ABSTRACT
This introductory chapter situates the handbook within feminist scholarship on conflict and peacebuilding and outlines the core objectives and contributions of the collection to scholarship, policy, and practice. A core objective of the volume is to texture and reconfigure prevailing assumptions about the relationship between masculinity, violence, and conflict, advancing understandings of gender, war, and peace. By reshaping understandings of women’s multiple roles and positions in armed conflict, feminist scholarship and organising profoundly challenges binary understandings of gender in conflict-affected settings. While scholarship on men and masculinities in conflict is rapidly evolving, it largely centres on violences by men or against men, occluding a wide range of men’s roles in, experiences of, and resistances to violence. Establishing this backdrop, the introduction provides an overview of the volume.
