Can Female Participation in Political Violence Lead To

CREST SECURITY REVIEW SUMMER 2017 KATHARINA KARCHER DRINGEND GESUCHTE TERRORISTEN Im Zusammenhang mit dem CAN FEMALE PARTICIPATION IN dreifachen Mord an Generalbundesanwalt Buback und zwei seiner Begleiter am 7.4.1977 in Karlsruhe POLITICAL VIOLENCE LEAD TO Mond an Jürgen Ponto am 30.7.1977 in Oberursel vierfachen Mond und der Entfürung von Hanns-Martin Schleyer am 5.9.1977 in Köln SOCIAL PROGRESS? What role can women play in terrorist groups, how might that be reported and can it help pave the way for women in other spheres of society? Dr Katharina Karcher, from the University of Cambridge, addresses these questions based on her research on the Red Army Faction. On 30 July 1977, Susanne Albrecht paid femininity as camouflage: individuals or every regard, women in the RAF distanced a visit to the villa of the German banker groups made effective use of feminine themselves from feminism. Other women Jürgen Ponto, a good friend of her father’s. accessories (e.g., dresses, make up, hand in the militant left in West Germany, by According to witnesses, the young woman, bags, etc.) and stereotypes (e.g., passivity, contrast, identified with the aims and accompanied by a ‘decently dressed’ couple, submissiveness, peacefulness) to prepare or ethics of the women’s movement. The brought Ponto a bunch of wild roses. carry out violent attacks. While the murder Red Zora, for example, was a self-declared When he opened the door to welcome the of Jürgen Ponto brought this tactic to the women’s guerrilla group with an explicitly visitors, they threatened him with guns media’s attention in Germany, the attack feminist agenda that formed in the mid- and tried to abduct him. Ponto resisted, was of course neither the first nor the last 1970s and carried out dozens of arson and was shot by the intruders. Two weeks use of femininity as camouflage in the attacks and bombings, most of which took after the attack, the left-wing terrorist history of terrorism. It is possible to trace place in the 1980s. group Red Army Faction (RAF), also known this tactic back to the Russian Anarchists’ The RAF and the Red Zora carried out as the Baader-Meinhof gang, claimed ‘propaganda of the deed’ in the late 19th their last attacks in the early 1990s. responsibility for the killing. century, and it has been used in a range of By then, the political landscape and political and cultural contexts including The violent conflict between the RAF and the gender dynamics in Germany had the Algerian Civil War and suicide attacks the West German State, which had started changed significantly: although still by the Islamist extremist group Boko with an armed raid in 1970, reached a greatly outnumbered by men, women Haram in Nigeria. dramatic peak in 1977. Jürgen Ponto was were represented in leading positions in the fourth of ten RAF victims that year, Although the suggestion that every citizen education, politics and industry. Recent and newspaper and other public responses should fear death in the shape of a young years have seen further steps towards to the Ponto murder show that it was girl was clearly exaggerated, research gender equality. In 2001, the first 244 not the brutality of this and other attacks has shown that almost half of the RAF female soldiers joined the Federal Armed alone that made the RAF Germany’s most members and almost all of the group’s Forces, and today there are more than notorious terrorist group. In 1977, women leading ideologists were women. The 20,000 women in the army. In 2005, clearly outnumbered men on the RAF best known examples are Ulrike Meinhof Angela Merkel became the first female wanted posters (see image), and their active (1934-1976), Gudrun Ensslin (1940-1977), Chancellor, and has remained in power participation in attacks was perceived as and Brigitte Mohnhaupt (1949-present). since. These developments raise an a violent transgression of and threat to This is striking, because there were hardly important question: have women in the the prevailing gender norms. An article any women in leading positions in West RAF and other terrorist organisations published shortly after the Ponto killing Germany at that point. helped to pave the way for women in other illustrates this point. Here, the (male) spheres of society? Like their male counterparts, women have war Germany. Others have disagreed, comparative level – my research shows Dr Katharina Karcher is a Research Fellow author asked polemically: ‘must every historically participated in armed political Recent studies have come to different acknowledging that the RAF put into that female political violence can, but in the Faculty of Modern and Medieval citizen worry they might encounter violent struggles for a range of reasons, and they conclusions regarding this question. practise a kind of subconscious feminism does not necessarily, have a feminist Languages at the University of Cambridge. death in the shape of a young girl?’ have identified with different theoretical Some have argued that female political but that this violent activism jeopardised background or agenda, and it is certainly The RAF has been associated with a and ideological positions. Whilst wanting violence has exposed and challenged feminist aims. While more studies on no guarantee for a gender revolution. tactic that I have described as the use of to be equal to their male comrades in the repressive gender regime in post- this subject are needed – especially on a 26 27.

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