The role of women in a changing IS, A study of the correlation between successes, setbacks and the role of women in the Islamic State

Abstract: Terrorism is a global problem and the existence of IS has been of global concern. People from all over the world have travelled to the caliphate to fight for IS, and 79 countries and organizations with USA in the lead has fought the battles against IS. This research looks into how the role of women has changed due to the military and territorial development. This is a hypothesis-testing case study where the method process tracing is used. Feminist theory is used to categorize the different roles of women, which are searched for in open sources that by the media house of IS were published in English. The findings show that the narrative of a woman as a mother and wife is seen as the most important task throughout the whole existence of the caliphate, even if women in 2015-2016 are described more as objects. In 2017-2018, women are described more as actors and even allowed to participate in combat ’under certain circumstances’. The morality codes are though maintained. Women are, for example, seen in a video participating in combat in a fully covering niqab. The main body of the thesis contains 18 407 words.