This article is part of the series—Raisina Edit 2022.

---

The world is on the cusp of a third World War. As of the beginning of April 2022, Russia’s invasion into Ukraine is running into its fifth week, displacing more than 10 million and killing thousands, including civilians, women and children.  Similar armed conflicts have been witnessed in recent years in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, and Yemen. While some were civil wars, others were acts of aggression by one country over another. What was common was the disproportionate risk of death, displacement, violence, and exploitation inflicted on women. Yet, women remain the least represented in decisions on peace and security. As per the Council on Foreign Relations, between 1992 and 2019, women constituted on average, 13 percent of negotiators, 6 percent of mediators, and 6 percent of signatories in peace processes around the world. This comes despite evidence of a positive correlation between gender equality and lower propensity for conflict between and within states. 

< style="color: #0069a6;">Women in peacekeeping and security roles often have easier access to marginalised populations and are able to strengthen intelligence gathering and evidence building. 

We can no longer ignore women’s roles as combatants, peacekeepers, and decision-makers in the peace and security agenda. Contemporary warfare demands the full participation and engagement of women — not only to mitigate the impact of armed conflict but also to reduce the propensity towards war and improve security multilateralism. Recent research proves that when women participate and engage in peacebuilding, peace agreements are more durable and better implemented, and peace accords are 64 percent less likely to fail. Additionally, women in peacekeeping and security roles often have easier access to marginalised populations and are able to strengthen intelligence gathering and evidence building.  Acknowledging women’s critical role in the peace and security agenda, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) passed a landmark resolution in 2000 that affirmed women’s position in conflict prevention and resolution, in post-conflict reconstruction and humanitarian response, and in peace negotiations and peacekeeping. The resolution urges all actors to mainstream gender in peace and security efforts, and demands that states, through their National Action Plans (NAPs), fully implement the Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC) and operationalise women’s participation and engagement in all aspects of conflict prevention, conflict resolution and state capacity building. Subsequently, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) began integrating gender perspectives across its three core tasks —collective defence, crisis management and cooperative security, and in its political and military structures. Other international organisations, including the United Nations, the European Union, Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, and the African Union have also been working towards mainstreaming the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda in their respective mandates.  Despite these efforts to institutionalise the WPS agenda in international security and cooperation, the transfer from policy to practice remains fragmented and inadequate. In light of the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine, it is only timely to urge the escalation of improved mechanisms for gender-mainstreaming security multilateralism. Formalising the WPS agenda neither necessitates widespread acceptance nor institutionalises robust implementation. 

< style="color: #0069a6;">The resolution urges all actors to mainstream gender in peace and security efforts, and demands that states, through their National Action Plans (NAPs), fully implement the Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC) and operationalise women’s participation and engagement in all aspects of conflict prevention, conflict resolution and state capacity building.

To its credit, NATO has been leveraging an Effects Based Approach to Operations (EBAO) to mainstream gender perspectives in its military operations. In theory, EBAO aims to influence the perceptions, behaviour, and capabilities of all actors in the operational environment — a top-down policy approach that has been critiqued for lacking standardisation and interoperability across NATO allies. Even the awareness of the WPS agenda among the military and civilian personnel at the NATO-allied armed forces has been found to be either inadequate or generally lacking. For a trickle-down effect to take place, last mile implementation must take centre stage. It may be necessary to establish Rules of Engagement (RoE) on how gender mainstreaming is integrated at the national, provincial and local levels, and its inclusion made essential in national security strategies.  With the exception of the current Russian invasion of Ukraine, most 21st-century wars have been classified as occurring among and between civilian populations. This makes understanding the actors and their motivations, incentives, and interests far more complex, layered, and systematic. The evolving nature of war dictates that the relational dynamics between men and women be accommodated in organising military, peacekeeping, and humanitarian efforts. Violent conflict affects men and women differently and leads to differentiated consequences. A lack of adequate representation of women in peacebuilding efforts marginalises women further and exacerbates the consequences faced by them.  In calling for Regional and National Action Plans, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) saw a structured way of making gender-blind military and security institutions more gender equal, and in 2004, asked UN member states to explicitly indicate their gender mainstreaming goals in their National Action Plans (NAPs). By 2015, National Action Plans were being implemented across 17 of the 28 NATO member states, and 14 of the 40 NATO partner states. While these efforts indicate progress, NAPs adopted across NATO member and partner states have differentiated structures in addition to monitoring and evaluation mechanisms, making it challenging to coherently observe and systematically evaluate any large-scale impact. No country has identified a single ministry to implement the NAPs – responsibilities remain fragmented across ministries, making accountability difficult. Such fragmentation affects operational consistently and impacts systemic change.

< style="color: #0069a6;">The greatest flaw in the gender mainstreaming agenda is the assumption that it starts and ends with representation — improving the number of women within the military and security institutions.

Political will sits at the centre of improved inclusion and engagement of women in peacebuilding efforts. NAPs will not be effective or efficient unless resources, human and financial, are dedicated to its cause. Military institutions in particular need to be cognizant of the costs of not mainstreaming a gender imperative in all stages of their operations, from planning to monitoring. The greatest flaw in the gender mainstreaming agenda is the assumption that it starts and ends with representation — improving the number of women within the military and security institutions. But integrating a gender perspective goes beyond representation. It comes from a deeper understanding and acknowledgement of women’s historical social roles and interactions, cultural power dynamics, and the inequitable access to resources, and accommodating these crucial aspects in planning and implementing the WPS agenda in distinct cultural contexts. Increased representation will not bring any meaningful change unless political will complements an institutional capacity to deploy action plans that address the differentiated impacts on women, in a systemic and targeted manner. Gender mainstreaming should not be the concern of NATO and its allies alone, but of all nation states and multilateral organisations engaged in security multilateralism. To make gender mainstreaming innate to security multilateralism will require a careful curation of standardised routines, plans, and assessments that consistently draw out holistic goals to improve participation, engagement, and inclusion of women in all aspects of the peace and security agenda. Additionally, standardisation must be supported with customisation. Understanding the gender norms within their sociocultural contexts is essential to meaningfully engage women, at the state and provincial levels, and to develop and implement inclusive peace and security operations. A counterargument to the women, peace and security agenda is whether the inclusion, participation, and engagement of women in peace and security operations will stop the occurrence of wars. It may. Or it may not. But it most certainly will deter the treatment of women as ‘collateral damage’.

• Gender
• Multilateralism
• European Union
• India
• Russia and Eurasia
• USA and Canada
• The Pacific, East and Southeast Asia
• LOAC
• Multilateralism
• NAP
• NATO
• security
• UNSC
• war
• Women
• WPS

The views expressed above belong to the author(s). ORF research and analyses now available on Telegram! Click here to access our curated content — blogs, longforms and interviews.