Masculinities in Conflict: My Publications

 

Last Updated 27 February 2026

I have numerous requests for my writing and publications on masculinities, conflict and transition. 

So below I have compiled a list of published work to date:  

• Hamber, B., Schulz, P., Touquet, H. & Messmer, G. (2024). Transitional Justice and Masculinities. In P. Schulz, B. Hamber & H. Touquet (Eds), Masculinities and Queer Perspectives in Transitional Justice. Routledge: Abingdon, Oxon and New York, p. 29-50 [Download]
• Philipp Schulz, Brandon Hamber & Heleen Touquet (Eds) (2024). Masculinities and Queer Perspectives in Transitional Justice. Oxon & New York: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group [More Information | Read Online | Download Open Access]
• Schulz, P., Hamber, B., Touquet, H. & Messmer, G. (2024). Introduction: Masculinities and Queer Perspectives in Transitional Justice. In P. Schulz, B. Hamber & H. Touquet (Eds), Masculinities and Queer Perspectives in Transitional Justice. Routledge: Abingdon, Oxon and New York, p. 3-28 [Download]
• Hamber, B. & Murray, C. (2022). Voices from the Margins: Young men and post-conflict masculinities in Northern Ireland. Interpeace: Geneva [Download]
• Gallagher, E. & Hamber, B. (2015). Addressing the psychosocial needs of young men: The case of Northern Ireland. In: Psychosocial Perspectives on Peacebuilding. Springer: New York, pp. 90-149 [Information | Request Publication]
• Hamber, Brandon (2015). There Is a Crack in Everything: Problematising Masculinities, Peacebuilding and Transitional Justice. Human Rights Review, 17(1), pp. 9-34 [Access in the Journal]
• Hamber, Brandon and Gallagher, Elizabeth (2014). Ships passing in the night: psychosocial programming and macro peacebuilding strategies with young men in Northern Ireland. Intervention: Journal of Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Conflict Affected Areas, 12(1), 43-60 [Download]
• Hamber, B. (2010). Masculinity and Transitional Justice: An Exploratory Essay (Politorbis). Politorbis, 50(3): 143-154 [Download]
• Hamber, B. (2010). Masculinity and Transition: Crisis or Confusion in South Africa?. Journal of Peacebuilding and Development, 5(3), 75-88 [Access in the Journal]
• Hamber, B. & Palmary, I. (2009). Gender, Memorialization, and Symbolic Reparations. In R. Rubio-Marin (Ed.), The Gender of Reparations: Unsettling Sexual Hierarchies While Redressing Human Rights Violations (pp. 324-381). New York: Cambridge University Press [Request Publication]
• Hamber, B. (2007). Masculinity and Transitional Justice: An Exploratory Essay (Peace Prints). Peace Prints: South Asian Journal of Transitional Justice, 3(1), Autumn [Download]
• Hamber, B. (2007). Masculinity and Transitional Justice: An Exploratory Essay (IJTJ). International Journal of Transitional Justice, 1(3), 375-390 [Access in the Journal]
• Hamber, B. (2006). Where are the men in the battle for equality?. Polity and Engineering News, 20 October 2006 [Substack | Medium | Blog]
• Hamber, B. (2006). "We must be very careful how we emancipate our women": shifting masculinities in post-apartheid South Africa. Paper presented at the Re-Imagining Women's Security: a Comparative Study of South Africa, Northern Ireland and Lebanon Round Table, New York, 12-13 October 2006 [Download]
• Hamber, B., Hillyard, P., Maguire, A., McWilliams, M., Robinson, G., Russell, D., et al. (2006). Discourses in Transition: Re-Imagining Women's Security. International Relations, 20(4), 487-502 [Access in the Journal]

If you cannot access any of the above publications, please send me a request and I will email it to you.

Gender, Masculinities and Peacebuilding: Joint Book Launch

On 19 June 2025, we gathered at Ulster University for the joint book launch of two groundbreaking volumes: The Routledge Handbook of Masculinities, Conflict, and Peacebuilding and Masculinities and Queer Perspectives in Transitional Justice.

This event celebrated the culmination of years of research exploring how gender, particularly masculinities and queer identities, influences contexts of violence and peacebuilding. The launch highlighted the relevance of these themes in today’s political landscape.

Belfast, with its rich history and vibrant academic community, provided the perfect backdrop for this celebration. Attendees joined several authors for an engaging interactive discussion about the books' implications for current debates and the path forward.

The Routledge Handbook of Masculinities, Conflict, and Peacebuilding (Edited By Henri Myrttinen, Chloé Lewis, Heleen Touquet, Philipp Schulz, Farooq Yousaf, Elizabeth Laruni). This comprehensive handbook challenges conventional views on men and masculinities in conflict and peacebuilding. It offers a multi-dimensional exploration of gender dynamics, combining feminist, intersectional, and queer perspectives to illuminate the complexities of men’s roles in these processes.

Masculinities and Queer Perspectives in Transitional Justice (Edited By Philipp Schulz, Brandon Hamber and Heleen Touquet). This volume investigates the intersections of masculinities and queer theories, enhancing our understanding of violence, justice, and post-conflict transitions. It aims to foster more inclusive approaches to gender in addressing violent pasts.

Editors Philipp Schulz, Brandon Hamber and Heleen Touquet

The event was co-hosted by the Transitional Justice Institute and INCORE at Ulster University, marking a significant moment in advancing conversations around gender and peacebuilding. Thank you to everyone who attended and contributed to the enriching discussions!

Voices from the Margins: Young men and post-conflict masculinities in Northern Ireland

Brandon Hamber and Conor Murray have published "Voices from the Margins: Young men and post-conflict masculinities in Northern Ireland".

The report points to the gap (noted in the YPS Progress Study’s recommendations) on masculinity and masculine identities as part of the gendered approach to implementing the YPS agenda. This policy brief focuses attention on supporting the development of alternative and positive masculine identities. While the paper draws on lived experiences in Northern Ireland, it derives lessons and recommendations, captures stories, and offers a narrative with wider relevance for other contexts.

This is a report commissioned by Interpeace for their Outside the Box: Amplifying youth voices and views on Youth, Peace and Security (YPS) policy and practice series. 

Download the Report

Watch a Video Summary of the Report

Militarised Masculinities and Sustaining Peace

As part of the Geneva Peace Week (2-6 November 2020), I took part in a podcast discussion entitled "Militarised Masculinities and Sustaining Peace: Lessons from the Ground”. The podcast by Impunity Watch and the Master programme in Transitional Justice of the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights provides space for an in-depth debate around this neglected topic. I argue for a more systemic understanding of masculinity and conflict that moves beyond individual acts of masculinised violence, to understanding how systems create militarised masculinity from the role of the military in society to the entertainment industry.  I share the platform with human rights activist Brisna Caxaj from Guatemala, who talks about her experience of militarised masculinity in her context.

Listen Now

Masculinities: Women, Peace and Security Online Seminar

The Women, Peace and Security (WPS)  agenda, as defined by the UN Security Council, has latterly addressed itself more directly to the question of 'engaging men and boys'. On 3 April 2020 I gave a seminar on these developments and its significance for debates on masculinity, as well as WPS more broadly. The seminar is now available online.

Listen to Seminar

This event is part of the WPS@20 seminar series hosted by the Ulster University Transitional Justice Institute to mark the upcoming 20th anniversary of the adoption of Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security by the United Nations Security Council.

Reflecting on Masculinities Through the Eye of the Needle

The Textile Language of Conflicts Exhibition launched today (6 November 2017) at the Magee Campus, Ulster University. The exhibition was curated by Roberta Bacic and organised by Professor Robinson. I gave the keynote address at the opening entitled "Reflecting on Masculinities Through the Eye of the Needle". The talk can be listened to below.

Women, Peace and Security Oversight Group

Yesterday I was lucky enough to attended a meeting of the Women, Peace and Security Oversight Group in Dublin discussing Ireland's National Action Plan. I spoke on issues of masculinity and inclusion in women, peace and security agenda. The Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Simon Conveney, attended for some of the time [Photos from Irish Foreign Ministry Twitter] #wpsireland

Engendering Transitional Justice: Silence, Absence & Repair

This special issue of Human Rights Review edited by Olivera Simic grew out of a two-day symposium held in Coolangatta, Australia, in November 2014, organised by the Socio-Legal Centre, Griffith Law School, Griffith University, Australia. As Simic writes "The symposium brought together experts concerned with transitional justice studies to consider new ways in which gender needs be rethought and perhaps reinterpreted, in the context of societies that deal with massive human rights abuse. The symposium was an intense and close engagement, where scholars from the fields of human rights, transitional justice, anthropology, psychology, and peace and conflict studies presented their work and received constructive feedback from their colleagues. Five papers that were part of the symposium proceedings are featured in this special issue, covering a broad spectrum of interrelated topics, and highlighting debates in the field of transitional justice that are often overlooked and underdeveloped in the literature. In accordance with the theme of the symposium, the articles in this special issue are unified by the topic of ‘Engendering Transitional Justice’ and the crosscutting themes of ‘Silence, Absence and Repair’".

• Editor Note: Engendering Transitional Justice: Silence, Absence and Repair (Olivera Simic)
• There Is a Crack in Everything: Problematising Masculinities, Peacebuilding and Transitional Justice (Brandon Hamber)
• Gendered Narratives: Stories and Silences in Transitional Justice (Elisabeth Porter)
• After the Truth Commission: Gender and Citizenship in Timor-Leste (Lia Kent)
• Engendering Transitional Justice: a Transformative Approach to Building Peace and Attaining Human Rights for Women (Wendy Lambourne, Vivianna Rodriguez Carreon)
• Feminist Research in Transitional Justice Studies: Navigating Silences and Disruptions in the Field (Olivera Simic)

Download or view the Special Issue

Masculinites, Violence & Post Conflict

Prof Brandon Hamber gives the closing remarks at the postgraduate conference on Masculinities, Violence and Post Conflict, 14 January 2016, Ulster University. The conference was organised by PhD students in TJI, INCORE and IRISS, and supported by International Alert, Conciliation Resources, Saferworld, and the Political Settlements Research Programme.

Problematising Masculinities, Peacebuilding and Transitional Justice

My latest piece on masculinity:Hamber, Brandon (2015). There Is a Crack in Everything: Problematising Masculinities, Peacebuilding and Transitional Justice. Human Rights Review, 1-26.

The study of masculinity, particularly in peacebuilding and transitional justice contexts, is gradually emerging. The article outlines three fissures evident in the embryonic scholarship, that is the privileging of direct violence and its limited focus, the continuities and discontinuities in militarised violence into peace time, and the tensions between new (less violent) masculinities and wider inclusive social change. The article argues for the importance of making visible the tensions between different masculinities and how masculinities are deeply entangled with systems of power and post-conflict social, political and economic outcomes. An analysis of masculine power within and between the structures aimed at building the peace in societies moving out of violence is considered essential. The article argues for an analysis that moves beyond a preoccupation with preventing violent masculinities from manifesting through the actions of individuals to considering how hidden masculine cultures operate within a variety of hierarchies and social spaces.

Click here for more details.

Conference: Masculinities, Violence and Post-Conflict

Call for Papers

Postgraduate Conference: Masculinities, Violence and (Post-)Conflict

Date: Thursday, 14 January 2016, 09:00 – 17:00

Venue: Ulster University, York St. Campus (Belfast, Northern Ireland)

The Transitional Justice Institute (TJI) and the International Conflict Research Institute (INCORE) at Ulster University invite proposals for a one-day postgraduate conference on “Masculinities, Violence and (Post-)Conflict” on Thursday, 14 January 2016. This student-led event will offer academic presentations, peer discussion, networking opportunities and expert feedback in a supportive environment. The conference will be followed by an international high-level workshop on Masculinities and Violence on Friday, 15 January 2016, organized by International Alert, Saferworld and Conciliation Resources (CR), providing a forum for both practitioners and international academics to engage on the topic.

The conference will bring together postgraduate students working on the interface between social constructions of masculinities as well as violence and (post-)conflict. Specifically, the conference will focus on the relationship between these areas, assessing how socially constructed notions of masculinities - in their varying forms, including hegemonic and subordinate conceptions - theoretically and conceptually can, and empirically do (or do not), fuel violence or impact the advancement of women's rights. At the same time, we aim to explore how situations of violence and victimisation influence and (re-)shape notions and dynamics of masculinities (both combatant and civilian identities), in itself and in relation to femininities and gender-hierarchies. The conference will therefore move beyond simplified conceptualisations of gender identities and critically explore the largely ambivalent role of masculinities. We thus aim to approach masculinities as both potentially contributing to violence and at the same time as potentially (and factually) vulnerable. Questions to be explored thus include, but are not limited to:

How, conceptually and empirically, can masculinities be linked to violence, including sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) and violence against women (VAW)?

Conceptually and empirically, what are the relationships between masculinities and femininities, gender equality as well as women's rights within (post-) conflict contexts?

How do situations of violence and (post-)conflict shape masculinities, and how are masculinities (re-)shaped and influenced during conflict and post-conflict lived realities?

How and to what extent do post-conflict peace-building and transitional justice processes consider and address masculinities?

We invite paper proposals from postgraduate students across various disciplines that utilize a gendered lens while exploring the dynamics of, and/or relationships between masculinities, violence and (post-)conflict either conceptually or empirically in different geographical contexts and across time. In-depth case study analyses alongside theoretical explorations and empirically-grounded papers, including feminist theoretical and methodological approaches, are welcome. Speakers and discussants at the conference include, inter alia, Prof. Fionnuala Ni Aolain, Prof. Brandon Hamber (both Ulster University) and Dr. Henri Myrttinen (International Alert).

If you would like to propose a paper, please submit an abstract of max. 250 words and a short one-paragraph academic bio by 15 November 2015 to Philipp Schulz (Schulz-P@email.ulster.ac.uk) and Seamus Campbell (Campbell-S25@email.ulster.ac.uk).

Papers will be grouped thematically and distributed among three main panels. Each panel will have a designated commentator, an established academic or other expert in the field. Commentators will offer expert feedback as well as complement and stimulate peer-discussion. We are seeking the possibility of a publication of contributions (from conference and workshop), for which selected postgraduate papers might also be considered.

Participation and attendance at the conference are free of charge and participants are invited to attend the workshop on the following day. We regret that we are unable to offer travel bursaries or other assistance with costs. 

Masculinity and Transitional Justice

The latest copy of the International Journal of Transitional Justice is just out and it focuses on gender and transitional justice. The issue was guest edited by Judge Navanethem Pillay of the International Criminal Court and former President of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. I have an essay published in the journal entitled: 'Masculinity and Transitional Justice: An exploratory essay". If you would like a copy of the article send me an email, or the Table of Contents of the journal to get see all the articles in it.

Where are the men in the battle for equality?

In the song There is a War, by Leonard Cohen, there are the lines: “There is a war...between the man and the woman. There is a war between the ones who say there is a war and the ones who say there isn’t.” These words capture the essence of research colleagues and I carried out over the last two years on gender and security in a number of countries in transition. As part of the study, we looked at whether the security of women has increased or decreased since 1994 in South Africa. Security includes, according to the United Nations, not only freedom from fear, but also freedom from need or want. So security is tied up with economic and social security, not just protecting yourself from physical harm.

If we think about the security of women in this broad sense, South Africa has made advances with greater representation of women in government and business. Disturbingly, however, our research found that many men think that women have advanced disproportionately. These men argue that the so-called war between men and women Cohen speaks of was over years ago. Some think the victors (women) are now taking their revenge on men and excluding them, making men the new victims. But statistical evidence shows this view is desperately mistaken. It is true that 30% of parliamentarians are now women, positioning South Africa eighth in the world in terms of gender equality in government. This means the country jumped 133 places in world rankings from 1994. A greater number of women are also now moving into managerial positions. But the changes are still miles off 50:50 representation. In the business field, for example, 80% of senior management positions are held by men.

So the war is hardly over and inequality exists on a massive scale. But where does this leave the men in our society who feel they are the victims of the transition? On one level, we have to take their views seriously and listen to what they have to say because some men may have lost their jobs since 1994. But, on the other level, we cannot back away from an agenda that wants equal representation of women. Surely, if we want South Africa to be everything it can be, we must harness the potential of all citizens, regardless of gender or race for that matter.

But furthering this agenda can have devastating consequences. Many of the women and some of the men we interviewed believe that the frustration some men are feeling at being challenged by women in the workplace, or being usurped as the breadwinner in a home, is causing them to act violently towards women. This goes some way towards explaining the high levels of domestic violence in South Africa. At least 50% of women report experiencing domestic violence, whether psychological, physical or financial. This is sickeningly high.

Feeling frustrated or challenged by social developments cannot justify violence. This means that, although we must seek to understand the challenges some men are feeling and address their economic hardships too, we cannot pander to violence as a justifiable reaction to the advancement of one sector of society.

So the war between men and women rages, but the time has come for new alliances. Men need to stand up and be counted. This means not only speaking out about violence against women, but also addressing some of the root causes of it. Inequality is one of these. It is not enough, my fellow brothers, to be horrified at domestic violence or shake your head knowingly next time some awful statistics hit the headline. We have to begin to actively promote gender equality. So let us stop pretending it is someone else’s problem and be man enough to bring this war to an end.

This article by Brandon Hamber was published on Polity and in the Engineering News on 20 October 2006 as part of the column "Look South". Copyright Brandon Hamber.