Would World Affairs Be More Peaceful If Women Dominated Politics?

A recent addition to the study of international relations is the idea of gender and the difference it may have on political beliefs and actions. The argument is rooted in the concept that women are not as prone to violence and war as men, and therefore would lead the world in a more peaceful direction than it is currently going. To make this assumption, one would have to suppose that there are fundamental biological differences between men and women and that these differences result in behavioral variations as well. This is exactly what Francis Fukuyama does in his article "Women and the Evolution of World Politics" in the Taking Sides text. For the counter side of …show more content…

She used Stuart Breme's 1996 Militarized Interstate Dispute data set. In this data it was found that an average of both female and male leaders use of violence was at an equal level. This shows that these women in power are not more peaceful as some may have suspected. It is known that there are biological differences between men and women. But what some people say is that these biological differences lead to behavioral variations as well. But in fact no single gene has been found to determine social behavior (Ehrenreich, et. al.). So the claim that there is a disposition for women to act a certain way due to genetics is false. What is actually the case is a social tendency for women to be less prone to certain types of aggression. Humans are socialized into acting certain ways and portraying certain images. Women have traditionally been cultured into behaving passively and not displaying any forms of violence or aggression. As the world is changing and gender equality is on its way to becoming a truth, these social "norms" are also changing. Young girls are no longer being taught to conduct themselves in specified ways. Their freedom is growing and so is the range of of ways in which it is socially acceptable to act. Women are more and more displaying their
"masculinities" and being rewarded for it. Therefore, it could not be predicted that women leaders would divulge on a peaceful route to