Women, Gender and Peacebuilding

YesJoel Joffe Trus

'What is wrong with men?': Revisiting violence against women in conflict and peacebuilding

yesMuch has been written about the high rates of rape and other forms of violence against ‘enemy’ women in wartime, and sustained violences against women in post-war contexts. Research on violence against women, recognised as a problem for peace and development and even a threat to international security, has begun to identify and explain contrasts between different locations. The explanations focus on men, their behaviour and ‘masculinities’, some of which, and even some military codes, may even proscribe such violence. By contrast, research on the mental health of male former combatants, and possibly other male survivors of war trauma, suggests that there is a strong risk of them perpetrating violence specifically against women, even in cases where the highest standard of veteran care is expected, but without much explanation. This article considers what potential there is in this topic for lessons in peacebuilding policy and identifies areas for future research

Gender issues in post-war contexts: A review of analysis and experience, and implications for policies

This book is concerned with what happens to women when wars officially end. Along with several other volumes it recognises that women face particular difficulties at such ¿aftermath¿ moments which often have very strong continuities with what happened during wars, and with the nature of gender relations in society prior to armed conflict. At the international level remarkable progress has been made; in establishing women¿s legal rights; in the identification of sexual violence as a potential war crime, and even progress in some women¿s abilities to access such legal frameworks. Nonetheless, when faced with a post-war backlash from men and the state, women in highly varied cultural contexts tend to face distinct difficulties as they seek justice for crimes committed against them during and after wars; when they attempt to participate in ¿truth and reconciliation¿ endeavours, and when they attempt to re-build their lives. This book explores how far we have come both through international frameworks and in particular countries, and examines the ways in which the endings of war still often bring highly gendered challenges for women which are themselves often violent

Peace and Justice through a Feminist Lens: Gender Justice and the Women’s Court for the Former Yugoslavia

Post-conflict interventions to ‘deal with’ violent pasts have moved from exception to global norm. Early efforts to achieve peace and justice were critiqued as ‘gender-blind’—for failing to address sexual and gender-based violence, and neglecting the gender-specific interests and needs of women in transitional settings. The advent of UN Security Council resolutions on ‘Women, Peace and Security’ provided a key policy framework for integrating both women and gender issues into transitional justice processes and mechanisms. Despite this, gender justice and equality in (post-)conflict settings remain largely unachieved. This article explores efforts to attain gender-just peace in post-conflict Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). It critically examines the significance of a recent ‘bottom-up’ truth-telling project—the Women’s Court for the former Yugoslavia—as a locally engaged approach to achieving justice and redress for women impacted by armed conflict. Drawing on participant observation, documentary analysis, and interviews with women activists, the article evaluates the successes and shortcomings of responding to gendered forms of wartime violence through truth-telling. Extending Nancy Fraser’s tripartite model of justice to peacebuilding contexts, the article advances notions of recognition, redistribution and representation as crucial components of gender-just peace. It argues that recognizing women as victims and survivors of conflict, achieving a gender-equitable distribution of material and symbolic resources, and enabling women to participate as agents of transitional justice processes are all essential for transforming the structural inequalities that enable gender violence and discrimination to materialize before, during, and after conflict

Globalisation and Democracy: International Donors and Civil Society in Zimbabwe.

NoThirteen chapters examine contemporary political and economic problems in Africa, analyzing causes and suggesting alternatives. Presented by editors from the U. of Central Lancashire (UK), the articles reject much of the self-serving explanations proffered by Western corporate elites and African autocrats for African problems, locating the root causes in lack of democracy at both national and international levels. Specific topics include international donors and civil society in Zimbabwe by Donna Pankhurst, implications for African export policies of misconceptions about the "world market," French foreign policy towards Africa, imperialism and Sub-Saharan Africa, and multinational peacekeeping operations in Africa

Gendered Peace: Women's Struggles for Post-War Justice and Reconciliation.

NoThis volume contributes to the growing literature on women, conflict and peacebuilding by focusing on the moments after a peace accord, or some other official ending of a conflict, often denoted as `post-conflict¿ or `post-war¿. Such moments often herald great hope for holding to account those who committed grave wrongs during the conflict, and for a better life in the future. For many women, both of these hopes are often very quickly shattered in starkly different ways to the hopes of men. Such periods are often characterized by violence and insecurities, and the official ending of a war often fails to bring freedom from sexual violence for many women. Within such a context, efforts on the part of women, and those made on their behalf, to hold to account those who commit crimes against them, and to access their rights are difficult to make, are often dangerous, and are also often deployed with little effect. Gendered Peace explores international contexts, and a variety of local ones, in which such struggles take place, and evaluates their progress. The volume highlights the surprising success in the development of international legal advances for women, but contrasts this with the actual experience of women in cases from Sierra Leone, Rwanda, South Africa, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, East Timor, Peru, Central America and the Balkans.

Women and Politics in Africa: The Case of Uganda

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Gender Dimensions of Group Violence

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