Introduction

The eye-catching United States (the US) president election has ended up the failure of Hilary Clinton, who was supposed to be the first female president of the US. In spite of her failure, it once again demonstrates that women who used to be regarded subordinated to men are playing increasingly important roles in the so-called public areas, thanks to the dedication of the feminists. The fruits that the feminists have achieved are not confined to the fields of daily life, but the theoretical ones, which of them is the discipline of international relations, as well.

The discipline of international relations, conspicuously believed to derive from war and security, are broadening its fields (Peterson 1994). One of the important parts is the feminist theories, entering in the late 1980s and the early 1990s (Dunne, Kurki and Smith 2013), which is partly due to the increasingly variety of roles that women can play in society. One typical example is women’s presence in battle fields as women per se rather than dressing up as men, as Hua Mulan from China and Jeanne d'Arc from France did. The perspectives that feminist international relation theorists provide help to improve global politics and draw attentions to aspects that used to be ignored. As a result, feminist international relations theory does challenge many conventional international relations theories. However, rather than threatening the research field of international relations, feminist international relations theory interact with conventional ones to refine the research field of international relations.

Structure of this essay is as follows. In the second section, this essay analyzes the issue of female security from various international relations theories. While comparing views of different theories, this essay expresses its attitudes towards these theories concerning female security. In the third section, practices in China regarding female security are discussed view feminist international relations theory. In final section, conclusions are drawn, together with suggestion for further studies.

Female security and international relations

Realism

War, one of the frequently discussed topics for Realism, is also involved when it comes to female security. Generally, security is discussed in terms of state, rather than from the aspect of gender. What is more, it is usually believed by realism that security of the state or prevention of war help to enhance security of individuals. However, this essay disagrees with this theory. The reality is that women compare with their counterparts, suffer more from wars, mainly for three reasons. First, women, by nature, are less powerful than men. Therefore, when they are confronted with invaders or rebels, women are more likely to be hurt, let alone being raped, which leave both physical and psychological harms on women. Second, during wartime, resources requirements of the troops must be meet at first, so as to defend state. That is to say, women and children might suffer from starvation and poor medication, leading to high casualty. Third, since men are fighting in the battlefields, women only play the role of caregiver, but breadwinner as well, which pose great challenge for women physically and even put them into dangerous situations. Thus, this essay reckons that including gender into the research of realism is of great significance.

In additional to the traditional framework concerning war and female security under realism discussed above, women suffer from war in other forms. Take the tough affair of Syrian refugees. Comparing with its counterparts, Germany shows greater mercy on the Syrian refugees and introduced more open policies. However, the inflow of Syrian refugees poses threat to the security of local women. It is reported that the refugees raped many German women in June (The Telegraph 2016). Regardless of the forms, female security is indeed harmed more than male security during wars, despite the fact that state security or global security is achieved. However, without putting on gender lens, it is hard to identify the contrary relationship between state security and female security, let alone introducing effective policies to address the problem.

Marxism

As for Marxism, it devotes to figure out the source of women’s oppression, which this essay agrees with, because finding the source of women’s oppression can help to figure solutions to female insecurity to some extent. Patriarchy is one of the causes. Under patriarchy, men are head of the family and organize the production in household. Although both women and men participate in production, some go out in the factories, some work at home, like doing laundries, cooking and so forth, only work in the factories are paid. As a result, women are regarded subordinate to men, even mistreated by men.

Marxists call for recognizing efforts women done in domestic domain, which generates income for them. This essay highly agrees with the solution that Marxists have put forwards, for economic independent can ensure their basic needs, protecting from physical insecurity like starvation. Moreover, feeding on their own feet can change attitudes that parents hold towards women. When labor of women are not recognized or paid, women, to some degrees, are treated as consumers. Hence, parents prefer to sacrifice their girls for their sons when confronted with extreme situations. Moreover, this convention also contributes to child marriage. Sending the little girl to the family of her husband cuts expenses for her family. Forced to have sex with men heavily affects the little girl’s physical and psychological health. Nevertheless, such tradition is still prevalent in countries like India.

Traditionally, Marxists analyze contradiction between capitalists and proletariats, how the unfair distribution of wealth between them causes exploitation and social inequality. Gender, broadens their study sphere and makes their study more complex and similar to reality. Like capitalists and proletariats who gain different unit return due to the difference between the types of resources them invest, men and women gain different wages and social status just because men conduct productive works while women mainly involve in reproductive and community managing tasks. If the relationship between men and women is not exploitation, it is inequality at least. Thus, this essay reckons that the issue of gender challenges traditional theories of Marxists, because they need to think twice whether the socialism recommended by them can handle the problem deriving from gender difference and improve security of women.