Rape Loot Pillage: The Political Economy of Sexual Violence in Armed Conflict

Abstract

Feminist scholarship has exposed the deliberate use of rape and other forms of sexual violence in war, as well as the social, cultural, and institutional norms that drive this behavior. Their analyses and activism around wartime sexual violence prompted global recognition of the issue of “rape as a weapon of war.” As influential as this narrative has been for bringing gendered violence to the attention of international policymakers, scholars, and aid organizations, it has also resulted in a homogenization of gender-based violence. Such a view of sexual violence in conflict obscures the contextually specific social, cultural, political, and economic determinants that inform the conflict and g..