Dr Paul Lushenko1
1Army War College, Carlisle, United States
Biography:
Dr. Paul Lushenko is an Assistant Professor at the US Army War College, Chief Strategist for the US military’s Joint Counter Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office, and Senior Fellow at Cornell University's Tech Policy Institute. His work lies at the intersection of emerging technologies, politics, and national security, and he also researches the implications of great power competition for regional and global order-building. Paul is the author and editor of three books, including Drones and Global Order: Implications of Remote Warfare for International Society (2022), The Legitimacy of Drone Warfare: Evaluating Public Perceptions (2024), and Afghanistan and International Relations (forthcoming).
Abstract:
Does the intersection of targets’ sex, gender, and race shape public perceptions of legitimate drone warfare? Scholars argue that targets’ lived identities can bias public opinion for drone warfare, though they often conceptualize identity along a single axis—such as sex or race. We test this claim by fielding an original survey experiment among a representative sample of Americans, varying targets’ sex, gender, and race. We find that female targets performing masculine gender roles enhance public perceptions of legitimacy, suggesting that Americans interpret such targets as socially deviant. Regardless of targets’ sex, respondents perceive strikes against White—versus Black—targets as more legitimate, corroborating research on the perceived racialization of drones. Finally, we observe that Americans’ perceived gender shapes their attitudes toward drones. Americans who self-identify as feminine are more likely to view drone strikes as legitimate. Together, this new evidence offers important insights for US drone policy and strategy.