IR scholars interested in empirically testing relationships between gender and foreign policy outcomes have nearly exclusively focused on either the individual-level of analysis and a sex-as-proxy approach, or the state/societal-level of analysis employing concepts such as gender (in)equality. However, many of the theoretical underpinnings of these studies identify traditionalist understandings of masculinity as a factor shaping men’s willingness to readily engage in war. These relationships are difficult to disentangle because of the way scholars also define aggressiveness, militarism, and propensity to war as characteristic of masculinity. How does the masculine nature of state institutions shape foreign policy attitudes conducive to war? Does the masculinity of some institutions within states ‘matter’ more than others? Are certain types of masculinity and idealized performances more conducive to war than others? Building from a wide range of feminist literature, I argue that the strength and type of masculinity that characterize state institutions shapes foreign policy attitudes towards war by structuring access, standards, norms of appropriateness, and the legitimation of violence. In other words, hegemonic societal ideas about masculinity support and shape state-level politics and approaches to foreign policy. I provide empirical support for this theory by conceptualizing and applying a new operationalization of state masculinity that avoids risks of endogeneity and essentializing conflations, while remaining rooted in feminist arguments tying masculinity to violence and war. This paper provides important evidence that the strength and type of state masculinity differently affects state propensity to war, even when disentangled from its militaristic characteristics. It also provides the foundation for future research by offering a new measure of masculinity specific to various institutions within states.
