State as patriarch and biblical discipline: theorising state sponsored violence in Zimbabwe

Abstract

ABSTRACT Although political violence has characterized the Zimbabwe body politic from colonial times, state-sponsored political violence escalated from the time of the violent land reform in the early 2000s. The violence has been well documented; however, the possible factors underlying it have not been well reflected on. When the state unleashes violence among its people, who does it think itself to be and what does it believe its role to be? This article attempts to answer this question from a gender theory perspective debating the gender of the state. States have been described as either male or female with gender scholars often concluding that the state is a direct expression of men’s interests. This has led to the idea of a ‘male state’ or a ‘sado-state’ in the words of Mary Daly (Gyn/Ecology) who assimilated the state to the destructive aspect of male sexuality. Arguing along this line, this article theorises that state-sponsored violence in Zimbabwe is a result of a state that sees itself as the disciplining father who takes a cue from the biblical teachings of ‘spare the rod and spoil the child’. The article provides a history of state-sponsored violence in Zimbabwe, considers patriarchy and biblical teachings on disciplining as factors influencing the violence and then calls for a new perspective of the gender of the state for addressing state-sponsored violence in Zimbabwe.