Despite signifcant comparative inquiry into women’s participation in the politics of the ‘developing countries’ (Kenworthy and Malami 1999; Waylen 2005), from a variety of ideological standpoints (Paxton and Kunovich 2003), the issue of electoral violence and how it afects the exclusion of women in sub Saharan Africa, and Sierra Leone in particular, has not received the scholarly attention it deserves. In Sierra Leone, all elections (between 1951 and 2018) were characterized by campaign-related violence. In fact, the violence reported by election observers was mostly gender-based. Even election-related deaths had their gender dynamics: ‘why do men die more than women in electoral violence’, and ‘why are women (not men) raped whenever there is an election in Sierra Leone?’ This gendered dynamic, I argue, occurs irrespective of whether electoral outcomes reinstate or oust the incumbent. Unfortunately, the lives lost, and the shattered identities of the survivors of sexual and gender-based violence do not matter, are understood politically only in their performative functions of inducing political uncertainty. Gender-based societal anxieties have contributed more than any other factor to dissuading women from entering politics—the space for the legitimation of the violent hegemonic masculine tendencies of men. For this reason, the gendered nature of electoral violence has far-reaching consequences for women (politicians and electorate alike) and their country as a whole.
The analysis presented here is, therefore, the frst to focus specifcally on Sierra Leone. Sierra Leone ofers a case study within which the scholar can hold a number of gendered factors constant, given the linearity of the evolution of party politics and the gradualist approach the country adopted in the development of a political will to grant women voting rights. I argue that, the attendant efects of hegemonic masculinity on the making and unmaking of political autocracy were evident in the levels (the rise and fall) of women’s political participation, with the number of women contesting elections representing the level of political empowerment and the number of women in non-active support roles (i.e., women with party membership but excluded from the hustings) representing the political disempowerment of women (and, in tandem, the legitimation of the space where women were expected to perform their roles as the comfort women for politicians). I argue that the rise and fall in the level of people’s political participation within this elect oral space was determined, in part, by a series of masculine push and pull factors, including the pathological use of sexual violence before, during, and (depending on the outcomes) immediately after elections. Sexual violence is understood here to mean groping, rape, sexual assault, sexual harassment, and sexual coercion. While these forms are commonplace at all times, my understanding of electoral gender-based violence is time-specifc, with its main drivers being, inter alia: (1) the general levels of insecurity created by the political actors; (2) the deliberate decision of politicians (incumbents and opposition) to elevate sexual violence as a systematic electioneering strategy; and (3) the commitment of politicians to the wording of their political manifestos on, say, women’s empowerment and the criminalization of acts of sexual violence.
In the frst section, I explore the history of electoral politics in Sierra Leone. In the second section, relying on personal interviews with women politicians (from the 1950s to the present), I reveal a nexus between hegemonic masculinity and gender-based electoral violence. On the one hand, the contest between male politicians was a contest to sustain the parallel rogue economy of patronage and clientelism held together, in part, by what they (the males) made of the performative function of the sexuality of women. On the other hand, when males enter into a political contest against women, the former often resort to electoral violence to avoid electoral defeat and a public mockery. It was a societal expectation that men should maintain their dominance over women and electoral politics was one of the most prominent public spaces for men to demonstrate their hegemonic masculine tendencies. Political defeat at the hands of a female candidate was, therefore, the worst form of public humiliation. The fear of such humiliation helped bringing together male politicians from across the political divide into a united front against women. My extensive interviews with the women of these electoral eras confrm the existence of pre-election year societal readings into masculinity and femininity that increased the risk of gender-based electoral violence. I suggest that this fnding is due, in part, to the tendency of male politicians to mobilize their supporters around a series of Machiavellian discourses that the "quickest means to destroy a nation is to have women at the helm of national politics and security sector decision-making platforms" (Lahai 2016, 6; see also Sylvester 1994; Saccarelli 2009; Saxonhouse 2004).
In the fnal section, I develop a set of assumptions to explain the positionality of gender and sexuality in the history of electoral politics. These assumptions are then tested on a unique dataset developed for this study. With a timeline from 1951 to 2016, this dataset covers inter-and intra-party electoral violence, the number of women politicians, the verifable reported cases of at least one form of violence, and the political ideology of the dominant political party during the election year. These variables are discussed extensively in the data and data analysis section. A linear probability model (LPM) of a time-series statistical technique is used to examine the relationship between electoral violence and women’s political participation (see Table 5.1 below). The study fnds, frst, a strong evidence that the higher the level of electoral violence (including sexual violence), the lower the level of women’s active participation in politics (as contestants in presidential and parliamentary elections). Second, electoral tensions or conficts that target people on the basis of the political afliations and gender identity are threats to political participation for both parliamentary seats and presidential. However, conficts (of a civil war in character) is a challenge that ofers women the opportunities to join politics to emasculate the masculine structures of war. Third, the gender aware electoral support men provide to women increases women’s participation. Fourth, anti-discriminatory electoral laws also enhance women’s participation. Fifth, an increase in the participation of men in elections leads to a downward trend in women political participation. And, fnally, election rigging has a direct adversarial impact on the number of women in active politics. The discussion contributes not only to a small but resilient literature on the discourse of gender and (post)colonial electoral politics, but also to the way we understand the role of hegemonic masculinity in shaping political behavior toward the discourse of gender inequality in Sierra Leone.