Protection as connection: feminist relational theory and protecting civilians from violence in South Sudan

The direct protection of civilians from the violence and harms of armed conflict is most often understood in fixed, identity-centred terms: of what protection is, where it is located, of who provides it, who receives it. Such analyses often conceal the relational nature of civilian protection: how it is co-created by actors in and through their relationships with one another and the protection architectures they operate within. In this article, I explore how a feminist relational approach helps to illuminate these underacknowledged dynamics of civilian protection. Using protection of civilians in the context of the civil war in South Sudan as an example, I highlight how relationships shape protection, and how a relational approach can illuminate a richer view of protection actors, action, and spaces. Drawing from the example of United Nations police mass cordon and search activities, I also demonstrate how relationships between peacekeepers and displaced communities are shaped by protection architectures. I argue that a relational approach can illuminate unjust structures, create important opportunities for new research, and assist in questioning and reorienting dominant peacekeeping strategies.