Gender and Peacebuilding
Programme
Evolving out of the global campaign, Women
Building Peace: From the Village Council to The Negotiating Table, and informed
by discussions with partners, policy makers and others in the external environment,
the Gender and Peacebuilding Programme plans, over the next three years,
to shift its focus and direction from overtly campaigning on women’s
issues to more of a focus on gender dynamics.
Thus, while continuing its attempts to integrate and mainstream the perspectives
of women into the global agenda on peace and security issues, there will
be an additional focus on working with men on these issues, identifying men
and organisations that are also working to advance equality for women and
their integration into peace and security issues.
The programme is comprised of two interlinked and interdependent projects
- the Gender Peace Audit Project that
works at the local, national and regional level and the Global
Policy Project that focuses on the international and regional policy
level. These two projects work in synergy to promote gender sensitive and
gender aware policies rooted in local realities.
Aim
The
Gender and Peacebuilding Programme aims to highlight women’s
positive role and contribution to peace building and to
encourage the international community to comply with, and
implement the international resolutions and commitments
relating to women, peace and security.
Objectives
The Programme seeks to:
1. Influence the policies and practices of international, regional and national peace and security institutions to make them more responsive to women's security and peace building needs.
2. Facilitate
women's access to international, regional and national policy
makers in order to influence policy formulation and implementation
to better reflect their perspectives on peace and security.
3. Contribute to a better understanding and increased visibility within the
international community of women's peacebuilding work, the challenges they
face and the perspectives and expertise they offer.
The research
and national and regional consultations undertaken in the Gender
Peace Audits inform International Alert's global policy work.
This ensures that policy recommendations and strategies are based
firmly on the practical experiences, perspectives and real needs
of women in conflict regions. It is intended that this work and
findings will feed into policy and practice development at the
international, regional and national levels.
Principles:
The
Gender and Peacebuilding Programme is underpinned by 7 strategic
principles:
- Evidence based policy advocacy
- Persistent and informed policy dialogue with all relevant stake-holders
- Constructive engagement and organic change
- Creation of strategic coalitions of like-minded organisations to deliver a strong message
- Recommendations developed from existing better practice and lessons learned
- Creating spaces for those affected by conflict to present their own experiences
- Simultaneous focus on agenda setting and reactive responses
Methodology and Approach
We adopt a ‘two-way advocacy channelling’ approach. This involves the in-depth regional and national Gender Peace Audit work being integrated and communicated in such a way as to make it accessible and relevant to policy makers and practitioners. At the same time, our work at the global policy level is disseminated to women’s organisations at the local level through national and regional consultations. We frame international policies on women, peace and security in the context of local, national and regional issues, which are relevant to local actors in peace building, to promote their implementation at the national level.
Gender issues have often been ignored in the formulation of policies on security. Our aim is to integrate a gender perspective into international security policies and strategies, including small arms, security sector reform, peace support operations and peace negotiations. We will expand the more traditional definition of security by integrating considerations of the structural, physical, psychological and context specific aspects of security.
The
current programme is framed within the context of United Nations
Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security.
We advocate for the practical implementation of Resolution 1325,
highlighting its relevance to policy makers and practitioners,
and strengthening its use as an advocacy tool and as a basis for
project research. To secure an effective interface between policy
and practice, the outcomes of the Gender Peace Audit will feed
into our global policy work both in research documents and in developing
inputs for the adoption of a follow-up resolution to 1325.
Activities
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Policy advocacy and lobbying through research, dissemination of publications and the organisation of policy events that are either conducted unilaterally or in strategic alliance with like-minded partners.
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Consultations at policy and practice levels to elicit concerns affecting women’s peace and security, locating key issues in existing policies, highlighting gaps and developing policy recommendations for policy makers and practitioners.
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The development of tools for monitoring the implementation of global, regional and national policies and building women’s capacities for engaging in peacebuilding activities.
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Monitoring for accountability through consultations.
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The systematic documentation and analysis of women’s peacebuilding know-how.
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Awareness raising and resource sharing where the outputs of the interlinked programmes are continuously disseminated through this website and electronic updates are provided to different interest groups of stakeholders through listserves.
Focus
Regions/Countries
Current:
-
Africa (Horn and West Africa)
-
South Asia (Nepal, Sri Lanka)
-
Caucasus (North & South)
- Latin America (Colombia)
- Central Asia (Afghanistan)
Planned:
-
Africa (Horn)
-
South East Asia (Indonesia and The Philippines)
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Latin America (Colombia)
-
South Pacific (Bougainville & Solomon Islands)
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