be strengthened. It is being realized in connection with UN calls for the empowerment and inclusion of women in capacity building (Calfas 2016). The United Nation Development Program (UNDP) on Preventing Violent Extremism, a report published by the UN in March 2016, clearly stressed that one of the pillars of a successful PVE policy is promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment (UNDP 2016). Educated and financially independent women will form a narrative standing in opposition to fundamentalist slogans. One could risk the hypothesis that women are less exposed to the effects of violent extremism in communities with a relatively high gender equality rate. Therefore, the activation of women may have a negative impact on the development of terrorism (For more, see Salman 2015). The correlation between the number of terrorist incidents and activities making up terrorism on the one hand and the problem of women’s participation in public sphere is obvious. Taking into account, for example, the situation in Western European countries, gender equality rates are high (in 2018, Germany was 5th in the world, the Netherlands 10th, United Kingdom 14th, France 24th, and Spain 26th), while the threat of terrorism is seen as real and serious, especially in the United Kingdom (28th on the Global Terrorism Index) and in France (30rd) (GTI 2018, p. 8; UNDP 2018, p. 34). The UN Security Council adopted seven more resolutions concerning women, peace and security—nos. 1820 (2008), 1888 (2009), 1889 (2009), 1960 (2010), 2106 (2013), 2122 (2013) and 2242 (2015)—which called, among other things, for greater participation of women in peace processes, in peace missions and operations; for strengthening their role in decision-making processes connected with

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peacekeeping (See more: Scheuermann & Zürn 2020). They also drew attention to the need to protect and support women and children during armed conflict, to strengthen the position of women as an effective means to counteract political extremism. The burden of implementing the demands of Resolution no. 1325 and subsequent ones rests primarily with states. Nonetheless, international organizations, NGOs, research institutes and think tanks are also involved in the implementation of the WPS Agenda. Resolution no. 2242 clearly emphasizes that the role of women in combating brutal extremism is of key importance. Moreover, it addresses the influence held by the growth of extremism today in the everyday life of women through forced emigration, and also through the use of direct or indirect force, among other things. It is therefore essential for women and women’s organizations to take part in the development of strategies to combat terrorism and radical extremism. The voice of women may be important in developing procedures and good practices related to incitement to commit terrorist acts and in creating antiterrorism narratives (S/RES/2242 2015). The world’s first women’s anti-terrorism platform, Sisters Against Violent Extremism (SAVE), has been operating since 2008 as part of the Women Without the Borders (Frauen ohne Grenzen) international organization. The initiative brings together a broad spectrum of women from the entire world, including scientists and representatives of religious communities, social organizations, politicians, peacebuilding experts and, significantly, victims and survivors of terrorist attacks. Its main aim is to promote knowledge and sociopolitical discourse and to create a common platform for countering terrorism. The idea of “sisterhood” is to be an impulse “to create more safer and secure word” by raising awareness of women’s agency and responsibility in counter-ideological work. One of SAVE’s first initiatives was to invest in schools which were to teach mothers to recognize the early symptoms of radicalization in their children. Presently, most such programs are directed toward reinforcing local resistance among communities which are most susceptible to ideologies calling for violence in Kashmir, Tadzhikistan, Nigeria, and the MENA region.6 It is worthwhile to note that the Women Moderating Extremism in Pakistan Program, implemented by the Pakistan Initiative for Mothers and Newborns (PAIMAN), was in operation in Pakistan from 2011 to 2016 and was supported by the US Institute for Peace (USIP). Its aim was to strengthen women’s ability to recognize the risk of radicalization in children. In 2011, the Program led to the creation of Amn-o-Nisa (Women and Peace), the Pakistan Women’s Coalition Against Extremism, which acts in a twofold manner—through their members’ involvement at the national and international level in actions to combat extremism, including actions focused on identifying its causes and consequences on the one hand, and through peace-building activities at the local level, promotion of tolerance and reduction of radicalization on the other (Chattelier and Fayyaz 2012). Similar campaigns involving mothers in counterterrorism prevention are also taking place in other countries, including the Palestinian Authority, Indonesia,

6 Women without Borders Webstite: http://www.women-without-borders.org/save/. Accessed on 7 September 2019.

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Tadzhikistan, Nigeria, and Zanzibar (Schlaffer and Kropiunning 2015). With the support of SAVE, a program has also been launched in Austria to raise mothers’ awareness of the radicalization of their children, toward Jihadism above all. A platform, Stop Djhadisme, which is aimed at making the family—the basic social unit—sensitive to socialization to extremism and able to recognize signs of radicalization also operates in France.7 Women undeniably constitute every community’s foundation of safety. Regardless of the structures and systems in which they function, they are the first to detect signs of change in the interests and behavior of those closest to them, especially among children. Mothers—in addition to schools, for example—may turn out to be the first line of defense. The role of women in strategies to counter radicalization toward violence is therefore crucial because “A figure of a woman, often a mother, symbolizes in many cultures the spirit of the collectivity, whether it is Mother Russia, Mother Ireland or Mother India” (Yuval-Davis 1997). But an excessive emphasis on that role, accompanied by an underestimation of the father’s role, may promote a patriarchal family model and press a woman into a life dominated by household chores and child-rearing. PVE/CVE initiatives focusing on the role of women as mothers, wives, and sisters may reinforce gender stereotypes. The image of a woman as a mother and the association of maternal thinking and peaceful coexistence are especially widespread. “Feminist groups, however, often challenge maternal politics, insisting instead that women should seek peace based upon shared gendered experiences” (Poloni-Staudinger and Ortbals 2013, p. 67). Therein lies the importance of education and of providing the appropriate tools, knowledge and abilities to the entire family, not only to the parent of the female sex. A sojourn in a penitentiary institution is another aspect of the radicalization problem. A prison can be a school of extreme radicalization and a place of recruitment for terrorists. American experiences with radicalization to jihadism in connection with the neo-Nazi Aryan Brotherhood or European ones with the Basque ETA or the Irish IRA, PIRA, CIRA, indicate that such fears are not unfounded. Terrorist groups use prisons as a means to recruit new members, and this is made easier by the susceptibility that is particular to detainees, the behavior of other prisoners, and by group dynamics. The prison environment makes detainees particularly vulnerable to influence and, therefore, to the discovery and assimilation of new belief systems. Prisons are places where new people are mentally vulnerable and experience cognitive openness—a desire and need to identify with new beliefs, emotions, and social groups. This is made easier by isolation from the outside world, a controlled environment and functional limitations. The negative consequences of isolation and adaptation to the prison environment can be further exacerbated by organizational faults, such as an authoritarian management style, deviations, lack of or inadequate resocialization, corporal punishment, excessive use of solitary confinement, of the humiliation or torture of prisoners (For more, see Silke 2014; Brandon 2009; Cuthbertson 2004). This problem also concerns women imprisoned for

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Stop Djihadisme Website: http://www.stop-djihadisme.gouv.fr/. Accessed on 4 September 2019.

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terrorist offences. They often attract more sympathy and support in the eyes of the public than after they are released. While she is free, an armed woman is seen as a deviation from the norm, while once incarcerated she arouses fascination and sympathy for the cause. A woman as a political prisoner also provides exposure for the cause for which a terrorist organization is fighting. The experience of incarceration and the example of “credible” ex-terrorists who have renounced the use of violence can be used in de-radicalization programs. An example of countering radicalization is Northern Ireland, where the community of former prisoners has been an integral part of the peace process since 1998. This process led to the disarming of the main paramilitary groups operating during the unrests of 1969–1998 and 2005. During their stay in prison, detainees and prisoners were also involved in the building and implementation of the peace process (Wahidin 2016). Former prisoners use their current role to give meaning to the past and to their involvement in conflict, while supporting the peace process. This is particularly important for people of the younger generation seeking a sense of purpose in a post-conflict environment. The transition from paramilitary to peacemaker status may seem controversial, especially to scholars. In particular, there are doubts as to whether it is at all possible and “how individuals themselves manage the identity transition between their role in the conflict and their current role in violence prevention” (Joyce and Lynch 2017). For the counter-ideological framework, it is important to rehabilitate detained terrorist members, as well as to strengthen their resistance to extremism and to present alternatives to terrorist ideology (Hassan 2006, p. 535).

6.2

The Gender-Oriented Fight Against Terrorism

In looking at the trends in the development of modern terrorism, the types of actions, innovation in tactics, recruitment and propaganda, one can single out nine complementary factors, which do not form an exhaustive list and which determine the face of modern female terrorism: • Rising global involvement of women in terrorism, with a greater diversification of the roles they play in the organization. • The powerlessness of security institutions in coping with this process and especially the rising role of women in terrorist organizations active in western countries and with ties to international terrorism. • Absence of worked out strategies and analyses of women’s environment; it is assumed that women do not act as “lone wolves”. • The belief that paramilitary organizations, including terrorist organizations, especially those of a right-wing bend, secular and religious, are hostile to women. • The perception of women as being hostage to an organization/situation (coercion, abduction) and not as a rational actor.

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• The impact of gender stereotypes on women’s image in the media, irrespective of whether they are engaged in a legal political struggle or radical political violence. • Less suspicion of women terrorists than men; this is why more and more terrorist organizations will use the tactical advantages of women in their attacks. • The recognition of terrorist attacks by women, particularly suicide attacks, as having a greater media impact for the cause. • The progressive mobilization of women through the Internet and the media (websites, forums, chat rooms, magazines, TV channels). The myth that women are passive and that they do not pose a threat, of a political nature above all, must be dispelled. Attempts to clarify women’s involvement in terrorist activities are still at the development stage. The main challenge for the researcher is the persistence of stereotypes and images of the female terrorist (masculinization, suffering—“black widows”) in the media. These create a false notion that those women’s choices are irrational. Each case should be considered individually, that is analyzed through diagnosis, collection of data (about the woman’s personal contacts, family members, childhood, education, habits, occupation, religion, private life, past illnesses, public activity, criminal past etc.), its processing, formulating an interpretation in the form of a final report and classifying it in terms of similar events in order to identify features that are common recurring features. There is no single profile of a man or woman terrorist, but criminology provides the appropriate tools to create a profile of the perpetrator. The majority of people who are undergoing a radicalization process and are actively engaged in terrorist activities are men, so gender analysis can also be used in the study of men’s vulnerability to violent extremism. Masculinity and femininity as cross-cultural constructs should be taken into consideration in the counterterrorism debate. The exclusive singling out of the place and position of women in the struggle against radicalization omits the wider issue of men’s participation in political violence and in counteracting it (Ezekilov 2017). The issue of counterterrorism has combined elements worked out thus far in major war strategies with methods used to prevent organized crime. Counterterrorism steps taken as part of each system focus on: legislation, the prosecution of perpetrators, international cooperation, initiatives aimed at communities and persons supporting terrorism, and public relations campaigns in support of given terrorism policies as you can see in Box 6.1. At this stage, I intentionally make no distinction between anti-terrorist and counterterrorism efforts, treating the latter as tactical in relation to anti-terrorism objectives overall. The key objective in creating an anti-terrorism system is, above all, is to prevent the escalation of terrorism, especially attacks, financing, recruitment of new members, and hate propaganda. Additionally, damage control is important, as a crisis management system made up of response and reconstruction systems. The effect of all initiatives related to the combating terrorism is to remove both the threat and the perpetrators of this form of violence from political and social life. Today, the aims of anti-terrorist policy are: neutralizing the causes of terrorism, preventing radicalization to brutal extremism and terrorism, limit the scope and effectiveness of the actions of terrorist organizations, deterrence, direct defense,

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minimizing the negative consequences of terrorist attacks, evaluating the system and proposing changes as needed (Bolechów 2012, pp. 273–274). All the above elements of the counterterrorism system and policy are interlinked. However, they may differ from each other with regard to actions taken by states to counter international and internal terrorist organizations and movements. Box 6.1 Anti-terrorist Measures Taken by States (A Non-exhaustive List) • Creating specialized units and adapting already existing security • Creating law (criminalization and penalization) • Prosecution and sentencing of perpetrators • Gathering and monitoring information about persons and groups suspected of terrorism • Identification of persons suspected of terrorism • Assessing and forecasting risk • Protection of buildings and persons • Reaction at times of increased threat • Removing the consequences of terrorist attacks • Countering radicalization of attitudes and behavior (including deprogramming, resocialization and reintegration in society, exchange of guidelines and good practices) • The government’s/international organization’s media policy • Awareness campaigns (education for security) • International cooperation The coordination of the actions and the flow of information between institutions engaged in combating terrorism and international collaboration are important elements constituting and influencing the effectiveness of a given state’s anti-terrorist system. Thus the share of individual states in regional counterterrorism systems (such as in the Commonwealth of Independent States, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, The Council of Europe, the Council of the Baltic Sea States, and the European Union) and in the global system (United Nations Organization) should be taken into account. This favors not only the implementation of international law in the domestic legal order, but also to exchange of experiences in terrorism prevention, physical counterterrorism methods, and information concerning persons and groups suspected of terrorist activity. Considerations about terrorism should not be limited to statements that it is a commonly phenomenon, but should reflect that it poses a threat to the modern state (See Sulowski 2017). The core of such considerations is the study of terrorism with a view to formulating guidelines to be used to eliminate terrorism, and this entails the need to define anti-terrorism. Anti-terrorism is created by the policy, strategy, and tactics serving to combat terrorism and can take different forms. However, government officials are not interested in developing a definition of terrorism, as this would force them to analyze, understand and adhere to consistent counterterrorism standards.

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A new era was ushered by the terrorist attacks on the twin towers of the World Trade Center and on the Pentagon on September 11, 2001—one in which terrorism was perceived in terms of the actions taken in order to counter it. The American antiterrorism campaign, carrying missionary elements in the narrative, went beyond the pure defense of US national interests and treated terrorism in war terms (war paradigm). Terrorism was presented as an all-encompassing evil and used to consolidate society and to promote political goals on the outside world using military means that are characteristic of hard power. The main principles of the so-called Bush Doctrine can be reduced to four elements: Messianism, unilateralism, militarism, and prevention. Its implementation was reflected in the slogan of Global War of Terrorism (GWOT). The attack on Afghanistan in October 2001 and, if to a lesser degree, on Iraq in spring 2003 were examples of its practical application. The opposite of a counterterrorism strategy depending on military means is one that treats terrorism as a form of crime (the crime paradigm). The crime perspective suggests that terrorism can only be contained by investigation, penalizationm, punishment and it will not disappaer. War paradigm assumes defeating of “hostile combatants” and futer victory over terrorism. Most often one can see combinations of these two approaches in the way modern sates combat terrorism. They contain the elements shown in Box 6.1 with the use of force, including repression against persons suspected of terrorist activity, military intervention, and retaliatory action (of a hit-and-run type, for example). This does not exclude possible negotiations or reaching an agreement. Quite important in this respect, is international cooperation, including the ratification of UN conventions and the documents issued by regional organizations such as the Council of Europe, the European Union, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the Commonwealth of Independent States, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the League of Arab States and others; the implementation of the recommendations of the FATF and the Egmont Group; and the establishment of regional monitoring centers (CIS Anti-Terrorism Centre, EU/SITCEN Situation Centre, RATS SCO, etc.). Given the nonhomogeneous nature of terrorism, it is difficult to assess and measure the effectiveness the abovementioned counterterrorism strategies as applied by of individual countries. This difficulty arises when researching the effectiveness of any counterterrorism system. If we treat the decrease in the number of terrorist attacks and arrests of terrorist suspects as a measure of the state’s victory over practitioners of radical political violence, it does not necessarily mean that terrorism has disappeared, but could indicate that such individuals/groups have relocated to another region. Radical counterterrorism campaigns relying on military methods and entailing violations of humanitarian law can contribute to rising radicalization toward terrorism. Terrorist activities change over time and may occur with varying levels of intensity, so reducing terrorist activity does not necessarily entail the disappearance of a terrorist organization. In addition, there is the problem of the organizational structure of bodies and institutions fighting against terrorism. The latter is the work of loose and informal networks, while the state has a hierarchical structure, which reduced its effectiveness at the combat and response levels. However, no counterterrorism strategy is gender-oriented. Few countries publish gender-specific statistics on

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terrorism-related crime. However, this data is focused on figures and marginalize trends and developments in this area. The struggle against terrorism must be gender-sensitive, because the modus operandi used exclusively by women (such as greater possibilities of camouflage, penetration of certain environments, unnoticed border crossings and control points) is significant. Karla J. Cunningham notes shortcomings in the system of combating terrorism, in particular the response to women terrorism at the level of “(1) exploiting female terrorists in custody; (2) organizational structure; (3) technology, (4) denial and deception; (5) tactical advantages, (6) culture and ideology” (Cunningham 2012, p. 439). Security institutions have yet to respond to her calls for the creation of an international database of terrorist incidents committed by women. Terrorism prevention also covers a wider social context. For this reason, any action serving to improve the condition and status of women plays a special role. Women and men, as well as sexual minorities, experience counterterrorism differently. CVE programs have an impact on women’s rights in the same way as steps strictly related to fighting terrorism: identification of the perpetrator, detention, interrogation, sentencing, etc. The gender category is one of the elements shaping power relations hence it also determines the perception of the fight against terrorism (Huckerby and Satterthwaite 2013; for more see Cook 2019). Women are often already involved at the community level in efforts aimed at fostering resistance, although these projects do not necessarily enjoy state support. These initiatives focus directly on integration work and indirectly reinforce security seen in terms of human needs. Feminist organizations working around violence have wide experience in: • • • • • • • • •

Education that promotes women’s rights Awareness campaigns about gendered violence and its impact women’s aid Social assistance Aid to refugees Fighting against domestic and family violence Crisis assistance in the case of sexual violence The issue of sexual abuse The anti-violence movement Dealing with trauma (See more Macmillan 2007)

The state is a key target of feminist demands, because it is the supreme organization of society, which has (1) the ability to promote women’s rights and improve women’s quality of life through changing in policy and law, and (2) the ability to take steps to change the actions and conduct of its agencies responsible for ensuring protection. The state is one of the main organizers of power in gender relations through legislation and policy, as well as through its role in regulating social life. At the theoretical level, the state is also seen by women’s and feminist movements against violence as one of the main violators of women’s rights and as an institution defining what is justified or not in terms of violence against a given person. The state represents both threats and opportunities for feminist movements, because it can act as oppressor and savior. The success of organizations working in the field of women’s rights often depends on support from the state, if only in the form of pure tolerance (Connell 1990; Gasztold 2017).

6.3 Final Remarks: “Adding Women” to Counterterrorism Policy

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Final Remarks: “Adding Women” to Counterterrorism Policy

Terrorism involving women is a phenomenon which existed long before the attacks of September 11, 2001. It should, therefore, be studied in the same way as other forms of political violence (revolutions, putsches, civil wars) through the prism of its structural, cultural, political, economic, and religious sources. The absence of a common definition of terrorism integrating the community of experts and political decision-makers does not preclude analyzing and combating this phenomenon. The non-homogeneity of terrorism makes it a unique subject of research, but also makes it difficult to demonstrate certain regularities, especially in predicting potential attack targets. Differences between women and men in political violence in terms of diversification of roles and tasks do exist, as in any public or private space. Gender, as a product of culture, is of great importance here and overcoming the barriers of what is deemed feminine and masculine may entail strategic consequences for the functioning/survival of a terrorist organization, and not solely emancipatory ones. In addition, the manipulation of women’s physicality, where the woman’s body itself carries a tactical advantage, as well as the stereotypes and meanings attributed to it, reduce the awareness of the potential threat. The terrorist threat involving women is a real one. Just as in the twentieth century, organizations from the national-ethnic and left-wing currents were very active, so in the twenty-first the largest number of victims is generated by “jihadist” terrorism. More and more often it widens its ranks to include women. A breakthrough in the activation of women was the extensive activities of the Islamic State in 2014–2018. Along with the decline of this organization in Iraq and Syria, women who have been indoctrinated and, in some cases, militarily trained may represent a real, globally dispersed threat. The myths accompanying the position of women in the context of political violence—victim, refuge seeker, mother of sorrow, peacekeeper—entrench the underestimation of their causative role. The clear contrast in the perception of men and women in terrorism can also be seen in visions of preventive actions. The clear emphasis that de-radicalization programs place on the roles of the mother, homemaker, confidant, carrier of traditions, and customs perpetuates the position of a woman associated with nature and the private sphere. The mother–child relationship and the nurturing nature attributed to women as such are singled out in social relations as therapeutic and anti-violence factors. The process by which dominant patriarchal patterns and behaviors are consolidated through the reference by de-radicalization programs’ to traditional values requires detailed scientific research taking into account cultural specificity. On the other hand, the challenge for today is to identify social groups that are susceptible to radical slogans inciting to violence. As a generalization, it can be said that those most susceptible are those who feel that the community with which they identify is discriminated against. Of key importance here is the individual’s social identity, whose analysis may help predict his or her future behavior with a greater degree of precision. The role of women in recognizing the first symptoms of radicalization does not relieve men (fathers,

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brothers, sons) of responsibility. Combining the role of mother with the function of community organizer and mentoring can strengthen the position of women in PVE and CVE programs. The challenge is to add women to community capacity building and to the counterterrorism discourse and policy making while, at the same time, ensuring that their rights are protected and that they are able to participate in decision-making processes. The problem of women’s position in the public space contrasts greatly with the typically masculine sphere of counterterrorism. Limiting the role of women to the implementation of de-radicalization programs may contribute to replicating gender stereotypes and eliminating the broader perspective. That is why it is so important to understand that “women have a key role to play in finding and implementing new, alternative approaches to ending violent extremism” (Poloni-Staudinger and Ortbals 2013, p. 66).8 Programs to combat radicalization and behavior are being developed in many countries as part of their anti-terrorism campaign, and are aimed at local communities where women—mainly mothers—play the role of guides to adult life. Projects and initiatives are developed under the auspices of ministries responsible for internal affairs and justice, with the active participation of numerous foundations and associations. Their implementation in the European Union is being supported since 2008 by the European Network of Experts on Radicalization (ENER) and, since 2011, by the RAN. Any anti-terrorism strategy should take into account the role and position of women in order to be effective. Women’s de-radicalization potential has been taken advantage of by initiatives and programs such as Sister Against Violent Extremism/ SAVE, Women/Girls in Violent Extremism/WomEx, and Pakistan Women Moderating Extremism/PWME. Today, true security cannot be built without the participation of women, as they play a key role in local communities, maintaining tradition, caring for religious values, transmitting legends and myths, and also child-rearing. Mothers are best at instilling peace and as role models for their children, in keeping with the maternal thinking concept promoted by Sarah Ruddick (1980, 1989). This assumes the existence of a specific female morality, based on interpersonal relationships and solicitude. Women are also “signifiers of difference, marking boundaries of belonging” (Pettman 1998, p. 493). That is why their perception of other groups, nations, and civilizations is so important. They may become agents in or against not only a specific policy of the state or nation, but also of extremist ideology. Encouraging women and supporting them in becoming active members of the local community creates an early warning mechanism. The first signs of radicalization are not entirely obvious and may symptoms of other behaviors. Those most often mentioned are, for example, isolation from family and friends, becoming increasingly argumentative, talking as if from a scripted speech, reluctance or inability to discuss one’s views, a sudden lack of respect toward others, an increased level of anger, the feeling of being persecuted, rising secrecy, especially in connection with Internet use or, for example, new acquaintances. As far as Internet use is

8

From an interview with Elaine Hargrove from Women without Borders.

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concerned, one worrying symptom may be a new online identity, or the creation of an alternate Internet identity at the initial radicalization stage. This knowledge can be used as a basic stage of programs meant to reverse the radicalization process (deprogramming). The role of women—mothers, wives, partners, sisters, and other female family members—in building cohesion and resistance of social networks to extremist slogans should be appreciated. Women make up more than 50% of the world’s population. This fact has an influence on social systems as such and on their security. Therefore, it cannot be ignored by politicians. In each of these circles, antiterrorist education and women’s sensitivity to certain types of behavior can strengthen the system’s resistance. In order to counteract all forms of political violence in an effective manner it is worthwhile to remember that (1) it is not the exclusive domain of men (2) collecting data on women’s role in an organization may reveal the specific nature of their involvement as well as the organization’s tactics (3) estimating the support which a movement/group enjoys within a given community also concerns the role women play in that community. No extremist organization operates in a vacuum. It exists in a specific time and space. Extremists and terrorists at different stages of their radicalization create or are embedded in relations with family, colleagues, and society. The role of the state in countering terrorism comes down to the tasks having to do with combat, response, prevention, and forecasting. However, an effective antiterrorist model does not exist. Western attempts have been marred by human rights violations (Guantánamo, Abu Ghraib, and the “black sites” in Central Europe) and increasing inroads into civil rights and freedoms. There are doubts in today’s public debate about whether it is possible to reconcile the principles of a democratic state under the rule of law with effective prevention and countering of organized crime, which terrorism undoubtedly is. States tend to view terrorism as a crime, but in their response, they increasingly favor military solutions which are characteristic of a warlike approach. The creation of an overly wide range of regulations empowering security institutions to interfere in the sphere of civil rights and freedoms and to engage in unchecked surveillance of foreigners gives rise to serious doubts about the constitutionality of the solutions being proposed and implemented. Moreover, there is no single model for organizing and coordinating security institutions involved in the fight against terrorism. Intelligence and counterintelligence services and security institutions not only have different competencies (information gathering, reconnaissance operations, and/or conducting investigations), but also different placements within the system. They are agencies that function independently or are subordinate to specific ministries (ministries of internal affairs, justice, foreign affairs, and defense) of military and/or military nature. Depending on a given state’s territorial and legal structure, such agencies may be centralized or decentralized. While it is pointless in terms of procedural and penal solutions to distinguish female terrorism or/and female counterterrorism; however, given the overall knowledge that may be used to prevent terrorist incidents, this is indispensable. Countering terrorism effectively also depends on international cooperation. The barriers such efforts must overcome are not only institutional, but also related to mutual trust (protecting the interests and secrets of one’s own state). Discussions on

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intensifying cooperation at the regional level or as part of the UN are undertaken in response to spectacular terrorist attacks or the aggravation of the situation in a given region. Due to differences in the way terrorism itself is viewed, in particular by the permanent members of the UN Security Council, and to their particular interests in conflict regions, it is often impossible to implement joint positions and actions. On the other hand, the counterterrorism systems of individual states, as well as the policies of regional organizations, are characterized by the cyclical nature of the acceleration process when increased terrorist activity is observed and inertia when the situation stabilizes and fears of further attacks decrease. Just like men, women perform different functions in terrorist groups. The positions they hold are therefore different and depend on the importance of the tasks assigned to them. A given position is connected with a place in the group’s hierarchy and is associated with certain competencies. Women’s participation in terrorism is determined by the structure of the group, the division of functions, and the status associated with them. Duties and privileges derive from a given role. They do not have to reflect the status of women and men in the community to which the group refers or within which it operates. The construct of gender is processed and played out in hermetic structures, which terrorist groups undoubtedly are, hence the attribution to individuals of certain traits and attitudes culturally seen as female or male may be subject to modification. Permanent predispositions reflecting gender stereotypes may be important at the stage of recruitment and propaganda, but not necessarily reflect the actual position of women in terrorist groups. The more so as women also play very active roles, including being responsible for shaping their organizations policies, taking part in armed fighting and becoming martyrs. A peculiar example are far-right extremist organizations (such as the Aryan Brotherhood in the United States), in which women are often excluded from strictly political activities, but are involved in overall support activities. Failure to take into account the specificity of female terrorism at the prevention level reduces the effectiveness of the state security system. Recommendations for state security systems should therefore include, first of all, a number of measures taking into account the impact of women on the social, political, and economic environment and their susceptibility to feel sympathetic toward and to support extremist and terrorist organizations passively or actively. Radicalization is a problem concerning many spheres of politics, such as labor, education, security, health care, foreign, and defense policy. A cross-sectoral approach, which brings together the knowledge and experience from various public policy areas, is the basis for a holistic approach to programs counteracting violent extremism. In Poland there is a lack of expert cooperation and projects aimed at counteracting political extremism by working with high-risk groups. The view radicalization only concerns countries with a high level of immigrants, that is, mainly Western Europe, persists and the rise of right-wing extremism groups is ignored. Some attempts to counteract polarization are made through the initiative of public benefit organizations. These include the “Anti-Discrimination Workshops” run free of charge for primary and junior high-schools offered by the Association Against Anti-Semitism

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and Xenophobia in 2011; the “Let’s Kick Racism out of the Stadiums” campaign of the Never Again Association, since 1996; the “Foreigners’ Rights—Human Rights” training program run from February to April 2016 in the form of lectures by the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights. Moreover, the foundation Institute of Social Safety has been engaged in the European Radicalization Awareness Network. However, there is no in-depth thinking on de-radicalization and deprogramming projects at the state level. Assistance provided as part of programs to combat the radicalization of attitudes and behavior is subject to the threat facing a given individual. The typical tasks carried out by programs implemented in different countries are ideological discussion, intercultural dialog, personal growth, work on social skills, building relations with loved ones, learning how to cope with pressure (families, environment), frustration and anger, leisure time management skills, counseling and professional development, education, health care (including psychological support), social support, education for safety and raising awareness about social problems and maladjustment. A growing number of the programs being implemented are dedicated to women, as they help to detect the early warning signs of radicalization, especially among close relatives. Nevertheless, in terrorism prevention the role of women as family members is emphasized (through slogans such as “the Mother—the first line of prevention”). Highlining the role of mothers, however, is undermined by feminists who ask about the role of fathers in the fight against radicalization. The woman is pushed into the private sphere. Nevertheless, in traditional communities it is necessary from the point of view of the counter-radicalization effectiveness. Other functions—active member of the local community, educational, religious, and political decision-maker—are marginalized. Women’s participation in the shaping of religious and theological interpretations remains problematic in all countries. The religiousness of women tends to be given caring and ancillary functions, despite women’s key role in preserving customs and transmitting traditions. This underestimates their position in building cohesion in social networks and resistance to extremist slogans. Activating women through social programs and campaigns is the key to preventing radicalization toward violence, regardless of whether it is strictly criminal or political in nature. Incorporating a gender perspective to CVE/PVE is not only a matter of “adding women,” but also of strengthening their awareness as actors on the public stage.

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Hassan, M. H. (2006). Key considerations in counterideological work against terrorist ideology. Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 29(6), 531–558. Heuer, R. J. (1999). Psychology of intelligence analysis. Washington DC: CIA Center for the Study of Intelligence. Home Office. (2016). Operation of police powers under the Terrorism Act 2000 and subsequent legislation: Arrests, outcomes, and stop and search, Great Britain, Financial Year Ending 31 March 2016. London: Home Office 2016. Retrieved September 5, 2019, from https://www. gov.uk/government/publications/operation-of-police-powers-under-the-terrorism-act-2000financial-year-ending-march-2016/operation-of-police-powers-under-the-terrorism-act-2000and-subsequent-legislation-arrests-outcomes-and-stop-and-search-great-britain-financial-y Home Office. (2017, April 2). New counter-extremism tasks force to help tackle extremism behind bars. Press Release. Retrieved September 3, 2019, from https://www.gov.uk/government/news/ new-counter-extremism-taskforce-to-help-tackle-extremism-behind-bars Horgan, J. (2008). Deradicalization or disengagement?. Perspectives on Terrorism, 2, 4. Retrieved January 2, 2019, from http://www.terrorismanalysts.com/pt/index.php/pot/article/view/32/html Horgan, J. (2009). Disengaging from terrorism. In D. Canter (Ed.), The faces of terrorism. Multidisciplinary perspectives (pp. 257–276). Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. Horgan, J. (2013). Fully operational? The ongoing challenges of terrorist risk reduction programs. E-International Relation (online) 29 July. Retrieved September 2, 2019, from https://www.e-ir. info/2013/07/29/fully-operational-the-ongoing-challenges-of-terrorist-risk-reduction-programs/ Huckerby, J. C., & Satterthwaite, M. L. (Eds.). (2013). Gender, National Security and counterterrorism: Human rights perspective. Abington: Routledge. Hulplijn Radicalisering Website. (n.d.). Retrieved 1 September 2019 from http:// hulplijnradicalisering.nl/nl/Home/ Joyce, C., & Lynch, O. (2017). “Doing Peace”: The role of ex-political prisoners in violence prevention initiatives in Northern Ireland. Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 40(14), 1072–1090. https://doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2016.1253990. Koehler, D. (2017). Understanding deradicalization: Methods, tools and programs for countering violent extremism. New York, London: Routledge. Koomen, W., & van der Pligt, J. (2016). The psychology of radicalisation and terrorism. London, New York: Routledge. Macmillan, L. (2007). Feminists organising against gendered violence. Houndmills, BasingstokeHampshire, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Marsden, S. V. (2017). Reintegrating extremists: Deradicalization and desistance. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Ministry of Security and Justice, National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism, Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment. (2014, 29, August). The Netherlands Comprehensive Action Programme to Combat Jihadism. Overview of measures and actions. The Hague. Retrieved December 11, 2019, from https://counterideology2.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/netherlandcomprehensive-counter-extremism-plan-2014.pdf Pettman, J. J. (1998). Gender issues. In J. Baylis & S. Smith (Eds.), The globalization of world politics. An introduction to international relations (pp. 483–497). New York: Oxford University Press. Poloni-Staudinger, L., & Ortbals, C. D. (2013). Terrorism and violent conflict: Women’s agency, leadership and response. New York: Springer. Report of the Secretary General. (2010). The role of the United Nations peacekeeping in disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (reference S/2000/101). United Nations Security Council, 11 Feb 2010. Retrieved August 3, 2018, from https://resourcecentre.savethechildren.net/ node/2374/pdf/2374.pdf Ruddick, S. (1980). Maternal thinking. Feminist Studies, 6(2, Summer), 342–367. Ruddick, S. (1989). Maternal thinking toward a politics of peace. New York: Ballantine. S/RES/1325 (2000). Resolution 1325 (2000) Adopted by the Security Council at its 4213rd Meeting, on 30 October 2000. Retrieved September 2, 2018, from http://www.un.org/ womenwatch/osagi/wps/#resolution

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S/RES/2242 (2015). Resolution 2242 (2015) Adopted by the Security Council at its 7533rd meeting, on 13 October 2015. Retrieved September 1, 2019, from http://www.securitycouncilreport.org/ atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/s_res_2242.pdf Salman, A. (2015). Green houses for terrorism: Measuring the impact of gender equality attitudes and outcomes as deterrents of terrorism. International Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice, 39(4), 281–306. Scheuermann, M., & Zürn, A. (Eds.). (2020). Gender roles in peace and security prevent, protect, participate. Cham: Springer. Schlaffer, E., & Kropiunning, U. (2015). Mothers against terror. Per Concordiam, 6(4), 19–25. Schmid, A. P. (2013, March). Radicalisation, de-radicalisation, counter-radicalisation: A conceptual discussion and literature review. ICCT Research Paper. The Hague. Retrieved December 1, 2018, from https://www.icct.nl/download/file/ICCT-Schmid-Radicalisation-De-Radicalisation-CounterRadicalisation-March-2013.pdf Silke, A. (Ed.). (2014). Prisons, terrorism and extremism. Critical issues in management, radicalisation and reform. New York: Routledge. Sulowski, S. (2017). Wolność i bezpieczeństwo w kontekście walki z terroryzmem. Kwartalnik Naukowy OAP UW, e-Politikon, 20, 8–24. Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act. (2011). Retrieved September 13, 2019, from http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2011/23/pdfs/ukpga_20110023_en.pdf UNDP. (2016). Preventing violent extremism through promoting inclusive development, tolerance and respect for diversity. A development response to addressing radicalisation and violent extremism. New York: UNDP. UNDP. (2018). Human development indicates and indicators. Statistical Update 2018. New York: UNDP. Retrieved September 9, 2019, from http://hdr.undp.org/sites/default/files/2018_human_ development_statistical_update.pdf VPN. (2019). Violence prevention network website. Retrieved October 7, 2019, from https:// violence-prevention-network.de/ Wahidin, A. (2016). Ex-Combatants, gender and peace in Northern Ireland: Women, political protest and prison experience. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Weilnbӧck, H. (2015). A better way to counter violent extremism and terrorism. Per Concordiam, 6 (4), 7–11. White, S. (2018). Peacekeeping in the African Union: Gender, women and the battle against sexual exploitation and abuse. In P. Frankowski & A. Gruszczak (Eds.), Cross-disciplinary perspectives on regional and global security (pp. 165–189). Cham (Switzerland): Palgrave Macmillan. Women, Peace and Security. (n.d.). Retrieved September 2, 2019, from https://dppa.un.org/en/ women-peace-and-security Yuval-Davis, N. (1997). Gender and nation. Los Angeles [u.a]: Sage. Zięba, A. (2016). Oczekując nieoczekiwanego: zagrożenie terrorystyczne w Europie. In Z. Siemiątkowski & A. Zięba (Eds.), Służby specjalne we współczesnym państwie (pp. 217– 234). Warsaw: Dom Wydawniczy Elipsa.

Chapter 7

Conclusion

I have learned that a woman can be a fighter, a freedom fighter, a political activist, and that she can fall in love, and be loved, she can be married, have children, be a mother. Khaled, L. (2001)

Feminism is going through an impasse of sorts related to the reformulation of the aims set for action, the assessment of women’s situation in the modern world and of their needs. This is reflected in the new directions of feminist research and in the search for a feminist perspective in areas previously monopolized (and masculinized) by traditional approaches. Choosing the topic of security, and especially issues of political violence, as an example of in-depth analysis using feminist concepts, was dictated by the importance of this area in the classical approach to the social sciences. Security research and the changes taking place in this field are a particularly important issue given the new international and internal factors affecting organized crime, which undoubtedly includes terrorism. This creates new challenges and the need to redefine the traditional approach to scholarship and the definition of security. In this context, the particular needs of women with regard to security, their participation in the process of providing security, and the escalation of security risks involving women cannot be overlooked. An individual seen as a man has been the universal subject of research interest in the social sciences. It constitutes the dominant model of action, and its behavior in relations with other men is extrapolated by analogy to describe behaviors related to political violence or to the state. The multiplicity and diversity of women’s experiences seemingly lay outside the boundaries of traditional cognition. Gender-based distortions remain particularly evident in the discourse about militarism and issues related to it. For this reason, studies on terrorism are one of the areas which should be explored using a feminist approach. The history of political violence, just like the history of wars, requires testimonies of the existence and activeness of women. Taking women’s experience into account is not tantamount to creating an alternative science—it expands the horizons of cognition by complementing them with a woman’s perspective. Marginalizing women as a causative factor and relegating © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 A. Gasztold, Feminist Perspectives on Terrorism, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37234-7_7

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them to the position of victim does not necessarily mean that they see themselves in this light. Robbing women of their power (agency) as a rational player, in constant contrast to the man-warrior-leader-winner, is a falsification of reality, a mirage in which one can believe, but not something on which to rest the theory of cognition. For this reason, the challenge for the researcher of brutal extremism is the need to demonstrate that women’s studies on security, including terrorism, meet universality criteria. The open question remains of whether the feminist approach in security research would lead to security systems being different. Feminism brings a fresh perspective to security research, placing the issues of socially created gender differences and androcentrism at the center of attention. Feminist concepts transform both the theory and practice of social sciences—through critique, deconstruction of the epistemological assumptions in traditional science, and by creating their own concepts based on the gender category. The feminist perspectives make it possible to transform theoretical and methodological assumptions, by rejecting simplistic assumptions about the possibility of creating objective and rational knowledge. This is especially stressed by the feminism’s postmodern current, which claims that the relativism of knowledge reflects the ways in which the researcher perceives, gives meaning, and assesses social reality. The available knowledge about political violence is built by taking into account, firstly, the experiences of men. Concepts presenting man as the universal subject of security research are based on a political philosophy that is “masculine” and entrenches the division between the public and private spheres. This dichotomous division perpetuates the space in which men and women function, and the roles and meanings that are attributed to them. According to positivist theories, these spheres are separate and the private sphere is not a subject of interest in security research, despite ever growing problems with the escalation of nonmilitary threats, including the radicalization of individuals toward violent extremism. The private and public spheres are inextricably linked with one another and interact in an unequal manner because they reflect the relationship of power, the subordination of the domestic sphere, with which women are associated, to the public sphere. Feminists propose a gender-sensitive analysis and the adoption of a model that takes the multiplicity of identities and interactions into account. Feminist concepts suggest various solutions—empiricism entails the necessity to include women in the public sphere; and standpoint—taking into account the values and features socially attributed to women. The worlds of women and men, while having been viewed as separate for centuries, are interdependent, especially in light of contemporary threats and an ever broader understanding of security. The postpositivist current of feminism draws attention to the needs of women in this area, to their participation and role in ensuring security and transforming it. It stresses the internal aspects of security, its social, economic and ecological and political dimensions. That is why the ties between gender, war, and peace are so important. In addition, the situation of women facing armed conflict and their participation in armed activities and political violence with the diversification of the roles of victim, perpetrator, etc. are also emphasized. Women’s peaceful nature is being questioned. Representatives of various currents take a different view of this formulation—some

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reject it as a harmful stereotype, while others seek to use it in support of thesis about the moral superiority of women. Gender experience has a considerable influence on such attitudes. And so, by means of criticism and a redefinition of the assumptions current in traditional positivist social sciences, feminist concepts of key issues of the theoretical and practical sphere were introduced. The introduction of the UN Women, Peace and Security Agenda, for example, constituted a shift toward solutions that would not discriminate against women, and enable them to participate fully in the shaping of their security. Evidence that such changes are taking place includes the adoption by successive states of a national action plans (NAP) in keeping with UNSC Resolution 1325 (as of October 2019, 82 countries have a NAP). Threats to security should be considered from the perspective from which they arise and gender is an inherent component of such threats. Trends occurring in the West are of marginal interest to political scientists dealing with security in Central Europe. Feminism’s negative associations as a social movement in the public debate are not conducive to the development of research in this area. The initiatives undertaken encounter the obstacle of “male exclusivity” in the discipline’s development. Neither does the presence of female political scientists lead to an interest in the problems posed by the set of feminist theories. Answering to questions unasked is a niche phenomenon. This is outlined in the first and second chapter of this book. In the third chapter I clearly emphasize the need to take the category of gender into account and to “add women” in research on terrorism. The notion of gender constitutes the adhesive holding the various currents of feminism together. It penetrates into many spheres of social life and several scientific disciplines, even though it is neglected in traditional research. It can be seen as a “system of social practice,” where the polarization of characteristics attributed to men and women is constantly created and played out through, among other things, roles, behaviors, social norms, and stereotypes ascribed to what is masculine and feminine. Innate physical characteristics are natural and factors of diversity, but do not lead to the formation of different moral or even political norms for women and men. Only their interpretation, that is, the cultural context, shapes them. The roles played by men and women in public life are relational. Hence, women’s participation in political violence may reflect culturally shaped positions of women and men or negate them (emancipation). Therefore, the gender variable should be treated as one of many factors of terrorism. The feminist lens allows us to approach the issue of objectification, politicization of the place and image of women, and the perception of their presence in violent extremism as a form of rational choice rather than a deviation from the norm. The feminist perspectives make it possible to analyze more fully the motives for women to engage in criminal activities, the ways in which they become engaged in it, and thus to demonstrate the specific nature of female terrorism. The approach I adopted focuses on the recognition of the differences and similarities between men and women, which are products of social life. Feminist theory can be used to analyze terrorism, as it focuses on research at the level of the individual man and woman. Gender difference as a constitutive variable of social reality is thus of key importance in the study of terrorism as well as in education for security.

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Whenever the media reports an attack or an attempted attack conducted by a woman, public opinion is astonished. People often seek to explain it by looking for traumatic experiences in the woman’s life. While trauma may be one of many initiating factors, it is also a decisive factor in men’s choices. In public debate, however, shows no sympathy for the man-warrior. But sympathy for a woman is cunningly used by terrorist organizations to strengthen their position in community of reference and to legitimize violent means and actions by resorting to moral Manichaeism, which is removed from the positivist legal reality. The media melodrama accompanying the spectacular actions of female terrorists serves to promote the cause and encourages other women to take action. In this way, it places political decision-makers in a rather uncomfortable situation. In the narrative skillfully built by a terrorist organization with the help of an unconscious media focused on sensation, those politicians are made to bear responsibility for the life of this woman. In this information struggle, terrorist organizations are usually the winner. There is no evidence that women terrorists differ from men terrorists in their performance of the same functions in the organization. Women’s recruitment, motivation, ideological commitment, and brutality are similar to those of men (For more, see Nacos 2005). There is a difference, however, in the widespread view about the “abnormality” of a woman’s involvement in terrorist acts, especially when its victims are civilians. The participation of women in terrorist activities does not require any specific psychological explanation. For example, suicide bombings of women, prepared by Palestinian organizations, are seen in some media in the Middle East as acts of heroism and self-sacrifice. However, in the Western media they are seen as a form of abnormal behavior. A woman’s choice is often explained by variables such as divorce, childlessness, past illnesses, mutilation, loss of a family member, etc., which are not singled out when an attack is carried out by a man. And so, stereotypical thinking triumphs again: on the one hand, we have sacralization (the symbolism of sainthood) by a reference community and, on the other hand, condemnation (taking life as a sin, that is, a defect and weakness that can be justified by trauma) (Schweitzer 2008). Nadezda Petrusenko shares an interesting point on the specificity of feminine nature. Traditionally, the traits attributed to women and perpetuated by stereotypes, are of a twofold character: women are perceived either as saints (Madonnas) or as fallen (whores). “On one hand women are seen as sinful—wanton, deceitful instigators of lust and pollution, on the other hand there has always been a positive model of a good woman, modest and hard-working, pious and chaste, devoted to her household and children, and submissive to her husband” (Petrusenko 2011, p. 135). Such a woman simply cannot be familiar with the arcana of violence. Only a man possesses the knowledge and skills that predestine him for the role of a warrior—both as an aggressor and as a defender. In this way, the image—or rather the ideal—of a woman gentle by nature has been perpetuated, while violence lies beyond what is typically understood as a good woman. Women of light mores, who are perfidious and provocative, are too unstable and focused on personal gain to be useful to a terrorist organization, even though the sexual deprivation of a woman and her subordination to a man may be a factor leading to the establishment of ties with

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such an organization. Side-by-side with this portrait of the debauchery, Laura Sjoberg and Caron E. Gentry have also placed the image of a female monster (a person with disorders) in contrast to the mother as a symbol of biological survival. Both portraits perpetuate the stereotype of the pathological nature of a women’s involvement in political violence, including terrorism. The symbol of Hakate, Medusa, Salomea, Megaera and other literary “witches” somehow confirms this (de Cataldo Neuburger and Valentini 1996, pp. vii–viii). Even the poetic symbolism of a woman who gives life (mother) can explain the woman’s need to belong and be loyal to men (Sjoberg and Gentry 2007, p. 12). This explains why there is still a belief that a woman-terrorist is a deviation from the general “rule.” Even when her role is analyzed in terms of her heroic attitude, her selflessness and self-sacrifice (the role of the saint) in the name of higher goals is never omitted. It is difficult to state unequivocally whether, through martyrdom, a woman transcends the boundaries of her sex and the meanings attributed to it. The involvement of women in political violence is seen as more fanatical than that of men. Women’s participation in suicide terrorism is not a form of emancipation or aspiration for power (although this may have been a factor in left-wing movements). It does not improve the status of those who are still alive, although it may increase the prestige of their family. Is eternal glory through death a sufficient motive? Taking gender into account at the level of prevention, combat and response can broaden knowledge of terrorism and enhance the defense abilities of institutions involved in the development of an anti-terrorism system. It is also worthwhile to single out child soldiers, fighters, and assassins as being most susceptible to multilevel indoctrination through films, the Internet, computer games, peer pressure, family tradition, the influence of cultural and educational centers, religious houses, and the role of authority. Eliminating the terrorist organizations’ asset consisting in the recruitment and use of women (and children) for terrorist attacks would improve the ability to defend society from terrorism. Recommendations for counterterrorism systems include a range of measures that can be used by states to influence the social, political, and economic environment in order to discourage women from supporting or playing a role in terrorist organizations. Counterterrorism campaigns include programs to fight against the radicalization of attitudes and behavior. Such campaigns are addressed to local communities where women—mainly mothers—play the role of guides toward adult life. The activation of women through educational programs, regardless of region and culture, holds the key to preventing their radicalization toward terrorism and extremism. It is no guarantee of success, however. Recruitment to terrorism can take place through circles of acquaintances, family members, neighbors, teachers, student colleagues, clerics, and other persons. The factors that make one susceptible to fascination with terrorism and, in consequence (it should be stressed that this is not a chain reaction), to commit terrorist acts are numerous and complex. The list of such factors remains open. So far, it has not been possible to come up with a profile of the typical terrorist, despite numerous attempts to do so (For more, see Stout 2004; Silke 2003; Horgan 2005; Post 2007; Victoroff and Kruglanski 2009). The number of people taking part in armed actions is incomparably small in relation to the number of persons involved in the group’s

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functioning, for example in its financing, providing shelter, intelligence and counterintelligence, propaganda and counterpropaganda, training, recruiting, securing procuring explosives and other substances and firearms, falsification of documents, ensuring communications between members, etc. In security studies, there is a clear trend to see the participation of women in terrorism through the prism of a debate on women’s position in public life. The role of women is often ignored, diminished or they are relegated to the status of victims. The exclusion of a social group identified by a biological trait, such as gender, is referred to as “gender blindless” and is a trait often encountered in the social sciences. Masculinized thinking in studies on terrorism changes its character in conjunction with progress in scholarly research on individual groups. “Adding women” to reflections on terrorism is mandated by their rising activeness as part of individual terrorist organizations and currents. The multiplicity or roles and tasks existing within an organization makes it impossible to create a portrait that would be universally applicable to each group, irrespective of the current with which it is connected. In the search for answers to the question about the sources of terrorism in human nature, the issue of how terrorist organizations recruit and motivate candidates is marginalized. What if terrorism is a career path? Would the same factors of growth/gratification be characteristic of both men and women? In order to answer these questions, quantitative and qualitative research has to be carried out on active and former members of terrorist organizations. Still, a long training and indoctrination process can distort the interpretation of the impulse that has pushed the individual toward violence. Justifying that individual’s choices, rationalizing them or making sense of them in the name of a higher good can distort the image (See Taylor and Quayle 1994). Ignoring the gender factor in anti-terrorist strategy and policy can contribute to an increase in the participation of women in terrorism. To omit the specific nature of women’s roles and tasks in a terrorist organization and to marginalize their position by claiming that most terrorist organizations (such as those of a religious profile) are not ready for women in military roles is engaging in wishful thinking. In real danger situations, such a mistake will lead to greater chances for a woman terrorist, as a less suspect and more determined individual, to successfully accomplish her mission. Distorted religious interpretations ably incite to terrorism through the use of fundamentalism, involvement, commitment, and homogenization (Wright 2016). The threat of religious terrorism is particularly high in Middle Eastern and North African countries (Global Terrorism Index). The problem of extremism in this region is related to lack of prospects in conditions of rapid economic growth in the conservative Gulf States, to cultural erosion, and to US actions in the region. In addition, religion has entered into the language of politics (Schmermund and Feinstein 2017, p. 16). Also in Europe, especially in Western Europe, the threat of terrorism has become a real problem (Europol’s Te-SAT Reports, Global Terrorism Index). Due to the phenomenon of foreign fighters associated with jihadist terrorism and the activity of, among others, neo-Nazi, anti-immigrant and anti-Semitic groups, these problems also affect Northern and Eastern European countries. Far-right extremism in Europe is a fact and is considered an internal phenomenon, despite such groups’

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transnational cooperation with organizations of a similar ideological profile worldwide (e.g. in the United States, Canada, and Australia). Modern motor for white supremacy extremism is conflict in Ukraine and possibilities of military training (The Saufan Center 2019). On the other hand, fascination with jihad is seen an external phenomenon mistakenly unconnected to domestic factors. Poor economic and social conditions of life in a foreign country are sometimes exploited by terrorist organizations. A significant number of Poles (labor migrants), in Great Britain or Germany for example, live in poorer (cheaper) districts, as do many other nationalities, including the Muslim community. Lack of prospects and poor living conditions can be exploited through social relations, with neighbors or friends, for example. The support coupled with indoctrination and manipulation offered by terrorist organizations may lead to changing attitudes and behaviors. Skillfully encouraged frustration generates aggression and is accompanied by the shaping off an alternative moral system. The consequence of this process can be the use of violence against strangers/ enemies/non-disbelievers, etc. This is only one of many possible scenarios, just as there are several models of radicalization. Nonetheless, irrespective of the real bases of a terrorist organization hidden behind the banners of a particular religion or ideology, social campaigns are extremely important in counteracting the recruitment efforts and the dissemination of propaganda. There is a place for women here. It is worthwhile to remember that women become involved in violent extremism and terrorism just as men do. However, the mechanisms of radicalization and recruitment may be different. The role of emotional ties is often overstated, to the detriment of the model of rational choice or coerced membership. A terrorist organization can also provide a chance for survival, education and the acquisition of certain skills. As far as Poland is concerned, the women “invisible perpetrators” of anti-Semitic or xenophobic crimes are an interesting issue. They are women who had known of the upcoming commission of a crime, encouraged it, and actively participated in logistic and intelligence activities before/during/after the sanctioned act was carried out. The degree to which women are involved in violent extremism is not, however, a topic of wider interest in public and academic discourse. Far-right organizations, including religious ones, promote gender inequality and a patriarchal system of relations, as well as the stereotypical separation of the masculine and feminine. It would thus be particularly interesting to examine the motives of women who become involved in such organizations and the motives of the organization itself in recruiting female members (oppression or strategy?). Gender norms are also used to recruit men, such as with the promotion of rewards like nuptials for fighters, access to an unlimited number of sex slaves, and the promise of bodily pleasures in the afterlife, etc. Gender is processed and played out in hermetic structures, such as terrorist groups undoubtedly are, hence the attribution to individuals of certain traits and attitudes culturally fixed as feminine or masculine may be subject to modification. Permanent predispositions reflecting stereotypical approach to gender may be important at the stage of recruitment and propaganda, and not necessarily reflect the real position of

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women within groups. Particularly as women also play very active roles, including in the formulation of the organization’s policy, in armed struggle and martyrdom. A particular example are white supremacy organizations (like the Aryan Brotherhood in the United States), in which women are often excluded from strictly political activities, but are involved in overall support activities. The failure to take into account the specificity of female terrorism at the level of terrorism prevention reduces the effectiveness of the state security system. In this book I sought to demonstrate the thesis that women’s participation in radical political violence, irrespective of the organization’s profile or the roles women play in them, is a global phenomenon and requires further in-depth analyses. It is important to determine the extent to which the gender variable is used by the organizations themselves in recruitment, training and terrorist activities, as well as by the state in its counterterrorism efforts. Trends observed in de-radicalization campaigns unwittingly promote among women the stereotypical roles of “tradition carriers” and homemakers, while at the same time appreciating the importance of women in recognizing signs of changing opinions and behaviors in their immediate surroundings. The invisibility of women in patriarchal systems can be used as an anti-terrorist resource in skillfully conducted security education programs. The activation of women by raising people’s awareness of threats is the key that gives access to local communities. Research conducted from the feminist perspectives points to the existence of a specific nature of female terrorism. This book points to new possibilities of studying terrorism from the feminist perspectives. Feminist categories, notions, and terms are not sufficiently explored in research on terrorism and radicalisation. For this reason, their use in the study of this phenomenon may broaden the spectrum of analysis, or at the very least, help enrich the methodologies and theories being used in the political and security sciences. My main conclusions, which could serve as a starting point for further in-depth analysis, are the following: (1) the need for a critical overview of traditional paradigms, theories, concepts and language in the analyses of threats to state security, including political violence; (2) the need for a critical review of androcentric trends in politics and (and security sciences) and in public debate; (3) the need to introduce a gender variable in the study on terrorism; (4) the need to present the experience and influence of women on security and various forms of security threats; and (5) the need to create a feminist conceptual grid, assumptions and explanations, both useful for theory and social practice in aspects related to terrorism and counterterrorist prevention. Women are involved in terrorist activities and are also involved in the fight against it. On the other hand, research into terrorism and counterterrorism policy remain strongly masculinized. The impact of gender on the specific conditions of political struggle can be crucial to understand the relationship between power and the deconstruction of its masculine face. Gender can by one dimension of power implicated in politics and political violence. Framing terrorism has to do with what is political, that is to concepts and systems of power, and even to gender order. This is why scholarly research taking the feminist perspectives into account should be

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conducted. The experience of gender and its structure and mechanisms within and outside terrorism should be explored. The present book is an attempt to meet this need and to encourage practitioners to use the gender lens in shaping counterradicalization and counterterrorism policies.

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