NCJ Number
155424
Journal
Journal of Forensic Psychiatry Volume: 5 Issue: 3 Dated: (December 1994) Pages: 583-597
Date Published
1994
Length
15 pages
Annotation
This discussion of rape committed during wars emphasizes the rape and sexual abuse of women in Bosnia-Herzegovina and concludes that the way that rape is normalized in war challenges the usual assumptions and psychiatric classifications regarding rapists, which attribute causality to individual deviance rather than regarding it as a manifestation of a wider social malaise.
Abstract
The author investigated allegations of the systematic rape and sexual abuse of Muslim women and children in the former Yugoslavia between December 1992 and 1993. The analysis concluded that the rape of women was part of a recognizable pattern perpetrated with the intention of demoralizing and terrorizing communities, driving them from their homes, and demonstrating the power of the invading forces. Thus, the systematic rape of women within the conflict could not be regarded as incidental to aggression; instead, it served a strategic purpose within itself. However, rape is a longstanding weapon of war and is not unique to the Bosnian conflict. Rape in war is often perpetrated by men in groups; the perpetrators know that they will receive no punishment or retribution. The case of a 21-year-old Serb named Borislav Herak supports these points. The analysis concludes that except for a relatively few cases, rape should be conceptualized as an extreme but normal aspect of behavior rather than as deviant and abnormal. Rape is more likely to occur in cultures that are rape-supportive and where it is possible and even acceptable to acknowledge and express hostility towards women. 73 references