Gender, Peace and the New International Politics of Humanitarianism in the First Half of the Twentieth Century

Abstract

This chapter examines the changing ideas of peace and their connections with the longer history of humanitarianism in the first half of the twentieth century, using gender as an analytical focus. In particular, it explores the international and internationalist contexts of the emerging peace movement and international humanitarianism and their changing character; the gender dimensions of peace-thinking and policies, especially in the context of the League of Nations and the United Nations; and the ways in which feminism was a significant influence on the development of these two international bodies, even as women were sidelined in their operations. In the first half of the twentieth century, these international, intergovernmental organizations had as their central rationale the taming of warfare. The chapter analyzes the extent to which, in each case, they contributed to the institutionalization of new gendered international norms of pacifist and humanitarian activism.