Gender and “Peace Work”: An Unofficial History of Israeli-Palestinian Peace Negotiations

Abstract

Unlike earlier attempts to theorize Israeli women's peace activism in civil society, this article examines the involvement of women in backstage roles of formal negotiations during the Oslo Process. On the basis of a qualitative analysis of the organizational structure and gender division of labor in Israeli negotiating bodies, I find that women were placed as midlevel negotiators and professional and legal advisors, and also served as spokeswomen and secretaries. This pattern of participation reveals 1) that the "security logic," developed by Israeli negotiators led to, and reinforced, a structured gendered division of labor, providing a rational justification for gender inequality; 2) that the ability to control administrative capacities and women workers generated symbolic masculine power and assisted in maintaining asymmetries between Israeli and Palestinian delegations; 3) and that midlevel Israeli negotiators' narratives reveal the extent to which conceptual confusion and self-contradictory approaches toward the Oslo Accords reinforced women's overall invisibility. I conclude that patterns of rigid gender roles in official negotiating structures not only minimize women's meaningful inclusion in peace negotiations but also affect the production of public historical narratives about gender, peace, and war.

Reconceptualizing Work and Building Ruddick's Feminist Solidarity Transnationally

“…In resisting the policies of the local governing body or the state, women's resistance movements affirm their right to engage in the living work of raising children and caring for the home; their actions do not challenge the social structure (or their socially determined work in the home) but do assert their right to work that is integrated with all other activities of existence. Women's politics of resistance of this sort encourages women to explore their “culture's symbols of femininity” (Ruddick 1989, 223; see also Aharoni 2011, 397). It also makes some feminists uneasy because it appears to reaffirm a gendered division of labor, but there is another lesson Ruddick would like us to pull from women's resistance movements.…”

“…The absence of their work—the ordinary tasks of tending the needs of others—became “starkly visible through the eerie ‘disappearance’” (1989, 228). The integrative work is further emphasized in Arahoni's use of Ruddick's theory of women's resistance movements to discuss women's contributions to informal peace processes: “resistance, community work, and grassroots activism have been perceived as enabling women to formulate new priorities and challenge existing concepts of security, human rights, justice and reconstruction” (Aharoni 2011, 397). In other words, the struggle to work according to the integrative model reveals how issues of justice, human rights, and security are tied into both domestic politics and day-to-day living.…”

The gender–culture double bind in Israeli–Palestinian peace negotiations: A narrative approach

“…Consequently, the selection of women and men reflects the impact of the gendered division of labor within Israeli negotiating bodies (i.e. the placement of men as primary negotiators and women in major supporting roles) on perceptions, attitudes, and narratives (Aharoni, 2011).…”

“…This view, which this article examines as a manifestation of the gender–culture double bind hypothesis for women’s absence from peace negotiations, not only connects gender exclusion to internal hierarchies within Israel’s political structures and security sector (Aharoni, 2011), but also sees this exclusion as related to a larger picture of unique cultural interactions between Israeli and Palestinian negotiators. On a simple level, I wish to use personal narratives about the cultural hypothesis to raise a series of questions related to the role of gender in real-life dialogical exchanges within a context of strategic dialogue or peace negotiations.…”

Feminist Interventions in International Relations

“…Another study of the Oslo peace accords explores the role of women in these negotiations empirically. Here women were absent from negotiations about ending violence and drawing boundaries, but they had a strong presence in negotiations about economic arrangements and other "low politics" issues that are typically framed as less important although they are crucial sources of conflict and discontent (Aharoni, 2011). The peace negotiations in this sense interlinked gender constructions with constructing a hierarchy of issues, and continued to associate masculinity with leadership and protection.…”