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Where Are the Women, Really?

Cynthia Enloe was the first to ask "Where are the women?" But states with feminist foreign policies have tried to answer that question and fallen short. What now?

Words: Laicie Heeley
Pictures: Milada Vigerova
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  • Political Scientist Cynthia Enloe is, arguably, the reason we’re all here. She was one of the first to explore gender in international relations, and the first to ask, “Where are the women?” But what she meant when she asked that question? It’s been lost in a sea of nuances around feminism and feminist foreign policy.[...]
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Political Scientist Cynthia Enloe is, arguably, the reason we’re all here. She was one of the first to explore gender in international relations, and the first to ask, “Where are the women?”

But what she meant when she asked that question? It’s been lost in a sea of nuances around feminism and feminist foreign policy. Leading to misunderstandings like so many we’ve seen this season on Things That Go Boom. 

Misunderstandings like the sense among some that feminism is just about turning things around and subjugating men. Or that a man could never be a feminist, let alone carry out a feminist foreign policy.

On this episode of Things That Go Boom, where are the women, really?

And where do we go from here?

Guests: 

Cynthia Enloe, Clark University

Additional Resources: 

Bananas, Beaches and Bases: Making Feminist Sense of International Politics, Cynthia Enloe

Twelve Feminist Lessons of War, Cynthia Enloe

The Invisible Frontline: How the Fight for Women’s Rights Changes in Times of War, Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe

Laicie Heeley

Editor in Chief

Laicie Heeley is the founding CEO of Inkstick Media, where she serves as Editor in Chief of the foreign policy magazine Inkstick and Executive Producer and Host of the PRX- and Inkstick-produced podcast, Things That Go Boom. Heeley’s reporting has appeared on public radio stations across America and the BBC, where she’s explored global security issues including domestic terrorism, disinformation, nuclear weapons, and climate change. Prior to launching Inkstick, Heeley was a Fellow with the Stimson Center’s Budgeting for Foreign Affairs and Defense program and Policy Director at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation. Her publications include work on sanctions, diplomacy, and nuclear arms control and nonproliferation, along with the first full accounting of US counterterrorism spending after 9/11.

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