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Book
Reviews
Speaking for Her Security
by Deepti Priya Mehrotra
October 30, 2005
 "Do
women understand and define security differently from men? Are they
animated by the same concerns about state and national security? Are
there other issues that concern them?" - asks Farah Faizal, a security
studies specialist from Maldives, who recently co-edited a collection of
writings entitled 'Women, Security, South Asia: A Clearing in the
Thicket'.
According to Swarna Rajagopalan, her co-editor (a Chennai-based security
studies expert), there are major gaps in the conventional masculinist
understanding of security, calling for feminist reappraisal and
re-setting of policy and research agendas. Their book is a beginning in
that direction.
A chapter by Pakistani political scientist Saba Gul Khattak deals with
Afghan refugee women - their lives torn asunder by conflict. Bangladeshi
international relations expert Amena Mohsin's paper focuses on Chakma
women of the Chittagong Hill Tracts whose lives were shattered by the
1971 Liberation War. Both Khattak and Mohsin dwell on the point of view
of victims of armed conflicts, the hardships they face and the
convergence of physical and social insecurities.
Women's bodies and lives seem to become the battleground on which male
violence is played out. At the same time, women are not just passive
victims, rather they are active agents in the processes that generate
both security and insecurity. As journalist-researcher Sudha
Ramachandran discusses in her analysis of women LTTE combatants in Sri
Lanka, when women take up arms, it is often due to their sense of social
insecurity, which exists in times of peace and conflict. When these
women were asked what life would be like in the Tamil Eelam they were
fighting for, many simply said it would be "a state free from hunger and
want, where lives and livelihoods are secure".
Faizal notes that, for Maldivian women, ordinary lives are a minefield
of insecurities even in times of peace. Women are commonly symbolically
identified with the honor of their community and nation, and are
pressurized to follow strict codes of behavior, speech and sexuality.
Rajagopalan asserts that so long as fundamental survival concerns are
unmet, "the State has no business securing itself".
For this to happen, women who explicitly relate to progressive women's
solidarity politics should have a voice at the negotiating table.
Although a few women do take part in inter-state and inter-ethnic
negotiations, the players at this level are predominantly men. Notes
Rajagopalan, "South Asia needs both women to be part of conventional
security discourse as well as for the discourse to be expanded to admit
the importance of their security concerns." A change in mindset, culture
and rhetoric is called for if ordinary women's concerns are to enter and
make a sufficient impact on the political process.
 Neluka
Silva's book 'The Gendered Nation: Contemporary Writings from South
Asia' views the same terrain from the stance of a literary critic and
analyst. She considers the implications of the overarching gendered
imagery associated with the 'nation' and 'nationalism'. Invoked through
gendered icons, the nation has a popular and emotive appeal. But while
feminized images define and denote the modern nation-state, the actual
practice of nationalism is reserved for men. Dress, eating and other
cultural habits fix certain forms of essentialised femininity, which
represent particular nations. Ideal womanhood is specified within
patriarchal notions and frameworks, with nationalism being basically a
'male drama'.
By virtue of belonging to certain warring groups, women are likely to be
uprooted, raped, displaced, widowed or used in conflict situations.
Vulnerable even in times of peace, this vulnerability is enhanced in
times of conflict and war. The exact forms of subordination of women
depends on the socio-cultural and religious contexts that differ in
different parts of South Asia. Yet most South Asian countries are
strikingly similar in according low value to women's lives, education or
health, and relatively high corresponding values for males. Violence on
women is legitimized in the name of superseding national priorities.
It is interesting to examine the role of women leaders, of which South
Asia has had several. Silva notes that these leaders have generally come
up as representatives of a lineage, and have seldom acknowledged women's
issues as significant. Thus when asked if she was a feminist, Indira
Gandhi's reply was: "Why should I be? I always felt I could do anything.
My mother was a strong feminist but she always felt that being a woman
was a great disadvantage."
Like Gandhi, Benazir Bhutto and Chandrika Kumaratunge positioned
themselves as 'daughters' of the nations, consciously projecting a
traditional image, with notions of martyrdom and sacrifice seeping into
their political discourses. They wore the national dress for every
public occasion and invoked the image of mother, a conscious effort
designed to appeal to the masses. They derived political mileage from
the achievements of their fathers/husbands. Although they prized radical
western ideas, when they engaged in mainstream politics, they conformed
to the dominant indigenous patriarchal codes of behavior and political
practice.
Though nationalism can at times be emancipating, at other times it is a
reactionary force. The underpinning of gender symbolism is usually a
drag on the emancipatory potential, drawing the nation-state back into
suffocating stereotypes. Concerns generally associated with women, such
as food and water security, sustainable households, subsistence farming,
child rights and sexual rights are relegated to the periphery and
marginalized. A clear line is drawn between social concerns and national
security - a binary division that further strengthens the masculisation
of the state. Women are essentialised and sub-divided, becoming symbolic
weapons with which to beat the 'other': thus for instance Sinhala women
as authentic "ideal Aryan wives" are used as foils to the "licentious
Burgher women". Women are manipulated, and themselves internalize
patriarchal thinking, within a politics of over-determined ethnic and
nationalistic identities.
The multidisciplinary approaches adopted by the two books at hand help
bring out some of the complex realities that determine the dilemmas and
contradictions faced by women in contemporary South Asia. We need to
grapple and engage with issues of identity, agency and politics in order
to carefully redefine pre-set agendas, so as to be able to effectively
intervene in the processes that exclude us. These processes are too
significant for us to tolerate this continuing exclusion.
'Women, Security, South Asia: A Clearing in the Thicket'; Sage, 2005, Rs
295
'The Gendered Nation: Contemporary Writings from South Asia'; Sage,
2005, Rs 320
By arrangement with
Women's Feature Service
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| Book
Reviews
The Week of October 30, 2005
The
Quake Opened a Window by Rajinder Puri
United States' "Democracy Thrust" in South Asia is Selective by
Dr. Subhash
Kapila
Lord Curzon and The Partition of Bengal by
Kumud Biswas
Third Child Trick by J. Ajithkumar
Inner City Schools, Affirmative Action and A Child
Left Behind by Gaurang Bhatt, MD
The Art of Happiness: Keep Your Pleasures Mild
by Vikram Karve
Choice of Children's Careers and Parental Aspirations
by Meera Chowdhry
Silver, Silver Shining Bright by Alipta Jena
Speaking for Her Security by Deepti Priya
Mehrotra
Victory for VAWA by Elayne Clift
A Moral Victory is Not What we Want by Gautam
Bhan
Power to the Village
Time to Take
Charge Again by Malvika Kaul
Very Rewarding Scheme by Vipin Agnihotri
Our trip to Cologne (Germany) Durga Puja 2005… by
Jayati Chowdhury
Visiting Ladakh by Anamika Banerjee
Wild Flowers of Chhialekh A Photo
Essay by Kana Talukder
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