| Summary/Abstract |
Pioneering feminist International Relations scholarship suggests that in order to function, militaries rely on spouses, most often wives, to undertake the majority of domestic labour, suspend their own careers, and relocate willingly for new postings. However, the contemporary military family’s relationship to war making may be different because family forms are changing: norms around domestic responsibilities and primary earners suggest greater gender equality, and women are contributing to war making as soldiers. Thus, this paper asks whether the military’s reliance on the traditional family, and conventional gender relations, is being reinforced or destabilized by policies and programs that speak to Canadian military families. A critical feminist policy analysis of select policy and program documents, which address unique and characteristics of military life (mobility and separation) is undertaken. While there is discursive acknowledgment of the changing composition of military families, traditional familial and gendered assumptions persist in subtle ways.
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