This book provides a critically informed and interdisciplinary global examination of the instrumental role of women as resistance actors, both historically and today.

Attention is given to the long and global histories that reveal systemic and structural oppression suffered by women, while highlighting that they have been, and continue to be, an important force for organizing for social change. Whether through the employment of formal or informal strategies of resistance, such as acts of dissent, activism, pacifism, and collective action, this book recognizes and highlights that women have repeatedly stood in the face of social, political, and cultural violence in ways that have gone unrecognized. Drawing heavily from existing feminist thought, especially those feminist voices that exist on the disciplinary margins, case studies are used to examine women’s strategic resistance acts.

Cases include women’s resistance to the Taliban in Afghanistan, Chile’s un violador en tu camino (a rapist in your path), the censoring of feminist activism in China, Korea’s 4B movement, Pussy Riot in Russia, Turkey’s International Women’s Day, the Women’s Social and Political Union in the United Kingdom, and the #MeToo movement, #SolidarityIsForWhiteWomen, as well as the freedom songs of the Civil Rights era from the United States. Careful consideration is given to the role of the oppressive patriarchal state, recognizing that many resistance actors and movements operate within a global order that enforces colonial carceral policies and prioritizes hetero-patriarchal Western ideals. The book includes chapters on the broad history of women’s resistance movements, strategies of nonviolent and violent resistance, state and feminist backlash, the dominance of white feminism in resistance, development, and philanthropic spaces, media both traditional and digital, and artivism.

This is essential reading for scholars and students of criminology, victimology, feminist and gender studies, sociology, and international relations studies, who are interested in the oft neglected role of women’s resistance.