Sexual violence, gendered protection and support for intervention
| Published date | 01 September 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/00223433221092960 |
| Author | Mattias Agerberg,Anne-Kathrin Kreft |
| Date | 01 September 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Regular Articles |
Sexual violence, gendered protection
and support for intervention
Mattias Agerberg
Department of Political Science, University of Gothenburg
Anne-Kathrin Kreft
Department of Political Science, University of Oslo
Abstract
The protection of civilians from human rights violations has increasingly become a global priority. The wars in
Bosnia and Rwanda in the 1990s, and the development of the Women, Peace and Security framework have placed
conflict-related sexual violence on the global protection agenda. Prior research has found that international attention
to, and intervention in, conflicts is in fact more likely when there are reports of widespread sexual violence, regardless
of overall conflict intensity. This article theorizes and empirically examines the micro-level underpinnings of these
patterns. We hypothesize that individuals are more likely to support military intervention in conflicts with prevalent
sexual violence as opposed to other types of conflict violence. The reason lies in gendered protection norms, based in
benevolent sexism, that continue to have traction also in Western societies. In equivalent survey experiments carried
out in the United States, the United Kingdom and Sweden, we find that support for international intervention is
highest in sexual violence conflicts. In the United States and the United Kingdom, the responsibility to protect and
gendered perceptions of victimhood mediate this effect. A follow-up experiment in the United States provides further
evidence of a gendered protection norm as a core mechanism driving our results.
Keywords
conflict, intervention, public opinion, sexual violence
Introduction
Internal armed conflicts pose severe danger to civilians,
who for ideological, economic or tactical reasons are
targeted by armed actors in both lethal and non-lethal
violence (Eck & Hultman, 2007; Balcells, 2010; Cohen
& Nordås, 2014; Fjelde & Hultman, 2014; Meger,
2016b). In 2005, the United Nations General Assembly
(UNGA) codified the responsibility to protect (R2P)
civilians from genocide, ethnic cleansing, war crimes and
crimes against humanity, with military force justified as
the ultima ratio if the government in question perpetrates
or fails to prevent these violations. While prior research
has found that international intervention is more likely
where conflict lethality is higher (Gilligan & Stedman,
2003; Townsen & Reeder, 2014), it is in particular con-
flicts with prevalent conflict-related sexual violence
(CRSV) that attract international attention and peace-
keeping missions (Hultman & Johansson, 2017; Kreft,
2017; Kreutz & Cardenas, 2017; Benson & Gizelis,
2020). This suggests that not all types of conflict vio-
lence are alike in activating civilian protection norms.
Why is that the case?
We know little about the micro-level processes under-
lying macro-level intervention patterns. How do different
types of conflict violence affect individuals’ support for
intervention? This is the question this article seeks to
answer, by examining public opinion in three Western
democracies. Using international intervention patterns
as our point of departure, we hypothesize that individuals
Corresponding author:
a.k.kreft@stv.uio.no
Journal of Peace Research
2023, Vol. 60(5) 853–867
ªThe Author(s) 2022
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DOI: 10.1177/00223433221092960
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