Encyclopedia of Violence, Peace, & Conflict, Second Edition - Gender Studies

This article summarizes key aspects in the field of gender studies in order to consider the contributions that gender analysis brings to inquiries into violence, peace, and conflict. A discipline in its own right, gender studies focuses on the implications of values, actions, and systems formed on the basis of definitions of and beliefs about masculinity and femininity. Suppositions in the theories of gender mesh well with the normative approach of peace and conflict studies. This essay considers the influence that gender studies has and can have on thinking about violence, nonviolence, war and peace, and conflict transformation.