The Evolution of Gender Roles in 20th-Century Wars

Abstract

The paper explores the changing role of gender in light of the 20 th century wars with particular attention on the role played by women in the military industry sector resistance and spy activities as well as politics.  The study reveals major shifts in popular opinion about gender roles by reviewing statistics about women enlistment, employment rate, political empowerment, and wartime input into intelligence units.  Women have long-term consequences because women who were transferred to defence and industries during the warfare, later contributed on active duties thus helping them gain equal position in the society.  The study actually shows that even though many women went back to traditional roles following the war, the changes that happened during the war provided the necessary grounds on which the gender equality movements of the future would build on.  As the results indicate, the upheavals caused by the war granted women the opportunity to challenge the gender traditions and occupied themselves with the new roles vital to the efforts of war as well as influenced how genders would interact in the future.  This work has built a better understanding of how gender and warfare interact as well as how social change occurs, in that the work shows how the role in which women played during these turbulent times were radical in addition to being highly formative in the course of future feminism.