Gender and Crisis in Global Politics: Introduction

The wide variety of feminist work about crisis in global politics suggests that a single feminist approach to, definition of, or politics of crisis is impossible to find. That same variety of work, though, makes a strong case that paying attention to crises in the world, and the manufacture of crisis rhetoric alongside events in global politics, is not only generally important but an important place for feminist scholarship, and feminist political activism, to direct attention. As I have listened to these conversations, and read the research project, no one is calling for a “feminist crisis studies” subfield – and I think that’s appropriate. But just because crisis is not, and should not be, isolated as a subfield of feminist studies of international politics does not mean that it is not intellectually important to think about across subfields of feminist studies of international politics. That is the message that I think that the many very different takes on international feminist politics and crisis in this issue convey: whether thinking about emergencies or manufactured urgency, whether thinking about security or political economy, whether thinking about interstate relations or personal/community relations – considering the roles that the language and practice of crisis and crisis management play adds dimensionality to research agendas and activist responses. We hope that these conversations inspire readers to consider of those dimensions in their scholarly and activist work.