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Chair: Dr Amanda Chisholm, Senior Lecturer in Security Studies / Researcher in Gender and Security
Speaker: Dr. Anwar Mhajne, Assistant Professor of Political Science and Head Faculty Fellow for the Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity, and Social Justice at Stonehill College
Discussant: Dr. Alexis Henshaw, Assistant Professor at Troy University and author of Why Women Rebel: Understanding Women’s Participation in Armed Rebel Groups (Routledge, 2017)
Cyberwarfare is becoming one of the critical issues on the agenda of policymakers and military leaders worldwide. The potential humanitarian impact of cyber operations on the civilian population is enormous. Therefore, it is essential to talk about international humanitarian law (IHL) governing such operations because one of its main objectives is to protect the civilian population during armed conflict and living under occupation.
However, some feminist legal scholars have critiqued IHL for being inherently discriminatory for prioritizing men–specifically male combatants–and often either relegates women to the status of victims or accords them legitimacy only in their role as mothers (See Gardam and Jarvis 2001).
Dr. Mhajne argues that feminist scholars should extend their critique of the limitation of IHL to protecting data and guaranteeing civilians the right to data privacy in conflict settings. In examining the use of cyberspace in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Dr. Mhajne argue that there is a need to include data protection and safe civilian access to information technology under IHL protections. The lack of regulation is concerning due to the potential dangers that gross abuses of the rights to privacy and data protection may introduce in conflict zones.
About the speaker
Dr. Anwar Mhajne is an Assistant Professor of Political Science and the Head Faculty Fellow for the Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity, and Social Justice at Stonehill College. She also serve on the Academic Council of American Friends of Combatants for Peace.
Interested in feminist international relations and security studies, civil society and activism, Political Islam, Middle East, gender politics and social movements, she has been featured in numerous publications including the Journal of Women, Politics & Policy and The International Feminist Journal of Politics.
At Stonehill College, Dr. Mhajne teaches Global Security Studies, Political Science Research Methods, US Foreign Policy, Political Islam, Politics of the Middle East, Trror, State and Society, Cyber Security, Politics of "Fake News" and International Politics. She is a Co-chair of the Faculty of Color Association at Stonehill College and currently serves as a Member-at-Large on the executive committee of the Feminist Theory and Gender Studies Section (FTGS).
This event is part of the Feminist Theory and Gender Studies (FTGS) Global Voices Seminar Series.
At this event
Reader in Gender and Security