done it better" (1997: xiii). Despite such evidence and the fact that even in the United States it is increasingly more commonplace to hear references to"men and women" in the armed forces and the gender neutral term"troops", there is still discomfort with-and even a desire to reject-the image and, indeed, the reality of women warriors. Still lingering and still powerful gendered divisions of violence account for this. Gendered Divisions of Violence at Work With modern state-making, gendered divisions became codified in par- ticular ways. Liberalism in political theory favored divisions of power whereas capitalism in eco- government-household, into public-private, nomic theory favored divisions of labor into paid-unpaid, productive reproductive, Interacting with these developments, modern state-making promoted particular divisions of violence. Masculinity involved not only heading the household and earning a"family wage" but also being pre- pared to defend"home and country." As Jean Bethke Elshtain notes, "War is the means to attain recognition pass in a sense, the definitive test of political the man become what he in some sense is meant to be by being absorbed in the larger stream of life: war and the state" (1992: 143), Femininity involved not only bearing and rearing children and maintaining the home front, but also serving. symbolically and Whereas men served their literally, as the object that required protection. country in combat as"life-takers, women served their country as moth ers, as"lifegivers" (Elshtain 1987), male-dominated societies have constructed n recent centuries, most elaborate sanctions and even taboos against women as warriors, especially against women bearing arms and initiating violence. As a result, men have worldwide, gained almost exclusive control over the means of destruction often in the name of protecting women(and children), who are either dis couraged from or not allowed to take up arms to to be warriors protecting others. It is therefore not surprising that war remains the centerpiece of IR-is seen as men's deadly business. We argue, however, that war has always involved women as well as the power as we already characteristics-typically, of gender to promote masculine interdependence, and conflict resnoted, at the expense of cooperation, olution(Grant 1994). Moreover, the identification of war with men peace with women completely unravels in the face of war practices over time in which civilians, not just combatants, have subject to a significant direct violence and even more to structural violence.