War’s Silver Lining?

  

We don’t wage wars expecting them to birth liberty or women’s rights. Wars are fought for power, territory, or survival, not to empower. Yet I’ve been struck by a puzzling pattern: war’s ruin can sometimes shift economic incentives, allowing women to gain additional economic freedom and legal rights. My initial essay highlighted how wars, especially those with foreign involvement, correlate with jumps in the Women, Business and the Law (WBL) index, reflecting legal reforms in women’s work and mobility. This Liberty Matters forum, with Jayme Lemke’s stark view of war’s destructiveness, Joshua Ammons’ focus on nonviolent change, and Abigail Hall’s exploration of war’s unseen costs, enriches this puzzle. While war embodies power and destruction, its upheaval can spark unintended openings for women’s progress, aligning with my colleagues’ insights in unexpected ways.

Engaging with Lemke: Destruction and Hierarchy vs. Disruptive PotentialJayme Lemke’s argument that war cannot liberate is compelling. War destroys and reinforces hierarchy. Her analogy to Bastiat's broken window fallacy is spot on. War's production is illusory, diverting resources from growth to death. I fully concur that combat trains for obedience, not equality, and that violence begets more violence, including against women. Post-war pushback, like U.S. policies favoring male veterans after WWII, shows how hierarchies reassert themselves, stunting women's gains.

Yet, my data suggests war's destruction can sometimes erode those hierarchies. In Saudi Arabia and the UAE, amid Yemen's internationalized conflict, WBL scores surged with reforms in women's work and mobility. These aren't born of enlightenment but necessity. War’s economic ruin, such as labor shortages and fiscal strain, makes excluding women too costly. Governments, needing taxes and labor, loosen restrictions on women out of economic necessity. This isn’t war’s intent, as Lemke stresses, but an accidental byproduct where chaos lowers the price of reform.

Unlike Lemke's view of war as purely reinforcing “power over,” I see potential for “power with” where women seize opportunities, fostering economic gains amid ruin. Still, without grassroots momentum, these shifts may fade, affirming Lemke's warning: true liberation demands peace.Parallels with Ammons: Bottom-Up Change in Violent ContextsJoshua Ammons' analysis of nonviolent revolutions advancing women's de facto property rights through social practices, not laws, mirrors my findings on war's bottom-up effects. His evidence that successful nonviolent revolutions boost women's civil liberties but not formal politics highlights how peaceful movements transform norms first. My missing men effect is similar. War’s demographic shock pushes women into new roles, blurring gender lines before legal codification. In Rwanda, post-genocide cooperatives preceded parliamentary gains; similarly, Ammons shows nonviolent change elevating women's agency organically.

But war isn't nonviolent, it's destructive. Ammons' point that peaceful movements create durable gains because they're inclusive contrasts with war's coercion. Yet, parallels emerge. Both disrupt status quo, empowering women through necessity. War's violence may reinforce hierarchies, as Lemke argues, but like Ammons' revolutions, it can incentivize de facto shifts that pressure de jure change. My correlations suggest external aid ties reforms to funding, but Ammons' de jure/de facto gap warns these may not stick without local ownership. Connecting to Hall: Unseen Costs and Hidden OpportunitiesAbigail Hall's exploration of war's unseen costs on women—sexual violence, economic burdens, displacement—fills crucial gaps in economic literature. Her call for public choice analyses of female combatants and institutional conditions that lead to Gender Based Sexual Violence (GBSV) align with Lemke’s view of war as hierarchy-reinforcing. Hall's questions about refugee gender composition and Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration (DDR) programs highlight how war destroys women's economic agency, aligning with my skepticism of lasting reforms without grassroots support.

Yet, Hall's unseen costs have counterparts in unseen opportunities. War's labor shortages, as Goldin (1991) shows, propel women into work, potentially challenging norms. My data suggests this nudges legal rights, but Hall's point on GBSV reminds us that the process of achieving these gains may come at a horrific cost. War's destruction creates voids women fill entrepreneurially, but as Hall warns, informal markets expose vulnerabilities. Public choice could unpack when war's incentives, like fiscal desperation, favor women's rights versus perpetuating violence. ConclusionWar is power and destruction, not liberty's architect—as Lemke, Ammons, and Hall illuminate. Lemke's hierarchy reinforcement, Ammons' peace preference, and Hall's unseen costs affirm war's harm. That’s the undeniable cost of war. But, as an economist, I must consider the full ledger: every action, including those advancing women's rights, involves trade-offs. Is there a benefit amid the devastating cost of war? Through disruption, can liberty emerge? Maybe economic necessities can erode economic barriers, bottom-up agency can reshape norms, and global scrutiny can pressure for legal change. 

True liberty springs from individual action amid uncertainty. This forum challenges us: how can we harness war’s disruptive potential for women’s rights while weighing the devastating trade-offs of its destruction?