Women, Peace, and Security: Beyond institutionalization and towards internalization

This October marked the 25th anniversary of the adoption of the United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325. This pioneering resolution advanced the idea that women’s human rights in conflict and post-conflict reconstruction was a matter of international peace and security. Additionally, UNSCR 1325 paved the way of the social construction of the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) global normative agenda.

What has transpired in the last 25 years in regard to WPS?

GLOBAL INSTITUTIONALIZATION
First, at the level of the United Nations (UN), there were nine subsequent resolutions after UNSCR 1325. With a total of 10 resolutions, the discursive frames are twofold. First are the agentic-centered resolutions that focus on women’s participation; the second is oriented towards the vulnerabilities and victimization of women, particularly to sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) in armed conflict and post-conflict situations.

Second is the drafting of National Action Plans (NAP) WPS. NAPs are policy frames that set forth priorities on operationalizing national and international commitments. These are mostly National Government strategies that define the implementation of women’s participation and protection of their rights in conflict and post-conflict contexts. Since 2005, over 100 countries have crafted their respective NAP WPS. Additionally, Regional Action Plans (RAP) WPS have also been crafted at the level of regional organizations such as the European Union, Arab League, African Union, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). These are commitments on how the WPS agenda will be implemented and concretized at the regional level.

And third, WPS can now be measured through Georgetown University’s Institute WPS Index that looks into women’s inclusion, access to justice, and security. In 2023-24, the top 10 countries were Denmark, Switzerland, Sweden, Finland, Iceland, Luxembourg, Norway, Austria, The Netherlands, and New Zealand, while the bottom 10 were Iraq, Somalia, Eswatini, the Syrian Arab Republic, Burundi, South Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, Yemen, and Afghanistan. In the ASEAN, the same report ranked the following member states: Singapore (15th), Thailand (52nd), Malaysia (64th), Vietnam (78th), the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (79th), Cambodia (110th), the Philippines (121st), and Myanmar (165th).

However, given the progress of the WPS global normative agenda, it is still disappointing that actual data have not fully reflected the realization of WPS commitments. For example, according to the Council on Foreign Relations, in the span from 2015 to 2019, only 14% of negotiators, 11% of mediators, and 7% of signatories of peace agreements were women. If we are to believe Ahmad and Tank’s claim that “women’s participation in peace processes can improve outcomes before, during, and after conflict,” then we should demand increasing women’s participation in peace negotiations.

THE PHILIPPINE EXPERIENCE
The Philippines takes pride as a country that included women negotiators in the peace negotiation with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). According to UN Women, Professor Miriam Coronel-Ferrer, the chief Philippine government negotiator, was also credited to have been “the first female chief negotiator in the world to sign a final peace accord with a non-state armed group.” Quoting Professor Coronel-Ferrer from her book entitled We Chose Peace: An Insider’s Story of the Bangsamoro Peace Talks, “[A]s a woman in the talks, I could not but shoulder the responsibility for other women. I got looked upon as somebody who will carry their cares, as women, and as human beings in a community made weary by war.” This was but an illustration that women inspire other women to be part of the peace negotiations.

Other women have been part of peace processes at the grassroots level. They become part of conflict mediation and resolution in their own communities.

In connection with WPS, Professor Coronel-Ferrer said, in a conversation with Hana Salama of the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR), that the normative agenda “created awareness that there should be additional voices in the room, specifically those of women… raised the issue of responding to women’s needs in conflict and post-conflict situations by including gender-specific provisions in peace agreements.”

At this point, it is important to remember the Philippines was the first country in Asia that launched a NAP WPS in March 2010. Since then, it has had several iterations: 2010-2016, streamlining the NAP 2014-2016, 2017-2022, and 2023-2033. In its current iteration, the Philippine NAP WPS has four substantive pillars, namely, empowerment and participation; protection and prevention; promotion and mainstreaming; and monitoring, evaluation, accountability, and learning (MEAL).

Women’s involvement in the peace process has always been an integral part of the NAP WPS. As its impact statement stated, the NAP WPS “is committed to transforming the peace and security landscape of the Philippines by guaranteeing equitable access to vital resources and opportunities to women in all their diverse and intersecting identities, leading to their substantive and meaningful representation, participation, and leadership in decision-making of the country’s peace and security policies and programs.” This is the current policy promise.

THE CONTINUING PUSH
However, inasmuch as there have been gains in the past 25 years, there are also emergent threats to the realization of WPS.

According to Wittwer, the global backlash against the human and equality rights of women advanced by states and multilateral security organizations may sideline the WPS agenda: “[C]ommemoration, therefore, must not be self-congratulatory; it must be a reckoning for the future.” In other words, 25 years later, WPS must continue to push forward in a sense that it should continue to demand the realization of women’s rights in conflict and post-conflict situations in various fronts and spaces.

Beyond institutionalization, current practices need to be internalized by various actors and no backtracking on commitments forged in the last 25 years. It should reach a point where it is not challenged as a matter of policy and as a matter of reality. We should reflect on current and emergent conflict and violence, demonstrate the resolve to end them, and further strategize to ensure that women are an imperative part of sustainable peace.

In this regard, the Philippines, as an identified WPS norm entrepreneur in the region, must continue the push towards internalization and remain a champion of the WPS agenda.

Ma. Lourdes Veneracion, Ph.D. is the chairperson of the Department of Political Science, Ateneo de Manila University

mlveneracion @ateneo.edu