This research paper will explore the meaning and prevalence of the notion and practice of “forced marriage” in the conflict-affected geographies of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The study will trace how forced marriage in the DRC can be analyzed through an interdisciplinary analytical method in order to attempt to understand what is the meaning and what is the prevalence of forced marriage used by non-state armed actors as a real contemporary form of subjugation and slavery.

Thus, this analytical work will argue that despite the existing differences in the socio-cultural, geographical and military contexts in the DRC – forced marriage is used by various armed groups in Eastern and Southern DRC as a practice subordinating women and girls to the categories of inferior and slaves with no sovereign power. This reveals key features of contemporary slavery, violence and masculinity in DRC and its production of power relations for gaining more power and control over human bodies, lives, lands and resources.

In other words, even if the notion and practice of forced marriage is not expressed in the same (cultural, linguistic and military strategizing) ways in different regions and armed groups in the DRC, its meaning is one assimilating women and girls to inferior and subordinate positions in socio-economic and politico-cultural terms. This meaning represents insane imaginary and delusions about the females place in society, sense and modes of existence, which are born in brutal wars and extremely violent forms of patriarchy and masculinity. Women and girls are imagined and represented as others - subordinated beings to men and are used by armed men for large profit in military conflicts, depriving them of their basic human rights.