Collective rape is an internationally important issue but it has been the subject of little academic research. In particular, comparative empirical research is missing from the literature. This article discusses the first steps in a comparative sociological study of collective rape, defined herein as a pattern of sexual violence perpetrated on civilians by agents of a state, political group, and/or politicized ethnic group. News source data was used to identify international incidents of collective rape for the period 1990-2002. Despite the methodological challenges involved in studying this issue using media-based data, the procedure produced a reasonable valid data set of thirty incidents. A comparative look at these incidents reveals several trends in collective rape offenses, perpetrators, and victims. Perpetrators are typically agents of the state and victims are typically discriminated-against minority groups. Most incidents occur in the context of internal war and other collective violence, indicating an intimate tie of collective rape to other major human rights problems. These trends suggest that further sociological research on collective rape is both necessary and feasible.
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Jennifer Green (2004) studied this question.