In the wake of 9/11 and the subsequent struggles in Afghanistan
and Iraq, gender has become even more obviously important for
understanding contemporary world politics, including armed conflict and
war. Gender is an explicit structuring principle of contemporary conflicts
between Western powers and an Islamist fundamentalism energized by
opposition to the freedoms enjoyed by Western women and committed to the
imposition of a version of sharia that explicitly denies to women
rights equal to men's.
