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Critically Examining UNSCR 1325 on Women, Peace and Security
Abstract
Here, we introduce the articles that comprise this special issue of IFJP, entitled, ‘Critically Examining UNSCR 1325’. The aim of this special issue is to examine the implementation of UNSCR 1325 and its implications for women's activism and for peace and security. Given that the articles in this volume approach UNSCR 1325 from various perspectives and in different contexts, our aim in this introduction is to point out a number of conceptual, policy and practical issues that are crucial in the debates around UNSCR 1325 specifically, and women, peace and security more broadly. We do this in four parts: first, problematizing the resolution in relation to changes in global governance; second, examining the Resolution's assumptions about (gendered) agency and structure; third, examining the Resolution's assumptions about the links between conflict and gender; and, fourth, comparing different contexts in which 1325 is implemented. To some degree, differences between contributors may be accounted for by different understandings of feminism(s) as a political project. Different feminisms may underpin different visions of peace and, consequently, different projects of peacebuilding. Ultimately, this volume, while answering the questions that we originally posed, throws up new questions about transnational feminist praxis.
... The growth of feminist approaches come a long way through numbers of conflicts and individual experiences to hone its' craft of practicality. The growth of feminist ideas and tools in addressing the issues of war and peace "received intense debate at the Third World Conference on Women in Nairobi" as the pioneering bottom-up approach was introduced "to complement the dominant state-centric top-down approach of peacemaking" [Pratt, Richter-Devroe 2011]. The further implication of this approach to various conflicts globally emphasized the importance of challenging the issues of women and security in order to design a sustainable plan of peace-building. ...
... The most crucial part in addressing and promoting any issue is the delivery and tone, as human beings have an irrational and emotional nature. Pratt and Richter-Devroe (2011) have argued that WPS-agenda employs "an understanding of gender that is 'largely synonymous with biological sex'" sustaining "deeply engrained myths of the woman as in need of masculinized protection" [Shepherd 2011;Eschle 2020]. ...
... 6 Challenging this issue is critically vital for the advance of feminist thought and gender mainstreaming, as the hundreds of millions of women worldwide work diligently to create the opportunities for emancipation, empowerment and equality. Furthermore, the UN institutions demonstrate the lack of awareness on issues of intersectionality, as the interrelation of "gender and other social categories, such as nationality, class, ethnicity, religion and sexuality are absent or actively prevented in such representations" [Pratt, Richter-Devroe 2011]. Under these circumstances, the global political governance project a utopian reality where the systems of power are represented in isolation from one another, ignoring the "intersect of unequal material realities and distinctive social and cultural experiences mutually constructing one another" [Acker 1999;Collins 2000;Collins, Chepp 2013]. ...
The global political elite has developed a pragmatic approach to addressing gender justice issues based on rationality and patriarchy, which hinders the activities of women. There is an urgent need to develop and implement the most efficient, inclusive and emancipatory practices in the light of experience. This article reveals an understanding of the content and meaning of feminist foreign policy in the context of official international content. It assesses the impact of UNSCR 1325 on the development of feminist foreign policy and gender justice. The author concludes that certain fundamental limitations of the document prevent the achievement of real goals lobbied by international organizations and feminist scientists, as well as the deconstruction of gender mainstreamin.
... Recognizing this situation, in 2000, the UN security council established Resolution 1325 (SCR1325) to affirm the vital role of women in peacemaking and peacebuilding (Charlesworth, 2008;Klein, 2012;Pratt & Richter-Devroe, 2011). SCR 1325 is well known as Women Peace and Security (WPS) agenda. ...
... SCR 1325 is also a reminder for states to protect women and girls from sexual abuse by establishing concrete regulations and ending perpetrators' impunity (Kirby, 2015;Charlesworth, 2008). Pratt & Richter-Devroe (2011) argue that SCR 1325 has been translated into programs and measurement in many countries but with different contexts and consequences for women. In 2015, the study of the implementation of SCR 1325 showed that the peace agreements that have addressed women's interests had increased 27% from the previous period, 1990-2000 (Kirby & Shepherd, 2016). ...
The UN security council established Resolution 1325 (SCR1325) to affirm women's vital role in peacemaking and peacebuilding. Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda emphases equal participation of men and women in the negotiation process, gender equality in post-conflict, and prevention of gender-based violence. This study illustrates women in Aceh fight for their rights throughout the conflict and post-conflict within an unequal society; and highlights the importance to adapt the WPS agenda to ensure gender equality and social justice. By applying narrative analysis, researchers explore Acehnese women's experiences and struggles in seeking justice. The implementation of the WPS agenda in Aceh faces many challenges, both structural and cultural. The government and combatant groups overlooked women's participation in peace negotiations. When the conflict ended, gender inequality is still lingering in every aspect. Aceh women experience injustice, sexual violence, and discrimination in the domestic and public sphere. Besides revealing the challenges in adapting the WPS agenda and creating gender equality in Aceh, this study also obtains policy recommendations to be considered by the local and central governments to ensure gender justice and substantial peace for women in Aceh post-conflict.
Resolusi DK PBB 1325 (SCR1325) menegaskan peran penting perempuan dalam membangun perdamaian di situasi konflik. Agenda Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) menekankan partisipasi yang setara antara laki-laki dan perempuan dalam proses negosiasi dan menciptakan kesetaraan gender di pascakonflik, serta menghapus kekerasan gender dalam konflik. Studi ini menggambarkan perempuan di Aceh memperjuangkan hak-hak mereka selama konflik dan pasca-konflik dalam masyarakat yang tidak setara; dan juga menyoroti betapa pentingnya mengadaptasi WPS untuk memastikan kesetaraan gender dan keadilan sosial. Dengan metode analisis naratif, peneliti dapat menggali pengalaman dan perjuangan perempuan Aceh dalam mencari keadilan. Penerapan agenda WPS di Aceh menghadapi banyak tantangan, baik struktural maupun kultural. Keterlibatan perempuan dalam negosiasi perdamaian diabaikan. Saat konflik berakhir, perempuan Aceh masih mengalami ketidakadilan, kekerasan seksual, dan diskriminasi di ruang domestik dan publik. Selain mengungkap tantangan dalam mengadaptasi WPS dan mewujudkan kesetaraan gender, studi ini juga menghasilkan rekomendasi kebijakan yang perlu dipertimbangkan oleh pemerintah daerah dan pusat untuk memastikan keadilan gender dan perdamaian substansial bagi perempuan di Aceh pasca konflik.
... UNSCR 1325 was the result of a long historical and political process; it had its roots in the UN Charter that recognises the equal rights of men and women (Olsson & Gizelis, 2013). The Resolution was adopted on 31 October 2000 by the UN Security Council, under its Namibian Chair. 1 Earlier that year, Namibia had passed the Windhoek Declaration and the Namibia Plan of Action on Mainstreaming a Gender Perspective in Multidimensional Peace Support Operations (Pratt & Richter-Devroe, 2011), and this provided the impetus to introducing this Resolution. UNSCR 1325 is commonly called a watershed moment for women, peace and security, and a major turning point in raising global attention to these concerns (Miller, Pournik & Swaine, 2014). ...
... Declaration and Platform for Action, signed by 189 countries (Miller, Pournik & Swaine, 2014). The breakthrough at the Beijing Platform for Action had its origins in Boutros Ghali's Agenda for Peace in 1992, which introduced a bottom-up approach of peace building to mainstream conflict resolution (Pratt & Richter-Devroe, 2011). UNSCR 1325 was adopted following feminist transnational advocacy groups uniting to put violence against women onto the mainstream security agenda (Harrington, 2011). ...
UNSCR 1325 was a watershed moment for women, peace and security. This article analyses and critiques the Resolution itself. The current implementation of the Resolution is identified, including failures to include women in all aspects of peace and conflict processes. Key opportunities to achieve transformative change are covered: meaningful engagement with civil society, experts and governments; a co- ordinated strategy to unite men and men's groups as male champions of change; and states having high-impact well-resourced national action plans that are a meta-policy requiring a complete gender re-think. The article concludes that the most important requirement is that there is a true commitment to gender equality in order to move from aspiration to action; the time to act is now. Resolucija VS OZN 1325 pomeni prelomnico za ženske, mir in varnost. Članek vključuje analizo in oceno resolucije. Analiza obsega uresničevanje resolucije, vključno z napakami o nevključevanju žensk na vseh ravneh mirovnih in konfliktnih procesov. Obravnavane so ključne priložnosti za doseganje sprememb: resno sodelovanje s civilno družbo, strokovnjaki in vladami, usklajena strategija združevanja moških skupin in posameznikov kot moških pobudnikov sprememb ter sprejemanje dobro financiranih in vplivnih nacionalnih akcijskih načrtov v različnih državah kot neke vrste meta politike, za katero je nujno popolno prevrednotenje vlog spolov. Iz sklepov članka izhaja, da je najpomembnejša resnična predanost enakosti spolov, s katero se bo mogoče premakniti od prizadevanj k dejanjem. Zdaj je pravi čas za ukrepanje.
... As attention to the agenda grew, so scholarship concentrated on a select number of key issues and sites in which WPS was understood to happen. Of the ten most-cited pieces on WPS in our survey, it is not surprising that most focus primarily on the politics of the United Nations Security Council (Shepherd, 2008;Tryggestad, 2009;Bell and O'Rourke, 2010;Puechguirbal, 2010;Willett, 2010;Gibbings, 2011;Pratt and Richter-Devroe, 2011;Shepherd, 2011) with only two emphasizing the circulation of UNSCR 1325 beyond the UN (El-Bushra, 2007;McLeod, 2011). Significant fractions of the literature address issues of wartime sexual violence (for example, Simic, 2010;Aroussi, 2017;Reilly, 2018); women's inclusion in peacekeeping (for example, Henry, 2012;Karim, 2017;Deiana and McDonagh, 2018) or WPS as grounds for humanitarian intervention (for example, Dharmapuri, 2013;Davies et al, 2015), with contestations within the UN system fundamental in each instance. ...
... For example, feminists have shown how UNSCR 1325 prescribes a link between women's roles as mothers and as advocates of peace (Puechguirbal 2010, 177;Shepherd 2008, 119). Third, while the attention that has been paid to sexual violence not as a by-product but rather as a weapon of war within the WPS agenda has been lauded by feminists (Pratt and Richter-Devroe 2011), the related theme of protection and victimhood of women has been shown to reduce women's agency and entrench existing gender-based restrictions placed on women and other non-hegemonic genders (Puechguirbal 2010;Shepherd 2008). ...
... As attention to the agenda grew, so scholarship concentrated on a select number of key issues and sites in which WPS was understood to happen. Of the ten most-cited pieces on WPS in our survey, it is not surprising that most focus primarily on the politics of the United Nations Security Council (Shepherd, 2008;Tryggestad, 2009;Bell and O'Rourke, 2010;Puechguirbal, 2010;Willett, 2010;Gibbings, 2011;Pratt and Richter-Devroe, 2011;Shepherd, 2011) with only two emphasizing the circulation of UNSCR 1325 beyond the UN (El-Bushra, 2007;McLeod, 2011). Significant fractions of the literature address issues of wartime sexual violence (for example, Simic, 2010;Aroussi, 2017;Reilly, 2018); women's inclusion in peacekeeping (for example, Henry, 2012;Karim, 2017;Deiana and McDonagh, 2018) or WPS as grounds for humanitarian intervention (for example, Dharmapuri, 2013;Davies et al, 2015), with contestations within the UN system fundamental in each instance. ...
... These developments in the literature have been accompanied, and mirrored, by the WPS agenda. As a UN framework, WPS pays particular attention to CRSV (Aroussi 2011) but has also been critiqued for over-emphasizing, if not even fetishizing, "rape as a weapon of war" (Meger 2016) over other forms of gender violence and other components of the agenda (Pratt and Richter-Devroe 2011). This growing international attention given to CRSV, in scholarship and policymaking, in many ways culminated in "[t]he award of the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize to Dr. Denis Mukwege and Nadia Murad 'for their efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war and armed conflict'" (Kreft 2020, 457). ...
Sexual violence against men and boys (SVAMB) in conflict has in recent years become a prominent topic in research and on the international policy stage. Simultaneously, there has been a slow but steady increase of attention to gendered harms against persons of diverse sexual orientations, gender identities and expressions, and sex characteristics (SOGIESC). These shifts, albeit slow and belated, are in many ways welcome and overdue. However, while broadening the scope of addressing the needs of gender-based violence survivors and acknowledging their victimhood is essential, there are several risks involved, in particular in terms of reasserting the centrality of male privilege. One risk is that work on SVAMB intentionally or unintentionally obscures the needs of women, girls, and persons of other gender identities. The second is an emerging trend of homogenizing diverse SOGIESC experiences, conflating these with SVAMB and invisibilizing women of diverse SOGIESC. Third, we argue, some of the work with male survivors carries a “re-masculinizing” message that often chimes with survivors’ wishes, but risks re-establishing heteronormative and latently misogynist and homophobic norms. We explore the salience of this wish for “re-masculinization” but also possible alternative approaches that address men’s legitimate concerns without reinforcing misogyny and homophobia.
... In Sri Lanka, while lacking an NAP, 1325 principles have been used by women's NGOs to increase some women's participation ( K.C. and Whetstone 2022 ). Despite this progress, some scholars condemn 1325 and WPS for promoting essentialized views of women as peacebuilders ( Pratt and Devroe 2011 ;Singh 2017 ). Additionally, the adoption of WPS policies in the Global South has been often deployed in a top-down manner by Global North actors to ensure Global North interests while making Global South countries passive receivers ( Basu 2016 ;Singh 2017 ). ...
This article analyzes the effects of COVID-19 on women and girls. It examines policy responses to the pandemic crisis and its implications on the women, peace, and security (WPS) agenda in postwar Nepal and Sri Lanka. Building on our previous work in Nepal and Sri Lanka, we rely on secondary studies, news sources, and governmental and nongovernmental organization reports and social media from March 2020 through March 2022 to demonstrate our argument that policymakers should place women and girls at the center of COVID-19 recovery plans. We further stress the need for an intersectional approach to understand the contextual relationships among gender, race, class, caste, ability, religion, sexual orientation, and additional markers that situate women's and girls’ experiences. The WPS agenda promotes women and girls’ participation in peace and security governance and has seen significant rollbacks given the impacts of the pandemic. We conclude by sketching new policy frontiers for the WPS agenda and urge WPS implementers to rethink their approach to WPS policies to promote women's diverse needs and interests in postwar Nepal and Sri Lanka in pandemic recovery policies.
... Little attention is paid to the fact that women participate in structures that oppress both men and women. 36 Others argued that the resolution does not take into consideration the structural dimensions of women's inequality, separating gender mainstreaming from gender equality. The WPS agenda more generally is seen as focusing on women as victims, particularly of sexual violence to the exclusion of other issues. ...
... In review, although the WPS resolutions have received critique for focusing solely on women as victims and actors in peacebuilding, but ignoring intersectional differences among women and also for ignoring women as combatants, for glossing over hierarchical gender relations, for co-option into nonfeminist power regimes and for not addressing militarism and masculinities (Puechguirbal, 2010;Holzner, 2011;Pratt and Richter-Devroe, 2011;SDC, 2013;McLeod, 2016), women peace activists embrace the WPS resolutions as a powerful instrument for acknowledging women's human rights and incorporating women in peace negotiations and in governmental functions which can be seen in the abundant publications collected by Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) 8 . ...
This article addresses gender-responsive governance reforms in post-conflict Kosovo from two perspectives: (1) the perspective of human rights as fundamental for state-building, and (2) the resolutions of the UN Security Council regarding Women, Peace, and Security (WPS), notably the initial UNSCR 1325. Special focus is laid on women's agency in governance matters—at the level of the state and at the level of civil society. A gender approach to three dimensions of governance—political-administrative governance, security governance, and socioeconomic governance—shows successes and problems in this post-conflict society. Special attention is given to the strategies of the women's movement in reaching gender-responsive governance. Some initiatives for new masculinities address the necessity of norm change in gender governance. The analysis of the literature and documents, supplemented by interviews, reveals the transformative potential of gender governance that solidly roots in women's rights and combines a multi-actor approach at grassroots, and at national and international levels with strong alliances and very concrete actions.
... While focusing particularly on women's political agency, it also acknowledged the need for better protection from conflict-related sexual violence. 3 There is a pervasive discourse on women's post-conflict political empowerment and the need to reconfigure gender relations in more egalitarian ways through post-war reconstruction measures (Anderlini 2007, Porter 2007, Olsson 2009, Pratt and Richter-Devroe 2011. This applies not least to processes of disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) and transitional justice (Hauge 2016). ...
In November 2006, a decade of civil war ended with the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Accord by the Government of Nepal and the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist). The large share of women in the first Constituent Assembly (33 per cent in the 2008 election) was seen as outstanding in the South Asian context, and many viewed the post-conflict scenario in Nepal as a promising opportunity for women's increased political participation. Further women's empowerment landmarks were proclaimed in 2015, when Nepal's parliament elected the country's first female President, Bidhya Devi Bhandari, and its first female Speaker, Onsari Gharti Magar. This chapter discusses the implementation of the UN's Women, Peace and Security agenda in post-conflict Nepal.
... It is in this vein that feminist security studies scholars (Olonisakin et al. 2015;Pratt and Richter-Devroe 2011) argue that the perceived global norm diffusion of the WPS agenda remains tenuous. The WPS package is criticised for its liberalfeminist approach arguing that the overemphasis on gender equality boils down to an almost exclusive focus on women in practice. ...
The article draws attention to the consequences of simplistically equating gender, sex and women when doing peacebuilding. Drawing on the ambivalent nature of security architecture interventions from the African continent, I make a case for keeping a variety of conceptual approaches to gender mainstreaming in mind in order to avoid a narrow fixation on adding women. I show through selected examples how institutional frameworks and commitments may appear progressive but could have potentially exclusionary effects. Gender is an important lens to analyse peacebuilding practices and commitments, but only if viewed as an action or means of ‘doing’ that disrupts additive liberal approaches to peacebuilding. As an alternative, the article proposes a gender-relational and intersected analysis of everyday securities and peacebuilding. A focus on lived, gendered and racialised experiences of insecurity and peacebuilding at the everyday level offsets the abstract and universalised approach adopted by states as well as regional and continental players. The article concludes that approaches to gender mainstreaming through sameness, difference and diversity should be seen as complementary to allow space for a context-specific, thick analysis of gender relations on the ground as well as gendered processes of structural or institutional change.
... Similarly, the women, peace and security agenda championed by the United Nations, most notably through UNSCR1325, largely ignores other forms of structural inequality in its prioritisation of policies that solely address gender. The intersections of gender and other forms of domination such as those connected to ethnicity and nationality are largely absent (Gibbings, 2011;Pratt & Richter-Devroe, 2011). As Claire Pierson (2019) argues, the lack of an intersectional interpretation of UNSCR1325 has reproduced the peacemaker/victim trope as the language throughout the resolution relies on the feminisation of peace. ...
While gender has been widely used as an analytical category to understand the dynamics of conflict transformation in Northern Ireland, surprisingly little has been written on the ways in which the conflict has shaped or constrained feminist organising. Singular focus on groups or initiatives like the Northern Ireland Women's Coalition, Peace People or the Women's Support Network has overshadowed the contested history and intricacies of the wider feminist movement. Adopting a more holistic view, this article takes the concept of ‘bridge-builders' as conceptualised by Ruane and Todd in The Dynamics of Conflict in Northern Ireland (1996) to examine the fractured development of the feminist movement in the North. It charts how ‘bridge-builder feminism' became a distinguishable feature of the feminist movement during the Troubles and was used as a mechanism to transgress what Todd calls the ‘grammars of nationality’ (Todd, 2015). I argue that although this organising approach pioneered some changes in Northern Irish society, it overlooked key feminist struggles and thrived at the expense of an inclusive, intersectional feminism. Though the movement has undergone significant changes in the last two decades, the legacy of bridge-builder feminism continues to impact the capacities of the movement to address key feminist issues.
... For example, feminists have shown how UNSCR 1325 prescribes a link between women's roles as mothers and as advocates of peace (Puechguirbal 2010, 177;Shepherd 2008, 119). Third, while the attention that has been paid to sexual violence not as a by-product but rather as a weapon of war within the WPS agenda has been lauded by feminists (Pratt and Richter-Devroe 2011), the related theme of protection and victimhood of women has been shown to reduce women's agency and entrench existing gender-based restrictions placed on women and other non-hegemonic genders (Puechguirbal 2010;Shepherd 2008). ...
The United Nations (UN) policy agenda on Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism (P/CVE) promotes a “holistic” approach to counterterrorism, which includes elements traditionally found in security and development programs. Advocates of the agenda increasingly emphasize the importance of gender mainstreaming for counterterrorism goals. In this article, I scrutinize the merging of the goals of gender equality, security, and development into a global agenda for counterterrorism. A critical feminist discourse-analytical reading of gender representations in P/CVE shows how problematic imageries of women as victims, economic entrepreneurs, and peacemakers from both the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and the Women, Peace and Security agenda are reproduced in core UN documents advocating for a “holistic” P/CVE approach. By highlighting the tensions that are produced by efforts to merge the different gender discourses across the UN’s security and development institutions, the article underlines the relevance of considering the particular position of P/CVE at the security–development nexus for further gender-sensitive analysis and policies of counterterrorism.
... The WPS agenda addresses the participation of women in peace and security institutions, the prevention of violence, and the protection of women's rights. Recognizing UNSCR 1325 as path-breaking (Anderlini 2010;Porter 2003), scholarship on the WPS agendacomprising UNSCR 1325 and subsequent resolutions adopted under the title of "Women, Peace and Security" -continues to evaluate its significance (Cohn 2008;Pratt and Richter-Devroe 2011), challenges (El-Bushra 2017), and limitations (Aroussi 2011;Puechguirbal 2010;Shepherd 2008Shepherd , 2011. While some have celebrated UNSCR 1325 as a landmark achievement, others have pointed out that "it means very little to women in conflict zones unless they know about it and have the security, resources and political spaces to organise and access decision-makers" (Cohn, Kinsella, and Gibbings 2004, 132). ...
The contributions and experiences of women in conflict at the grassroots level in India are not well recognized by the Indian state. In this article, I examine women's engagement with conflict in the Darjeeling Hills and Nagaland in the Eastern regions of India, highlighting both the varied forms of conflict and women's experiences of them. I use these case studies to engage with the question of “participation” as envisioned by the Women, Peace and Security agenda, which has often been understood only in terms of the representation of women at the “high table” of peace negotiations. Restricting the idea of participation to representation alone not only constrains women's agency but also reproduces a binary of “participants” and “non-participants,” obscuring the different ways in which women actually participate in peace activism and conflict prevention. By examining women's experiences and engagement in these “hidden” conflicts, I provide a more nuanced account of women's agency and open up space for different conceptualizations of participation in the Women, Peace and Security agenda.
... According to the gendered aspects of the WPS agenda (Pratt & Richter-Devroe, 2011), civil society organizations, especially women's groups, are the main strategic actors to push for the discussion of women's experiences in armed conflict. The WPS agenda addresses three main themes: (1) Women and girls in war and armed conflict demand to be protected from sexual and gender-based violence; (2) Women must have a role in the prevention and resolution of conflicts and peacebuilding; (3) Local actors, member states, and the United Nations (UN) system need to adopt a gender perspective in peace operations, negotiations, and agreements. ...
Rampant forms of violence increasingly take place not only in troubled areas but also in centers and metropoles. Such violence is no longer simply confined to local concerns or historical ruptures, but emerges instead in relation to modalities of power. The movement of people and expanding networks of actors and capital enables the notion of violence to transgress boundaries set by institutions, geography, state, and power. In some conditions, rather than sealing off the emergence of violence, the transition to democracy has opened the door for engineered violent confrontations to manifest out of cleavages that have been tempered by previous authoritarian rule. ASEAS 12(2) addresses violence in selected cases and on different scales. The contributions discuss how violence is practiced, how it (re)produces structures, and how it may eventually transform into non-violence. Violence is not simply an outcome of tensions but is a mechanism that actors and organizations deploy to stabilize their struggles, which eventually makes peacebuilding or democratic projects volatile. The articles in this issue feature police violence in the Philippines; intimate partner violence against women in Vietnam; Islamist online/offline mobilization strategies in Indonesia; the role of traditional actors in reconciliation processes in Timor-Leste; and gender security in the context of conflict management in Thailand’s Deep South.
... Since the first call to develop National Action Plans (NAPs) for Women, Peace and Security (WPS) in a United Nations (UN) Security Presidential Statement (United Nations 2004), the debate has shifted away from a narrow preoccupation with technical concerns (Miller, Pournik, and Swaine 2014;Popovic, Lyytikainen, and Barr 2010) to over time mirror the discourse about the broader development of the WPS agenda. Critics argue that NAPs perpetuate the flaws and silences of United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325 (for instance, with regard to masculinities, race, and sexuality) and stand little chance of addressing the implementation gap until power inequalities are eradicated (Pratt and Richter-Devroe 2011). By contrast, norm-entrepreneur proponents view NAPs as a concrete means of grounding these international gender norms in local contexts (Tryggestad 2010). ...
The African Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda is supported by a well-developed architecture. However, the problem-solving language of the Continental Results Framework to monitor state implementation may impede critical gender discourses and practices. This article therefore examines the discursive repetitions and ruptures across Rwanda’s National Action Plans (NAPs) of 2009 and 2018, with specific attention to the dynamics of discursive relations between the two NAPs, and examining whether the language offers openings for alternative interpretations of dominant Rwandan WPS discourses. Our temporal reading of the NAP discourses is grounded in the idea that time as well as learning over time is non-linear, multiple/fluid, connected to a particular space, linked to processes rather than products of repetition and rupture, and representative of an interlocking of pasts, presents, and futures. Three categories of change – namely, “dominant,” “residual,” and “emergent” – are used to structure the analysis. The empirical evidence shows that the categories are not mutually exclusive: the new NAP reflects more of the same dominant discourses, but with some minor qualitative and critical shifts, as well as isolated opportunities for creating a new perspective on WPS.
Mali, Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Myanmar, Burundi, Uganda, Libya, the Ivory Coast, and South Sudan have one sad footnote in common: they are sites of recent armed conflict characterized by sustained sexual violence attacks against women. Increasingly, paramilitary fighters, nonstate actors, perpetrate sexual violence offenses. Even those who are meant to protect civilians, such as UN peacekeepers, have engaged in acts of violence. Recent examples brought to the attention of the world media include attacks by UN peacekeepers against girls as young as 12 years old in the Central African Republic. In response to this alarming trend, the UN has promulgated a series of groundbreaking resolutions condemning conflict‐related sexual violence offenses since the turn of the millennium. To date, eight UN Security Council resolutions have called for a greater inclusion of women at the peace negotiation table and in post‐conflict demobilization efforts, urging states to implement national action plans to give effect to these objectives. However, despite the UN's efforts to address wartime sexual violence, there remains a stark discrepancy between the political action and the reality on the ground, where conflict‐related sexual violence continues to be pervasive.
The two decades since the adoption of the first Security Council Resolution under the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Agenda has paved the way for much introspection and debate. While there have been several positive impacts such as the inclusion of women in peacemaking processes and in bringing to light the deliberate deployment of sexual violence in armed conflict as a tactic, there have also been several gaps in implementation. Since the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1325, legal, policy, and academic discourse has focused on armed conflict and women and has made an essentialist case for the inclusion of women in post-conflict peace processes. Among one of the major concerns with the WPS Agenda in its verbiage and implementation is the tendency to conflate 'gender' with 'women's issues.' As a consequence, non-binary gender identities in general, and their experience of armed conflict in particular, have been sidelined and rendered obscure. Sexual violence in conflict has been understood through a limited 'gender' lens, and the unique experiences of queer people in armed conflict have neither been acknowledged or addressed in policy, legislation, and transitional justice measures. Tis paper critically evaluates the WPS agenda and identifies gaps both in its language and implementation through National Action Plans. It presents the unique challenges of sexual and gender minorities in armed conflict and calls for a gender, peace, and security regime founded on the principles of intersectionality, queer theory, and the right to self-determination.
The aim of the paper is to find out how the UN agenda “Women, Peace, Security” (WPS) established inUN Security Council’s Resolution 1325 of October 2000 is pursued in Sweden and in Poland. The agendais considered to be the starting point in building a new architecture of security with an equal participationof women and men globally, regionally and nationally. Both Sweden and Poland adopted national actionplans to achieve the goals of the WPS agenda. The reading of these documents in the context of Sweden’sand Poland’s foreign policies shows considerable differences between the two states. Sweden is activelypromoting the WPS agenda in the context of its feminist foreign policy and the activity of its feministgovernment whilst Poland adopted its national action plan relatively late. The documents and statements onthe priorities of the Polish foreign policy do not mention the WPS agenda.
The roles played by the women in the conflict resolution involving the Muslim community in the Southern Philippines was not given the spotlight it deserved in the series of peace talks between the republic and the separatist groups. The roles of women were as if they were insignificant and of a passive manner while women were undeniably the important “stakeholder” beside the fact that the conflict that erupted affected this group the most amongst the population there. They are also capable to contribute to a new paradigm in conflict resolution. Realizing this, the United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) passed Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security as a democratizing mechanism towards the encouragement of women in conflict resolution, protection amidst conflict, and peacemaking.
This research paper presents a queer feminist analysis of gendered discourses in South Africa’s (SA) (2020-2025) National Action Plan (NAP) on Women, Peace, and Security (WPS). It builds on an extensive field of WPS scholarship by using the case study of SA’s NAP to illustrate how policy can be used to harness critical gendered language and create possibilities for radical (re)imaginings of gendered peace. While a considerable knowledge base that explores the gendered discourses of NAPs on WPS already exists, a key gap in the literature —that has only more recently begun to be explored with greater rigor— is the bridging of queer and feminist theories to further push the boundaries of discursive policy analysis. Against this backdrop, feminist critical discourse analysis (CDA) was applied to the NAP case study to surface dominant and counter-discourses on gender and their possible inclusionary/exclusionary effects. Key findings centre the potential value of policy discourses which, in their fragmentation, ruptures, continuities and ambivalences, can facilitate opportunities for queer peace at the instrumental level and beyond.
This article locates Turkey in discussions of gender and violent extremism (VE), probes women’s diverse roles, motivations, and constraints for and against religious radicalization, and discusses the impact of sustainable patriarchy on their agency. Building on the findings of an extensive field study on women’s recruitment to ISIS and al-Nusra from Turkey, the article disproves women’s widely assumed passivity, demonstrates other roles as sympathizers, recruiters, and perpetrators, and explores potential push, pull, and enabling factors. It also reveals the hindering effects of patriarchy on women’s preventive roles and accentuates the empowerment of both women and women’s NGOs for an effective and gender-sensitive fight against VE.
This article focuses on those “points of fracture” (Kirby and Shepherd 2020, 12) that have manifested in the implementation of the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Agenda in the Mediterranean region by examining National Action Plans (NAPs) in two distinct sub-regions – the Western Balkans and North Africa. We develop a comparative framework to shed light on the dimension of participation of these plans in four countries where the debate on WPS has reached different stages: Bosnia–Herzegovina, Kosovo, Tunisia and Morocco. By empirically investigating participation as both modality and focus of WPS debate and practice in these countries, we show that NAPs are unable to produce “meaningful local ownership” (Basini and Ryan 2016, 390) and that the international discourse on WPS should be re-thought to resonate with women’s needs, experiences and perspectives in post-conflict and post-revolutionary settings.
While the naïve optimism of the liberal peacebuilding perspective has been tempered by recent real-world events that have revealed the complex and stubborn nature of conflict-ridden societies, peacebuilding remains a relevant tool for recovering from post-conflict devastation. This edited volume aims to examine the relevance of contemporary peacebuilding to post-conflict reconstruction by relying on evidence that illustrates how these programs work to address conflict-related problems on the ground. To contextualize the arguments contained in this volume within recent debates on peacebuilding, this chapter introduces the theoretical and practical trends and the validity of micro-level approaches to peace and conflict studies.
Intersectionality, one of the most crucial concepts developed in feminism and gender studies in the 1990s, has been widely adopted to examine interconnecting oppressions as well as privilege. While diverse social categories and structures have been discussed in studies drawing on intersectional paradigms, spatiality – which is one of the critical bases of inequality – has arguably not received enough attention. By examining global and national policies on women, peace and security (WPS), this chapter aims to illuminate how spatiality is central in understanding the intersecting challenges of women enduring and fleeing war and conflict.KeywordsSpatialityIntersectionalityThe Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agendaUK National Action PlansRefugee and asylum-seeking women
Norge har et sterkt nasjonalt selvbilde som likestillingsforkjemper og fredsnasjon. I denne artikkelen utforsker vi skjæringspunktet mellom likestilling og fredsengasjement i norsk utenrikspolitikk. Mens systematisk integrering av likestillingsperspektiver har stått på dagsordenen i norsk utviklingssamarbeid i flere tiår, er integreringen av likestilling i fredsengasjementet av nyere dato. I vår studie har vi vært særlig interessert i å se nærmere på hvordan norske diplomater balanserer erfaringer, verdier og interesser når likestilling som norm og praksis integreres i det norske fredsengasjementet. Vi finner at likestilling mellom kjønnene blir sett på som en norsk kjerneverdi det er «naturlig» å videreføre i norsk fredsengasjement. Dette har også blitt en viktig valuta i spillet om status, makt og innflytelse i internasjonal politikk. Samtidig finner vi en bekymring hos diplomatene for at et for sterkt fokus på normative og verdidrevne feministiske idealer og målsetninger kan være risikabelt, da det ville kunne svekke bildet av Norge som nøytral tilrettelegger av fredsprosesser.
The adoption of gender mainstreaming strategies has become an increasingly common expectation within countering terrorism and violent extremism policy and programming. Through comparative case study examination of two iterations of a Strengthening Resilience to Violent Extremism programme, this article shows that practitioners are often left struggling to design effective and transformative strategies that can overcome practical and conceptual barriers. This is due to several intersecting and compounding elements, including institutional conceptual limitations around gender and gender equality in the security context, a weak evidence base on how and why gender plays a role in violent extremism, and a lack of effective feminist knowledge transfer and co-creation processes between academic and practitioner researchers.
More than 20 years after the landmark achievement of the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda, feminist scholars and activists are debating the conditions in which peacebuilders should employ the agenda and those in which they should pursue alternatives. This article argues that the conflict and peacebuilding in Manipur, a state in Northeast India, is ripe for creative thinking beyond WPS. India refuses to acknowledge legally this intractable, low-intensity armed conflict, barring international and humanitarian actors from entry. Moreover, the WPS agenda has failed to reach from New Delhi into the marginalized Northeast region, where plentiful forms of direct and structural violence persist. Thus, rather than rallying around the WPS agenda for this case, feminist scholars and activists should find other ways to support longstanding women’s peacebuilding initiatives. Using Ackerly’s critical feminist methodology, I synthesize inductive insights from women’s peacebuilding praxis and apply them to Lederach’s contextual and relational approach to conflict transformation, revising it to incorporate the gendered concerns of women building peace across ethnic and religious differences. The result is a grounded normative theory called “critical feminist justpeace,” an alternative to the WPS approach.
This article examines the localization of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (hereafter 1325) on women, peace, and security (WPS) and its successor resolutions, which call for equal participation of women in conflict resolution, peace negotiations, and postconflict development. The article asks: How, and to what extent, does 1325 and any accompanying National Action Plan (NAP) address grassroots women's issues to transform the WPS agenda in Nepal and Sri Lanka's postwar development? Nepal's NAP (2011–2016) is applauded for its localization efforts. Because Sri Lanka does not yet have a NAP, we explore its informal adoption of 1325. Using interviews and a review of policy documents, this article demonstrates that grassroots women's lived experiences support 1325, even as they are often left out of 1325 processes, both state-led and NGO-led. The paper argues that inclusive and bottom-up localization of 1325 and NAPs is critical to achieving the WPS agenda.
Resisting a single-axis framework and adopting intersectionality in gendered security research and practice ensures that more inclusive and holistic security, and thus sustainable peace, is achieved in post-conflict societies. Yet, the way in which intersectionality is used in research and policy-making determines different outcomes that either take us further away or closer to that goal. The aim of this study is to explore how gender intersects with other systems of oppression to create experiences of gendered (in)security in Rwandan communities. My research suggests that the failure to cultivate a thorough understanding of intersectionality in gender security practice results in gender-based violence (GBV), gender discrimination and gender hierarchies, all of which threaten the sustainability of peace in the post-conflict era.
The key objective of my study is to critically evaluate the value of analysing the inner workings of intersectionality for the Rwandan context, gendered security research and practice, and Women, Peace and Security (WPS) work. The inner workings of intersectionality refer to the modes, dynamics, contestations and strategies that surround the concept. I use three logics to explore the inner workings of intersectionality. These are the logics of domination, addition, and interdependence. The logics are used in combination to cultivate a holistic understanding of intersectionality. I use a deconstructive discourse analysis to reveal how the different logics, and indeed the inner workings themselves, are (re)produced and the effects that the logics have, and have had, on gendered security in Rwanda. My conceptual exploration of the inner workings of intersectionality draws from examples in colonial, post- colonial and post-genocide Rwanda. I use a multi-level analysis, focussing on the everyday experiences of marginalised women, whose social location lies at the intersection of multiple systems of oppression, while also paying attention to larger structural power differentials that are filtered through the global economy and global security. My study shows that there is a link between the utilisation of intersectionality according to the logics and gendered (in)security.
Rwanda is a useful case study for the analysis of intersectionality because the history of Hutu/Tutsi political violence lends itself to an intersectional analysis. In addition, despite Rwanda’s robust gender equality and gender security policy and legal frameworks, gendered
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insecurities, such as persistently high rates of GBV, continue to threaten the sustainability of peace in the post-genocide era. My analysis reveals how intersections have generated complex experiences of violence in Rwanda’s past; how the misappropriation of intersectional thinking can lead to the creation of gendered (in)security silences, which allows gender discrimination to thrive and threaten peace in the contemporary moment; and how positive intersections can be cultivated through community forums for generating positive peace and gender justice at a local level.
To commemorate the twentieth anniversary of Resolution 1325, this introduction discusses the state of the field in the women peace and security (WPS) agenda and outlines the challenges to implementation. It begins by introducing the current gaps we see in WPS practice, many of which are driven by insufficient data and lack of funding. The section that follows provides a brief discussion of the global diffusion of the WPS agenda. We highlight the important contribution the Global South has made in implementing the agenda in the absence of great power leadership and the stultified progress of the Global North. We argue that the WPS agenda remains hampered by poor national implementation, a lack of support for civil society initiatives and a failure to recognize the importance of its application in context. The final section introduces the articles in this issue, showing how they advance an emerging human security agenda: integrating WPS into UN-led security initiatives like R2P, and the challenges of the implementation of the WPS agenda in varied local and national contexts. We conclude by arguing that to meet future challenges, the WPS agenda must be broadened to include areas outside traditional conceptions of security and embrace the full remit of evolving security threats; in particular, structural barriers that prevent the empowerment of women across the board.
This article traces the discursive construction of women as “civil society actors”; a discourse common to the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) Doctrine and the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Agenda. I argue that the discursive construction of women as civil society actors relies on and (re)produces gendered constructions. By tracing the discourses and logics across the R2P Doctrine and WPS Agenda, I demonstrate that both normative frameworks rely on gendered logics of agency. This poses significant dilemmas concerning the implementation of the R2P Doctrine and WPS Agenda. Namely, the gendered and therefore unequal expectations of women's civil society organizations (CSOs) to prevent, detect, and respond to violence. This paper contributes to broader concerns regarding the closer alignment of R2P and WPS, with a focus at where these two frameworks overlap in relation to mass atrocity detection, prevention, and response. The argument this article develops demonstrates that the spaces within and between the WPS Agenda and R2P Doctrine, the agency of women's CSOs is constrained, instrumentalized, and co-opted by the state and market. This presents concerns for the implementation of the aims (shared or otherwise) of R2P and WPS. Finally, this article raises urgent questions concerning the relationship between states and women's CSOs, the funding and independence of CSOs and the expectations placed on CSOs to contribute to international peace and security.
With gender equality becoming a key feature of the global food security agenda, international organizations have produced a rich body of knowledge on gender. This paper argues that such gender expertise generates political effects through identity constructions, problem definitions and rationalities. We critically analyse 59 documents relating to gender and food security in the South written in international organizations between 2000 and 2018. Our analysis reveals two gendered constructions articulated in these documents – the productive female farmer and the caring woman food securer. We demonstrate that problem definitions, solutions, and rationalities associated with these identity constructions are contradictory. Their juxtaposition reveals that gender expertise in international food security discourse is not only governed by neoliberal orthodoxy but also surfaces ambivalences and alternatives.
This chapter introduces the concept of women born equal and its theoretical foundation in social change. The chapter acknowledges the development of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 within the global framework of Women, Peace and Security (WPS). The WPS framework is anchored in five tenets: (1) increased participation and representation of women at all levels of decision-making; (2) attention to specific protection needs of women and girls in conflict; (3) a gender perspective in post-conflict processes; (4) a gender perspective in UN programming and reporting, and in SC missions; and (5) gender perspectives and training in UN peace support operations. These tenets are reinforced by the three pillars (popularly known as the “3Ps”); protection, prevention and participation. Together with relief and recovery, the three pillars form the basis of analysis throughout this volume.
31. oktobra 2000 je Varnostni svet Organizacije Združenih narodov (OZN) sprejel Resolucijo 13251 o ženskah, miru in varnosti. Sledile so ji še druge (1820, 1888, 1889, 1960, 2106, 2122 in 2422), ki poudarjajo nesorazmeren vpliv vojn in konfliktov na ženske in otroke ter osvetljujejo dejstvo, da so bile ženske zgodovinsko vedno na obrobju mirovnih procesov in stabilizacijskih naporov. Poudarjajo pomembno vlogo žensk pri preprečevanju in reševanju konfliktov, v mirovnih pogajanjih, pri graditvi miru ter humanitarnih in pokonfliktnih aktivnostih. Resolucija 1325 poziva države članice, naj vključijo vidik spola v načrtovanje, priprave in usposabljanje za mirovne misije ter v sisteme obveščanja in programe OZN, predvsem naj zaščitijo ženske in deklice v oboroženih spopadih. Resolucijo je sprejela tudi naša država in Slovenska vojska jo je kot obvezno čtivo vgradila v programe usposabljanja in priprave slovenskih kontingentov, ki sodelujejo v mednarodnih operacijah in na misijah. V Sloveniji sta po osamosvojitvi leta 1991 izšla dva zbornika, namenjena ženskam v oboroženih silah. Prvi je nastal leta 1995, pet let pred resolucijo OZN. Njegova urednica je bila Zorica Bukinac, založilo ga je Ministrstva za obrambo, naslov pa je Ženske v oboroženih silah. Leta 2002 je nastal drugi. Urednici sta bili Ljubica Jelušič in Mojca Pešec, moči so združili Obramboslovni raziskovalni center Fakultete za družbene vede, Ministrstvo za obrambo in Generalštab SV. V prvem zborniku smo dobili prvi opis ženskih izkušenj iz SV ter poglede domačih in tujih avtorjev na vlogo žensk v oboroženih silah. V drugem so bili z vidikov tradicije, kulture in vzorcev spolnih vlog predstavljeni omejevalni dejavniki pri vključevanju žensk v oborožene sile ter analiza deleža žensk in dolžnosti, ki jih opravljajo v SV. Večje vključevanje žensk v oborožene sile še vedno vzbuja veliko pozornosti in vprašanj. Izkušnje številnih držav so zelo različne, veliko je pozitivnih, pa tudi negativnih. Leta 2015 je minilo 15 let od nastanka Resolucije 1325 o ženskah, miru in varnosti, 20 let od nastanka prvega zbornika in 13 let od nastanka drugega. V uredniškem odboru smo želeli s tematsko številko preveriti, kaj je novega na področju resolucije doma in po svetu, in to objaviti. K sodelovanju smo povabili podpolkovnico dr. Suzano Tkavc, svetovalko na področju vidika spola v Generalštabu SV, imenovano tudi za koordinatorico za enakost spolov na Ministrstvu za obrambo in nacionalno predstavnico v Natovem odboru za vidik spola. Z združenimi močmi je nastala številka, ki je pred vami. Pablo Castillo Díaz, ki je zaposlen v Organizaciji združenih narodov, je pripravil članek z naslovom Pripadnice oboroženih sil v mirovnih operacijah in politika Resolucije 1325 Varnostnega sveta OZN. V njem z nami deli svoj strokovni pogled in izkušnje z vidika resolucije o ženskah, miru in varnosti, pri čemer s poudarkom na mednarodnih operacijah in misijah opozarja na prednosti in pomanjkljivosti resolucije. Garry McKeon je napisal članek z naslovom Boljši državljani – usposabljanje s področja humanitarnosti in spola EUTM Somalija. Avtor je več kot 30 let pripadnik Irskih oboroženih sil, med drugim je sodeloval tudi na misiji v Somaliji. Njegove izkušnje pri usposabljanju za uresničevanje Resolucije 1325 so zelo zanimive, saj gre za kulturno okolje, ki se precej razlikuje od našega. V članku z naslovom Nekatere dobre prakse s področja vidika spola in uresničevanja Resolucje VS OZN 1325 v 25-letnem obdobju SV avtorice Suzane Tkavc dobimo vpogled v obravnavo vidika spola v obdobju samostojnosti slovenske države, predvsem s poudarkom na oboroženih silah in njihovih aktivnostih v mednarodnih operacijah in na misijah. Kako dobro smo se pri tem izkazali glede na predstavnice in predstavnike vojsk drugih držav? Dosežki in stališča pri izvajanju Resolucije VS OZN 1325 na Ministrstvu za obrambo in v Vojski Srbije je naslov članka avtoric Jovanke Šaranović, Brankice Potkonjak-Lukić in Tatjane Višacki. V Srbiji so si za uresničevanje Resolucije 1325 zelo prizadevali, saj je področje vključeno v nacionalni akcijski načrt. Pri tem sodeluje veliko različnih državnih organov in drugih nevladnih ustanov. Avtorice v članku ugotavljajo, kako uspešni so pri tem. V članku z naslovom Analiza in ocena Resolucije VS OZN 1325 – kakšna so priporočila za priložnosti v prihodnje nas Jane Derbyshire seznanja s pogledom na področje resolucije in z izkušnjami z vidika Obrambnih sil Nove Zelandije. So te zelo drugačne od izkušenj drugih držav? Avtorica meni, da je zdaj čas za spremembe. V primerjavi z večino avtorjev, ki so predstavniki oboroženih sil ali pa so z njimi neposredno povezani, je Nadja Furlan Štante članek z naslovom Ženske v oboroženih silah: med nasiljem in ranljivostjo napisala z drugačnega vidika. Specializirana za religijske in ženske študije izhaja iz bioloških, zgodovinskih, religijskih in drugih vidikov, hkrati pa upošteva tudi ugotovitve, prakso in dela avtorjev, ki pišejo o področjih obrambe in oboroženih sil. Verjamemo, da smo s to tematsko številko posredovali nove izkušnje in prispevali poglede v dinamičen mozaik vidika spola, spodbudili koga k branju in morda tudi k pisanju.
In the twenty years since the adoption of United Nations Security Council resolution 1325 on “women, peace and security” (in 2000), civil society organisations have continued to shape the agenda's development and work towards its implementation, although geographical and other disparities in recognition, access, and authority over the agenda exist. In this research, we explore the online interactions among civil society organisations working on policy and practice related to the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda. Informed by a postcolonial theoretical framework, and using social network analysis, we analyse data from the Twitter and Facebook accounts of a WPS social network, seeded by social media pages of 21 organisations. Our data suggest that a small group of organisations based in the global North have disproportionate visibility in online activities related to the WPS agenda, and that this has implications for issues of diversity and representation in the network.
Recent research has directed attention to the transformative potential of war for female empowerment. As a disruptive shock, armed conflict can create a window of opportunity for advancing the societal role of women. We complement this research agenda by looking at how conflict severity and termination condition the outcomes for women in the aftermath of civil conflict. We expect that both level of violence and mode of resolution affect subsequent female empowerment, where severe conflicts ending by a negotiated settlement have the greatest transformative potential. Consistent with expectations, we find that post-conflict improvements in female empowerment occur primarily after high-intensity civil conflicts. However, subsequent tests reveal that this effect is driven largely by conflicts terminated by peace agreements. The greatest improvement in female empowerment is seen when peace agreements have gender-specific provisions. These results support calls for a sustained effort toward mainstreaming gender issues in conflict resolution and peacebuilding processes.
As the United States and world transition from a reflexive and hard approach in counterterrorism to a more reflective and soft one for the prevention of terrorism, the search for best practices and lessons learned is more critical than ever. While programming related to countering violent extremism (CVE) continues to grapple with the adoption of official definitions, priorities, evaluation methodologies, and qualitative and quantitative metrics, there is a growing awareness of the importance of harnessing female actors as positive, operational agents of change. Women continue to be an underutilized and under-tapped resource in the fight against extremism. This research identifies best practices through lessons learned from efforts that utilize women to encouragingly affect catalysts and circumstances that drive individuals to engage in or support terrorism.
Currently, the gendered approach to preventing recruitment and radicalization to violence has been based on assumptions rooted in lessons learned from women in peacebuilding and conflict prevention and resolution. This translates in real world applications to the supposition that an increase in women empowerment and gender equality has a positive effect on countering extremism, as it does similarly in peacebuilding. I examine whether this assumption is valid based on the evaluation and comparative study of CVE approaches and programming in two countries that are considered to have marked success in reducing sympathy and support for violent extremism.
The empowerment of women not only makes practical sense, but also is a good investment in economics, business, and counterterrorism. In micro lending, for every $1US a woman earns, she reinvests 90 percent back into her family and/or community; men reinvest only 40 percent. When a woman has an education, she marries on average four years later, enters into non-abusive relationships, and has 2.2 children who are healthier and better educated. Violent extremism is most effectively countered through increased education, better critical thinking, and enhanced opportunities. These empowerment scenarios and positive outcomes manifest in the impact a woman has within her family and community. In the words of former Secretary to the United Nations Kofi Annan, “There is no development strategy more beneficial to society as a whole—women and men alike—than the one which involves women as central players.”
The United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (UNSCR 1325) is an important instrument because it mainstreams gender in conflict (Cohn, 2004). The resolution outlines an agenda for women, peace, and security as it addresses the distinct and disproportionate effect of war on women (Klein, 2012). Despite its progressive nature in profiling the roles of women, the resolution is critized for its failure to sufficiently address and integrate the concerns of women in its aspirations. Therefore, this poster highlights the visible and invisible experiences of women as reflected in UNSCR 1325 of 2000.
The Security Council recognizes that peace is inextricably linked with equality between women and men…[and] that the equal access and full participation of women in power structures and their full involvement in all efforts for the prevention and resolution of conflicts are essential for the maintenance and promotion of peace and security. – Ambassador Anwarul Karim Chowdury (2000) President, UN Security Council Recent feminist efforts to engage with the United Nations (UN) Security Council could be dismissed as a futile attempt to employ the “master's tools” to dismantle the “master's house.” There is a long history of lip service by international institutions to the antimilitaristic ways of thinking that have been at the heart of women's peace movements for centuries. However unlikely it was, these efforts have borne fruit as evidenced by the Statement of the Council's President, Bangladeshi Ambassador Chowdury, on International Women's Day in 2000, linking gender equality “inextricably” with peace, the core project of the UN. The Statement was followed several months later, on October 31, by the Council's unanimous adoption of Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace, and Security. The resolution calls for inter alia the increased participation of women in decision making related to the prevention, management, and resolution of armed conflict. Although it is nonbinding, the resolution has been enormously productive. Not only has it provided the basis for strengthening institutional commitment to gender mainstreaming and continuing annual dialogue between women's peace advocates and the Security Council in New York, it has also supplied leverage for many grassroots women's groups to claim a role in peace negotiations and postconflict decision making.
The United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD) is an autonomous agency that engages in multi-disciplinary research on the social dimensions of contemporary problems affecting development. Its work is guided by the conviction that, for effective development policies to be formulated, an understanding of the social and political context is crucial. The Institute attempts to provide governments, development agencies, grassroots organizations and scholars with a better understanding of how development policies and processes of economic, social and environmental change affect different social groups. Working through an extensive network of national research centres, UNRISD aims to promote original research and strengthen research capacity in developing countries. Current research themes include Crisis, Adjustment and Social Change; Socio-Economic and Political Consequences of the International Trade in Illicit Drugs; Environment, Sustainable Development and Social Change; Integrating Gender into Development Policy; Participation and Changes in Property Relations in Communist and Post-Communist Societies; and Political Violence and Social Movements. UNRISD research projects focused on the 1995 World Summit for Social Development include Rethinking Social Development in the 1990s; Economic Restructuring and Social Policy; Ethnic Diversity and Public Policies; and The Challenge of Rebuilding War-torn Societies. A list of the Institute's free and priced publications can be obtained from the Reference Centre.
In this paper, I examine the dilemmas of over a decade of efforts by feminist peace and human rights advocates to engage with the UN Security Council. These efforts have born fruit in the Council’s adoption of four thematic resolutions on women, peace and security – SCRs 1325 (2000), 1820 (2008), 1888 (2009) and 1889 (2009). While marvelling at the productivity of this feminist engagement with power and the new possibilities that have been opened for feminist peace activism, the paper also highlights the ‘dangerousness’ of this strategy. In particular I am concerned about the concessions that have been made in order to be ‘taken seriously’ by Council members, the further erosion of feminist ideas as they are deployed to serve the Council’s own agenda, the protective stereotypes of women that have remained dominant, and the legitimacy that the strategy ascribes to the Security Council as a protector of women and as a (hegemonic) creator of general international law. My goal is not to counsel against such dangerous liaisons because, after all, ‘everything is dangerous’ as Foucault has said, but rather to promote a deeper understanding of how feminist ideas can become the tools of powerful actors and new thinking about how this can be contested.
In October of 2000, the UN Security Council (SC) unanimously adopted Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security (WPS).2 Resolution 1325 is often called a landmark resolution because it represents the first time the SC directly addressed the subject of women and armed conflict, beyond a few passing references to women as victims, or women as a “vulnerable group.” It not only recognizes that women have been active in peace-building and conflict prevention but it also recognizes women’s right to participate — as decision-makers at all levels — in conflict prevention, conflict resolution, and peace-building processes. Further, it calls for all participants in peace negotiations “to adopt a gender perspect-ive,” and “expresses its willingness to incorporate a gender perspective into peacekeeping operations.” Gender perspectives, in this context, are taken to include attention to the special needs of women and girls during disarmament, demobilization, repatriation, resettlement, rehabilitation, reintegration, and post-conflict reconstruction, as well as measures supporting local women’s peace initiatives. Resolution 1325 recognizes that women are disproportionately victimized in wars and calls upon all parties to armed conflict to take special measures to respect women’s rights, to protect women from gender-based violence, and to end impunity for crimes of violence against women and girls. It calls for gender training for peacekeepers and others involved in peace operations. And it calls for better representation of women throughout the UN system itself.
Cynthia Enloe's riveting new book looks at the end of the Cold War and places women at the center of international politics. Focusing on the relationship between the politics of sexuality and the politics of militarism, Enloe charts the changing definitions of gender roles, sexuality, and militarism at the end of the twentieth century. In the gray dawn of this new era, Enloe finds that the politics of sexuality have already shifted irrevocably. Women glimpse the possibilities of democratization and demilitarization within what is still a largely patriarchal world. New opportunities for greater freedom are seen in emerging social movements - gays fighting for their place in the American military, Filipina servants rallying for their rights in Saudi Arabia, Danish women organizing against the European Community's Maastricht treaty. Enloe also documents the ongoing assaults against women as newly emerging nationalist movements serve to reestablish the privileges of masculinity. The voices of real women are heard in this book. They reach across cultures, showing the interconnections between military networks, jobs, domestic life, and international politics. "The Morning After" will spark new ways of thinking about the complexities of the post-Cold War period, and it will bring contemporary sexual politics into the clear light of day as no other book has done.
This study quantitatively tests the relationship between state militarism and domestic gender equality. International relations literature on the impact and potential impact of women on foreign policy suggests that women are more peaceful in that they are less likely than men to support the use of international violence. Other research indicates that a domestic environment of inequality results in state militarism on the international level. Both lines of inquiry suggest that a domestic environment of equality between women and men would lead toward greater state pacifism, and four hypotheses are developed to test this relationship. The Militarized Interstate Dispute dataset is used with hostility level as the dependent variable to measure the level of militarism employed by any given state to resolve international conflicts. Independent variables for gender equality include percent women in parliament, duration of female suffrage, percent women in the labor force, and fertility rate. Several control variables (alliances, contiguity, wealth, and democracy) are added to the multivariate logistic regressions, and all four hypotheses are confirmed. This study substantiates the theory that domestic gender equality has a pacifiying effect on state behavior on the international level.
This essay highlights but then refuses a dominant urge within extant applications of political philosophy to the Troubles: the urge to prescribe ‘solutions’ to ‘the Northern Irish problem’. The argument presented here is that this urge can be seen as constitutive of the very problem presumably most analysts seek to overcome. The aim, therefore, is to explore alternative approaches to representations of conflict drawing on aspects of the work of William Connolly, Jacques Derrida, and Michel Foucault. Ultimately, I hope to demonstrate how a deconstructive approach might open up new possibilities for critical intervention into ‘the Troubles’ in a way that avoids merely reproducing the main fissures of conflict.
We know, most notably through Ted Gurr's research, that ethnic discrimination can lead to ethnopolitical rebellion–intrastate conflict. I seek to discover what impact, if any, gender inequality has on intrastate conflict. Although democratic peace scholars and others highlight the role of peaceful domestic behavior in predicting state behavior, many scholars have argued that a domestic environment of inequality and violence—structural and cultural violence—results in a greater likelihood of violence at the state and the international level. This project contributes to this line of inquiry and further tests the grievance theory of intrastate conflict by examining the norms of violence that facilitate a call to arms. And in many ways, I provide an alternative explanation for the significance of some of the typical economic measures—the greed theory—based on the link between discrimination, inequality, and violence. I test whether states characterized by higher levels of gender inequality are more likely to experience intrastate conflict. Ultimately, the basic link between gender inequality and intrastate conflict is confirmed—states characterized by gender inequality are more likely to experience intrastate conflict, 1960–2001.
Cet article evoque le processus qui a conduit a l'enterinement de la resolution 1325 des Nations Unies concernant la protection des femmes et leur reconnaissance dans la participation au maintien de la paix. L'A retrace ici les etapes qui ont conduit le Conseil de Securite a prendre en consideration les femmes et leurs combats pour la paix dans les conflits armes
The essay seeks to problematize the recent UN discourse on gender, peace and war by demonstrating how modernity sets the limits for the discourse, and therewith confines the discourse to the pre-given binary categories of agency, identity and action. It engages in an analysis of modernity and the mode of thinking that modernity establishes for thinking about war and peace. It is demonstrated in the text that new thinking on post-Westphalian conflicts and human security did open up a discursive space for thinking about gender in peace operations, but this space has not been fully utilized. By remaining within the confines of modernity, the UN discourse on peace operations produces neoliberal modes of masculinity and femininity where the problem-solving epistemology gives priority to the ‘rationalist’ and manageralist masculinity and renders silent the variety of ambivalent and unsecured masculinities and femininities
Peace-building is now a major aspect of the work of international institutions. While once the international community aimed simply to maintain a ceasefire and restore some form of stability in conflict zones, since the early 1990s there has been increasing attention given to creating peaceful and democratic societies through international intervention. A common problem in international peace-building projects over the past decade has been the position of women, particularly their limited involvement in the institutional design of peace-building strategies and the possibility that peace-building may actually reduce local women's agency in society. This article discusses the modern enterprise of peace-building and identifies international legal principles that can serve as a framework for peace-building projects in which women's lives are taken seriously.
This article introduces the main themes that underpin this special issue, namely representations of the conflict in Northern Ireland. Overall a primary aim of this collection is to problematize how the conflict has conventionally been represented, particularly through scholarly work. A central reason for doing this is the suspicion that conventional analyses of the conflict, especially in the context of the persistent search for solutions, may be partly constitutive of the very problems that analysts seek to resolve. Deploying contemporary political theory, the article discusses the vexed relationship between the production of scholarly work and the impact of this work on matters of social and political significance. It then goes on to illustrate one way in which conventional analysis works to mask the functions of a crucial site of political antagonism – gender. This is demonstrated through the examination of a scholarly text and through an analysis of the electoral failure of the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition.
A case study of the Mozambican conflict is used to illustrate the need to integrate a gender perspective which is historically grounded and which encompasses social relationships between women and men rather than the existing 'impact of conflict on women' approach. This is demonstrated first by examining ways in which postcolonial states have continued constructions of gender which assign women to the private/domestic sphere and then by establishing how security in Southern Africa has been mediated by gendered constraints, whether in peace or war. The specific character of the Mozambican conflict is summarised, as are its outcomes in terms of gender relations which have intensified women's vulnerability. This is then related to an examination of the nature of some of the major humanitarian responses to the Mozambican emergency, where there was a wide divergence between stated policies on gender and practice. It is argued that this 'gender gap' is being perpetuated in some aspects of the reconstruction phase, despite women's enormous contribution to the task of rebuilding Mozambican society.
This radical new analysis of international politics reveals the crucial role of women in implementing governmental foreign policies, be it Soviet Glasnost, Britain's dealings in the EEC, or the NATO alliance. Cynthia Enloe pulls back the curtain on the familiar scenes - governments restricting imported goods, bankers negotiating foreign loans, soldiers serving overseas - and shows that the real landscape is less exclusively male. "Bananas, Beaches and Bases" shows how thousands of women tailor their marriages to fit the demands of state secrecy; how foreign policy would grind to a halt without secretaries to handle money transfers or arms shipments; and how women are working in hotels and factories around the world in order to service their governments' debts. Enloe also challenges common assumptions about what constitutes "international politics."She explains, for example, how turning tacos and sushi into bland fast foods affects relations between affluent and developing countries, and why a multinational banana company needs the brothel outside its gates. And she argues that shopping at Benneton, wearing Levis, working as a nanny (or employing one) or planning a vacation are all examples of foreign policy in action. Bananas, Beaches and Bases does not ignore our curiosity about arms dealers, the President's men or official secrets. But it shows why these conventional clues are not sufficient for understanding how the international political system works. In exposing policymakers' reliance on false notions of "feminity" and "masculinity," Enloe dismantles a seemingly overwhelming world system, exposing it to be much more fragile and open to change than we are usually led to believe.
Study submitted by the Secretary-General pursuant to Security Council resolution 1325
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