Summary
In Manipur, northeast India, women have become central actors in an ongoing inter-ethnic conflict between Meitei and Kuki communities. Drawing on field research conducted near the India–Myanmar border, including group discussions with around 180 women and interviews with security forces, armed groups and civil society actors, the research examines how neighbourhood-level women’s collectives organise checkpoints, road blockades, night vigils and fundraising activities that support their communities’ war efforts.
The findings challenge common assumptions that women in conflict are primarily victims, peacebuilders or, more rarely, armed combatants. In Manipur, the same forms of collective mobilisation that were previously associated with anti-militarisation activism and peacebuilding have been redirected towards sustaining conflict. The research highlights how unarmed women can shape frontlines, humanitarian access, trade routes and security operations, demonstrating that women’s agency in conflict is more complex and politically consequential than is often assumed.
Key Findings
- Women’s mobilisation should not be read as inherently peaceful; the same repertoires of collective action that have supported peacebuilding in the past can be redirected to sustain war efforts.
- Neighbourhood-level women’s collectives play a central role in the conflict, operating checkpoints, organising night vigils, controlling movement and raising funds that support frontline activities.
- This mobilisation is highly organised, with rosters, fines and social sanctions making participation largely mandatory rather than voluntary.
- Women-operated roadblocks and checkpoints have helped transform a temporary security buffer zone into a de facto border, affecting trade, mobility, humanitarian access and the supply of food and medical provisions.
- Gender norms shape conflict dynamics by limiting how security forces respond to unarmed women, making these forms of mobilisation particularly effective in controlling access and movement.
- Women affected by conflict may simultaneously occupy multiple roles, including victims of conflict-related violence as well as organisers, financiers and enforcers of community war efforts.
Policy Implications
- Women’s collectives should be treated as important actors in conflict environments. Monitoring who controls roads and checkpoints, including women-led groups, can provide important insights into conflict dynamics and emerging risks.
- Conflict analysis, early warning systems and programming that focus primarily on armed actors risk overlooking influential actors who determine access, mobility and community mobilisation.
- Support to women’s organisations in conflict settings requires the same conflict-sensitivity analysis applied to other actors, recognising that women’s participation is not inherently moderating or peace-promoting.
- Humanitarian access strategies should engage neighbourhood-level women’s collectives that control roads and checkpoints, as negotiating exclusively with armed commanders may be insufficient to secure access.
- Women, peace and security policy frameworks may need to better account for the ways in which women’s agency can contribute to both peaceful and conflict-supporting forms of mobilisation.
- Security force doctrine, training and force composition should anticipate situations in which unarmed women shape frontlines, access routes and operational decision-making.