Doctoral Dissertation Research: Collective Rape: A Cross-National Study of Political Sexual Violence

国家工作人员或政治行为者对平民进行系统和广泛的性侵犯是一个具有国际重要性的问题，但却很少受到学术界的关注。在这个项目中，我将对集体强奸事件进行跨国时间序列分析，集体强奸被定义为国家、政治团体和/或政治化种族群体的代理人对平民实施的性暴力模式。该项目主要关注两个主要研究问题：1)性别不平等、世界文化、军事实力、经济发展、国家实力、种族分裂和政治暴力等因素如何影响集体强奸的发生？2)这些相同的因素如何影响集体强奸的强度？为了解决这些问题，我将从1980年至2003年间发生的集体强奸事件的媒体数据中构建一个原始数据集。该数据集将包括两项关于集体强奸的定量措施，即开始和强度（即受害者的估计人数），以及关于受害者、肇事者和社区特征的若干定性措施。这些数据将来自三个主要的新闻来源：《纽约时报》、《世界新闻文摘》和《路透社商业简报》，并将通过两名学生助理的工作获得。这些本科生助理将接受训练，以电子方式搜索《纽约时报》和《世界新闻文摘》，识别1980-2003年间的相关事件，并将与这些集体袭击有关的数据编码为几个变量。《路透社商业简报》的数据将在虚拟研究协会的协助下获得。虚拟研究协会是一家私营咨询公司，可以访问路透社的档案（1983-2003）。然后，我将使用汇集的横截面时间序列分析和离散时间事件历史分析来测试上述假设的关系。由此产生的知识将对性别、暴力、和平与冲突以及国际关系的社会学研究作出重大贡献。此外，这个项目将产生四个更广泛的影响：第一，它将首次进行跨国尝试，以适合于比较分析的方式估计世界范围内集体强奸的发生率和强度。论文完成后，该数据集将提供给其他科学家使用。我们在许多其他相关主题（如内战、政治暴力、性别/政治灭绝）上有广泛的跨国数据，但在集体强奸方面没有。这些数据的可用性将鼓励其他人使用比较方法来研究这个问题。其次，通过本项目获得的知识将通过文章和专业会议在整个科学界传播，例如2004年美国社会学协会年会。第三，该项目将培养两名本科生，他们将参与新闻故事的编码和数据的构建。这种“课堂之外”的体验对于理解社会科学研究的内容至关重要。最后，这项研究具有现实意义。决策者和一般公众对造成集体强奸和有关侵犯人权行为的过程很感兴趣。该项目将评估关于这些可怕事件发生原因的各种流行理论，并为关注预防和缓解的相关公众提供见解。

The systematic and widespread sexual assault of civilians by state agents or political actors is a matter of international importance but has received little scholarly attention. In this project, I will conduct a cross-national time-series analysis of incidents of collective rape, defined as a pattern of sexual violence perpetrated on civilians by agents of a state, political group and/or politicized ethnic group. The project focuses two primary research questions: 1) How do factors such as gender inequality, world culture, military strength, economic development, state strength, ethnic cleavages and political violence affect the onset of collective rape? 2) How do these same factors affect the intensity of collective rape? In order to address these questions, I will construct an original dataset from media-based data of collective rape incidents occurring between 1980 and 2003. The dataset will include two quantitative measures of collective rape, onset and intensity (i.e., the estimated number of victims), as well as several qualitative measures of the victim, perpetrator and community characteristics. The data will derive from three major news sources: The New York Times, Facts on File World News Digest and Reuters Business Briefs, and will be acquired through the work of two student assistants. These undergraduate assistants will be trained to electronically search The New York Times and Facts on File World News Digest, identify relevant incidents in the years 1980-2003, and code the data in several variables bearing on these collective assaults. Data from Reuters Business Briefs will be procured with the assistance of Virtual Research Associates, a private consulting firm that has access to the Reuters archive (1983-2003). I will then test the hypothesized relationships described above using pooled cross-sectional time-series analysis and discrete-time event history analysis. The resulting knowledge will contribute significantly to the sociological studies of gender, violence, peace and conflict and international relations. In addition, this project will have four broader impacts: First, it will produce the first cross-national attempt to estimate incidence and intensity of collective rape on a worldwide basis in a manner suitable for comparative analysis. Following the completion of the dissertation, this dataset will be made available to other scientists. We have extensive cross-national data on many other related topics (e.g. internal war, political violence, geno/politicide) but not on collective rape. The availability of this data will encourage others to use comparative methods to study this issue. Second, the knowledge gained through this project will be disseminated throughout the scientific community through articles and professional conferences, such as the 2004 American Sociological Association Annual Meeting. Third, the project will train two undergraduate students who will be involved in coding the news stories and constructing the data. This type of "beyond the classroom" experience is critical to providing an understanding of what is involved in social science research. Finally, the research has real-world implications. Policy makers and the general public are interested in the processes that create collective rape and related human rights abuses. This project will evaluate various popular theories about why these horrific incidents occur and provide insights for the relevant public concerned about prevention and mitigation.