Women Peace And Security E News October 2018

18 Years After: Where does the Security Council stand on Women, Peace and Security?

By Abigail Ruane and Marina Kumskova, WILPF’s Women, Peace and Security Programme 

Security Council Unanimously Adopts Resolution Calling for Participation of Women in the Prevention, Management, and Resolution of Conflict (Photo: UN Photo/Milton Grant)

This month marks the 18th Anniversary of United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325 and the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Agenda. 

18 years after UNSCR 1325, where are we now? 

Although it is easy to be frustrated at the slow rate of change, we were reminded this week that it is important to recognise our successes.

Today, discussions on peace and security -- at least in some spaces -- have an increasingly political edge. Aside from humdrum talking points on “protecting women-and-children” or adding “women”, international discussions are increasingly raising issues of power and coercion that are naturalised through gendered roles. At one event with diplomats earlier this week, one panelist affirmed that, “an unswerving commitment to feminist principles and practices should guide WPS implementation and accountability”. 

These calls for political rather than technical change are increasingly recognised in the formal UN discussions. This year’s report from the UN Expert Group Meeting on Women’s Meaningful Participation affirmed that “Institutionalized patriarchal and militarised systems...are one of the most basic and persistent barriers to women’s meaningful participation in efforts to resolve conflict.” Building on this, this year’s Secretary-General’s WPS report affirms that “we must begin to pay greater attention to the continuum of violence … [t]his includes assessing and addressing violent masculinities and the gender-specific impacts of harms”. 

At the same time, every step forward faces two steps back, and independent women’s voices remain more critical than ever. 

As pointed out by Razia Sultana in her April 2018 statement at the Security Council open debate on Sexual Violence in Conflict, rape was systematically planned and used as a weapon against Rohingya people in Myanmar for years, yet “the Security Council has failed us”. This crisis should have been prevented if the warning signs since 2012 had not been ignored and women’s experiences were taken seriously by the Council.

In countries such as Palestine, women peace leaders have brought attention to how military occupation, surges of violence and lack of accountability, coupled with increased politicisation of humanitarian assistance, have disastrous gendered impact. Yet despite women’s leadership in demanding accountability, the Security Council remains chronically blocked on key crises.

18 years after women civil society successfully pushed to create UNSCR 1325, women peace leaders continue to be the driving force on Women, Peace and Security. Whether crossing the demilitarised zone in the Korean Peninsula or rebuilding communities in Colombia, the feminist peace movement continues in its pioneering leadership for action that disarms violence and ensures women’s meaningful participation, livelihoods and justice.

If the Security Council is to deliver on its mandate to maintain international peace and security in a way that works for women - and men, it must support actions that do not just end active conflict but build sustainable and democratic peace, with local women’s leadership and rights at the core. 

Next week at the UNSCR1325+18, we will work with local partners to demand holistic and effective action on women’s meaningful participation by amplifying experiences of women and women’s groups and putting them at the centre of peace work.

Join us in demanding that the international community steps up!