ABSTRACT
This chapter provides ample evidence that the political exclusion of women that permits their abuse in conflict and post-conflict situations is at the core of the larger system of violence and is perhaps the most significant of all obstacles to human security. It offers cases of women's responses to militarization and its violation of their human security. The chapter describes gender violence as the hallmark of the larger system of patriarchal violence manifest in war and armed conflict. It presents news reporting on security controversies, and reveals the media as one of the most powerful tools for conditioning publics to the acceptance of patriarchal approaches to national security. The national security paradigm, embedded as it is in patriarchy and dependence on armed force, has exploited an exclusive and gendered form of nationalism. Such nationalisms tend to stand against democratic practices that might threaten the authority of an unjust state.
