Papers by Rita Santos
Brazil’s engagement in United Nations (UN)-mandated peacekeeping operations dates from 1956. Sinc... more Brazil’s engagement in United Nations (UN)-mandated peacekeeping operations dates from 1956. Since then the country has participated in 46 of 65 UN peacekeeping operations, deploying 11,669 personnel in total. Yet until 2004-05, with the UN’s peacekeeping mission in Haiti, Brazilian contributions to such operations were mainly symbolic, military based and concentrated in Portuguese-speaking countries. Recent changes in the size, type and geographical distribution of Brazil’s participation in peace operations echo the reorientation of the country’s foreign policy in its search for a more globalised political influence, especially under Lula da Silva’s presidency. In particular, peacekeeping under UN aegis has enabled Brazil to showcase its perceived added value in terms of its expertise on stabilisation, track record on development and conflict mediation, and advocacy for the Global South. Aspiring to become a world power, Brazil has assumed a role in peace and security that is more ...
DiGeSt - Journal of Diversity and Gender Studies
This article aims to discuss the intersections of the anti-feminist and anti-immigration agendas ... more This article aims to discuss the intersections of the anti-feminist and anti-immigration agendas in the Portuguese far-right through critical discourse analysis of the PNR and Chega’s positions. These political actors convey nationalist, racist and anti-multiculturalist messages at the same time that they show their hostility towards gender equality policies, using racial, cisgender and heteronormative categories as criteria to define whose citizens are worthy of defense/protection. Recently, they have also co-opted gender equality agendas to justify anti-immigration positions, specifically opposing the hosting of refugees, depicted as a potential threat to the imagined Portuguese and European white and Christian community. The latter representation, apparently disruptive of their own conservative ideology based on protecting the traditional family/nation, is thus re-oriented in order to simultaneously attack “gender ideology”. The article shows how the mobilization of gendered and ...
DIGeST. Journal of Diversity and Gender Studies, 2021
This article argues that far right antifeminist and gendered narratives are not separate from the... more This article argues that far right antifeminist and gendered narratives are not separate from their ethnonationalist/racist purposes; in fact, they are at their core and cannot be analyzed independently. It reflects on the intersections of antifeminist and anti-immigration agendas in the Portuguese far right by critically analyzing PNR/Ergue-te's and Chega's discursive positions on immigration, feminism, and gender equality, and initiates a theoretical dialogue between feminist postcolonial peace and security studies and populist far-right studies. This shows how these political actors convey ethnonationalist, racist and anti-multiculturalist messages by co-opting women's rights agendas (femonationalism), whilst resisting and opposing feminism. Femonationalism, ostensibly disruptive of their own conservative ideology, is thus reoriented to attack feminismaccused of failing the goal of serving all women and of being co-opted by 'gender ideology'. It concludes that the mobilization of gendered and racialized tropes serves the construction of Europe and Portugal as being at risk from 'external' forces, re-inscribing securitarian discourses in the political sphere.
From the European South. A transdisciplinary journal of Postcolonial Humanities , 2021
This article deals with discourses about the Covid-19 pandemic in the Portuguese media from 2020-... more This article deals with discourses about the Covid-19 pandemic in the Portuguese media from 2020-2021. Through thematic qualitative content analysis, we explore how migrants, refugees/asylum seekers and Afro-descendants-that is, racialised people who are often read as non-Portuguese-have been portrayed by the media, and the idea of 'non-Portugueseness', constructed in relation to this phenomenon. The pandemic is an interesting context in which to analyse discourses reproducing the us/them divide, but also the 'us', given the heightened role security imaginaries have played in framing and reacting upon the pandemic. In this analysis, we examine (de)securitisation moves present in the Portuguese media when representing refugees/asylum seekers, immigrants and Afro-descendants, focussing on three main tropes: securitising said groups, explaining and deconstructing securitisation of these people, and shedding light on the threats and vulnerabilities faced by them.
Contexto Internacional
This article focuses on media representations of ‘the South in the North’ crosscutting the Europe... more This article focuses on media representations of ‘the South in the North’ crosscutting the European mediascape in 2015 and the beginning of 2016. Assuming that both identities and perceptions of in/security are socially constructed, particularly by means of discourse, that security is gendered and gender constructions are in turn built on dynamics of in/security, and that gendered power relations and representations are always entangled with other structures of inequality and domination such as racism, this article argues that gendered categories of othering in the media’s representations have been critical to produce and justify 1) hegemonic narratives of securitisation that aim to protect an imagined European identity and 2) counter-narratives denouncing the racial and cultural discrimination tied to the ‘North’s’ hegemonic representations of refugees. Theoretically, the article proposes a dialogue among critical, feminist, and postcolonial peace and security studies. Methodologic...
Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais
Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais, 2010
Aviso O conteúdo deste website está sujeito à legislação francesa sobre a propriedade intelectual... more Aviso O conteúdo deste website está sujeito à legislação francesa sobre a propriedade intelectual e é propriedade exclusiva do editor. Os trabalhos disponibilizados neste website podem ser consultados e reproduzidos em papel ou suporte digital desde que a sua utilização seja estritamente pessoal ou para fins científicos ou pedagógicos, excluindo-se qualquer exploração comercial. A reprodução deverá mencionar obrigatoriamente o editor, o nome da revista, o autor e a referência do documento. Qualquer outra forma de reprodução é interdita salvo se autorizada previamente pelo editor, excepto nos casos previstos pela legislação em vigor em França. Revues.org é um portal de revistas das ciências sociais e humanas desenvolvido pelo CLÉO, Centro para a edição eletrónica aberta (CNRS, EHESS, UP, UAPV-França)
Resumo: Este texto pretende dar conta de iniciativas vocacionadas para a minimização, prevenção e... more Resumo: Este texto pretende dar conta de iniciativas vocacionadas para a minimização, prevenção e transformação das violências, protagonizadas por mulheres, que contribuem assim para contrariar a tendência de invisibilização e ausência histórica das mulheres enquanto sujeitos sociais em tempo de paz mas, acima de tudo, em tempo de conflitos armados. Em primeiro lugar, analisar-se-ão alguns movimentos de mulheres que se destacaram no movimento anti-guerra durante o período entre guerras e a Guerra Fria; num segundo momento dar-se-á destaque a exemplos da chamada "maternidade militante", activismo protagonizado por mães sobreviventes da violência.
Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais, 2009
Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais, 2009
Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais, 2012
Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais, 2012
RCCS Annual Review, 2013
This article analyzes the limitations of the United Nations Security Council Resolution on Women,... more This article analyzes the limitations of the United Nations Security Council Resolution on Women, Peace and Security (1325/2000) as a product of the concepts of gender, violence and security underpinning it. Although it represents an important historical advance, recognizing the potential role of women in peacemaking processes and post-conflict agreements, and ensuring that violence against them is taken seriously both nationally and internationally, the Resolution nevertheless has a number of limitations and challenges. It is argued here that the Resolution is (only) a first step towards the recognition of the connections and possibilities of dialogue between gender, violence and security, and that it does not necessarily transform the way each concept and the connections between them are understood within the United Nations, its member states and even non-governmental organizations dedicated to gender issues, particularly women's groups. The limits of the Resolution are questioned by analyzing contexts of armed violence other than wars or post-conflict situations that are not covered by 1325, focusing particularly on their gender dynamics.
Revista crítica de ciências sociais, 2010
Scientific Articles by Rita Santos
From the European South, 2021
This article deals with discourses about the Covid-19 pandemic in the Portuguese media from 2020-... more This article deals with discourses about the Covid-19 pandemic in the Portuguese media from 2020-2021. Through thematic qualitative content analysis, we explore how migrants, refugees/asylum seekers and Afro-descendants-that is, racialised people who are often read as non-Portuguese-have been portrayed by the media, and the idea of 'non-Portugueseness', constructed in relation to this phenomenon. The pandemic is an interesting context in which to analyse discourses reproducing the us/them divide, but also the 'us', given the heightened role security imaginaries have played in framing and reacting upon the pandemic. In this analysis, we examine (de)securitisation moves present in the Portuguese media when representing refugees/asylum seekers, immigrants and Afro-descendants, focussing on three main tropes: securitising said groups, explaining and deconstructing securitisation of these people, and shedding light on the threats and vulnerabilities faced by them.
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Papers by Rita Santos
Scientific Articles by Rita Santos