Bibrief By Joshua S. Goldstein's International Relations Brief

Gender Theories

Gender issues have gradually become one of the dominant topics and a very sensitive issue in our society today. These issues are connected with an increased gender identity driven towards a perceived gender inequality that has formed a type of society where a certain group of people or a certain gender feels less incorporated in the functioning or the affairs of the society or being less recognized in certain spheres in the society. By gender identity, according to genderspectrum is “one’s innermost concept of self as a male or female or both or neither.” In this essay, I will be summarizing and critically analyzing gender theories in the book ‘International Relations Brief’ written by Joshua S. Goldstein; Jon C. Pevehouse.

But, these scholars see women being potentially more effective than men due to a considerable amount of experience acquired through nurturing and human relations. Consequently, they posit that women could be more proficient in conflict resolution and decision making. On the other hand, liberal feminist rejects the position of difference feminists. This school of thought does not believe that there is any difference between the male and the female. They see everyone as equals hence; they seek for an inclusion of women in all spheres of the society, ranging from being state leaders to female soldiers and every other domain. Thirdly, postmodern feminism rejects the assumptions of both schools of thought. They believe that gender issue is rather arbitrary and flexible which means that it is subjugated to an individual’s discretion or people’s preferences. The authors briefly talks about the masculinity of realism, which still stresses on the core tenet of realism. Difference

The rise of feminism still seems to be a new development that is gradually being accepted in the African society. This is because the traditions in Africa and some other countries in the world defines the position and the rights of both genders which has gone for generations. Women had limited access to education and also limited or sometimes completely removed from decision making whether in the family or community. According to Shawn F. Dorious and Glenn Firebaugh in their article Trends in Global Gender Inequality pointed out that “the biggest success story for women involves tertiary education where, by the year 2000, women had eliminated the gap in post-secondary educational enrolments.” This was the case in Africa, where women were seen as simply responsible for taking care of the home while the men were to provide, especially financially hence, the community saw no relevance is educating the girl child. According to the UN sustainable development goals, 103 million youths lack literacy skills in the world and 60% of them are women. In terms of asset ownership, the male have 13% more asset wealth and 28% more landed property than the females, but isn’t the case in Senegal as women owns more in both categories. Professional students who are females or colored most times have to deal with what Carrie Yang term as “identity dissonance.”