War on two fronts: Gender regimes and the ethnonationalist state in Myanmar and Sri Lanka

Abstract

Critical scholars have long noted gender ideologies, gender symbolism, and gendered discourses in nationalist and ethnonationalist politics. Building on these insights and employing a historical materialist framework, the article explores the effects of the ethnonationalist state on gender. Specifically, it asks what impact does the ethnonationalist state form have on gender power relations? The article argues that ethnonationalist states’ central logic lies in the reproduction of racialized social forces and, as a result, it strategically buttresses and depletes social forces through the weaponization of social reproduction. Because ethnonationalist states aim to undermine social reproduction of subordinated ethnic groups, this manifests in intense violence directed at women. The article demonstrates this argument using data generated from qualitative time-use studies conducted in Myanmar and Sri Lanka—two ethnonationalist states characterized by violent ethnic cleavages, comparable variations in conflict geographies, and the political mobilization of Buddhism. It connects gender-based violence across the home-front and the warfront, revealing patriarchal violence as crucial to the project of war. In conclusion, the article suggests that academics and practitioners seeking to understand and contend with the ethnonationalist state would benefit from a clear-eyed assessment of one of its central logics: the reproduction of the racialized gender order.