Book review: Sexual Violence as a Weapon of War? Perceptions, Prescriptions, Problems in the Congo and Beyond
| Date | 01 May 2017 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0269758017694726 |
| Author | Oluwaseun Bamidele |
| Published date | 01 May 2017 |
| Subject Matter | Book reviews |
Book reviews
Maria Eriksson Baaz and Maria Stern (eds)
Sexual Violence as a Weapon of War? Perceptions, Prescriptions, Problems in the Congo
and Beyond.
New York: Zed Books, 2013, soft cover, ISBN 978 1 78032 163 9, 168 pp.
Reviewed by: Oluwaseun Bamidele, Ekiti State University, Nigeria
DOI: 10.1177/0269758017694726
Never have I been so movedby any book on the embedding of sexual violence in socialstructures as
IhavebySexual Violence as a Weapon of War?: Perceptions, Pr escriptions, Problems, i n the Congo
and Beyond. I admit, when I first opened the cover, I expected sexual violence to be presented as a
force within itself or as a shadowy backyard ghost that lingered around but was not an ever-present
part of the military, war, or the structure of society. After reviewing the table of contents and the
detailed index,I saw that the authorsconsidered regional and state manifestations of sexual violence
within a global framework. Sexual violence was analyzedas an integral part of contemporary global
institutionsand mechanisms of inequalityas it was defined as an integraland fundamental part of war
that reflects the interconnectedness of gender, racial, ethnic, colonial, and global violence, particu-
larly as it has been expressed in comparative and historical processes of genocide.
In the first chapter, ‘Sex/Gender Violence,’ the authors depart from their experiences of
researching rape in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and argue that the dominant
and seemingly progressive perspective of seeing, listening to, and understanding wartime rape,
when probed, reveals a host of unexamined effects. They set the stage for subsequent analysis by
offering a reading of the dominant narratives that frame possible understanding of sexual violence,
i.e. the ‘sexed story’ of wartime rape, follo wed by the ‘gendered story’ that produces sexu al
violence as both normal and ‘abnormal’ and fundamentally different from and outside of other
forms of violence that are presumed to be gendered. Both of these moves (simultaneously render-
ing sexual violence normal and abnormal) ultimately contribute to dehumanizing those who rape
as well as those who are raped. The authors, therefore, briefly explore some uncomfortable
subjects, which do not neatly fit into the dominant framework. In light of these uncomfortable
subjects, they reflect on the ethno-political implications of writing about those who rape in the
DRC, instead of about their victims. And they also explore the complexity in researching violence
and those who commit violence and the thorny questions of the ethics, dilemmas, and fears that
arise when attempting to understand how rape becomes possible from the perspectives of those
who commit these acts. The chapter on ‘Rape as a Weapon of War’ also offers a critical reading of
the discourse in order to make it visible. In so doing, the authors identify four nodal points that are
central to producing meaning and coherence: strategicness, gender, guilt/culpability, and avoid-
ability. What assumptions are needed to make the claim thatrape is a weapon or strategy of war? And
International Review of Victimology
2017, Vol. 23(2) 225–230
ªThe Author(s) 2017
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