Quite literally, values determine ‘what is worth fighting for.’ When fighting entails a willingness to kill and/or be killed, we must take codes of valuation seriously. My essay explores how dominant value codes – and the emotional investments and power relations they generate – operate at the intersection of conflicts.
‘Causes’ of war are complex and multi-dimensional. While no single factor is decisive, the harms, grievance and violences produced by entrenched social hierarchies are inevitably significant. Social hierarchies are context-dependent and value-laden; their power relations and patterned effects vary by which hierarchical ‘difference’ (race, sexuality) and corollary valuation code (racism, heterosexism) are emphasized. Kimberlé Crenshaw introduced intersectional theory to contest the dominant view of social hierarchies as separate and distinctive. She argued instead that more adequate analyses of social hierarchies, and especially their persistence, requires understanding how vectors of inequality overlap, interact and are mutually constituted; in other words, they intersect.1
The deliberate and extreme devalorization (‘Othering,’ objectifying, dehumanizing) of one’s enemy is an intersecting feature of militarized conflicts. This familiar tactic draws on values embedded in societal norms and dominant cultural codes to gain emotional and material support for war and to justify violence against the demonized ‘Other.’ Peace and conflict scholars clearly recognize this dynamic and variously address the role of values, yet the emotional investments and power relations of systemic devalorization remain poorly understood.
Feminist research documents the pervading significance of masculinity and masculinization in militarized conflicts.2 In particular, the social hierarchy of gender and its corollary codes of valuation figure prominently in devalorizing the enemy ‘Other.’ To present a necessarily condensed analysis of systemic devalorization, I focus on gender-coded valuations that underpin the intersections and persistence of conflicts.3 My (over-simplified) starting points include: gender refers to socially constructed identities (not body parts); identities, meaning systems, and social practices are co-constituting (interactive, inseparable) dimensions of social reality; governing codes are powerful because they regulate conduct and incentivize conformity to dominant social expectations, norms, rules, etc.; and the governing code of gender constructs masculine-feminine differentiations as unequal and hierarchical, which interactively shapes not only identities but also meaning systems and social practices.
I submit that to understand how devalorization operates in conflicts requires taking gendered values seriously. Crucial here is understanding gender not biologically but conceptually: as a governing code of valuation with far-reaching effects. First, governing codes often operate beneath conscious awareness, which obscures their power relations and deflects critique. Second, because governing codes operate systemically, manifestations of gender are less individual ‘choices’ than effects of normalized social codes, which are collectively internalized to such an extent that nonconformity requires conscious awareness and intentional resistance. Third, in militarized conflicts these codes are explicitly manipulated to support strategic objectives and to ‘justify’ violence against the ‘Other.’ Fourth, dominant gender codes constitute masculine-feminine differentiations as binary (either-or) and hierarchical (unequal, ranked), where what is associated with masculinity (strength, reason, control) — is valorized over what is associated with femininity (weakness, emotionality, unruly); and as the value of masculinized traits increases, the value of feminized traits decreases.
Gender coding pervades language and culture, with systemic, interacting effects on identities, meaning systems and social practices. Hence, governing codes of gender devalorize not only the category of ‘women’ but also racially, sexually and culturally marginalized men, as well as feminized (devalued) objects, beliefs, roles, methods, nature, cultural expressions (art, music, literature) and activities (sports, careers, hobbies). In short, dominant gender codes have problematic effects far beyond the already oppressive consequences of devaluing ‘women.’
The myriad implications of systemic devalorization warrant more study, and especially in militarized conflicts. If we take seriously that values determine ‘what is worth fighting for,’ then codes of valuation warrant closer attention and critical investigation. I have explored how virtually anything can be feminized and thereby devalorized. Considering, how the dominant code of gender affords a powerful mechanism for demonizing the enemy ‘Other’ (within and outside of militarized conflicts), ‘justifying’ violence against the ‘Other’ and complicating prospects for peace, it often fosters the persistence of conflicts.
Endnotes
1 Crenshaw, Kimberlé. “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics.” University of Chicago Legal Forum, 1989, 1989, pp. 139-168. HeinOnline.
2 See especially Laura Sjoberg. 2013. Gendering Global Conflict: Toward a Feminist Theory of War, New York: Columbia University Press,
3 For a fuller account and additional references see V. Spike Peterson. 2007. “Thinking through Intersectionality and War.” Race, Gender & Class, Vol. 14, Issue 3-4: pp. 10-27.
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V. Spike Peterson is a Professor Emeritx of International Relations in the School of Government and Public Policy at the University of Arizona.
