With this publication, the Women Peacemakers Program (WPP) aim to contribute to the many conversations and debates that will be taking place during coming months, assessing the impact of UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325 and accompanying Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Resolutions of the past years. Last year, the United Nations Security Council adopted UNSCR 2122, and reiterated its intention to convene a High-level Review in 2015 to assess progress in implementing UNSCR 1325 (2000) at the national, regional and global levels.

Upon the UN Security Council’s adoption of Resolution 1325 — which provides an important recognition of the crucial role that women have to play in processes of conflict prevention, resolution and peacebuilding, as well as the specific impact of war on women’s and girls’ lives — WPP was pleased to see an increase both in the amount of interest about the resolution and in the number of activities taking place around it, both at the level of civil society and at the governmental level. However, to many working in field of WPS today, it is clear that the actual implementation of UNSCR 1325 faces many challenges. To name a few: there is little to celebrate in terms of women’s participation in peace negotiations and peace agreements.

Though some progress has been made in the adoption of UNSCR 1325 national action plans (NAPs) and in terms of legal and judicial reforms in some countries; implementation is often not enforced. Conflict related sexual violence as a deliberate weapon of war still occurs on a large scale and with impunity.

Over time, WPP have observed a trend that got us concerned as a women’s peace movement. To a large extent, implementing UNSCR 1325 seems to be interpreted as being about fitting women into the current peace and security paradigm and system; rather than about assessing and redefining peace and security through a gender lens.

This publication is a testimony to the increasing number of people — women and men — who are challenging the norms bestowed upon us. They are linking the dots and showing us how militarization is coming at us from many angles — including entering the private sphere through IT and financial services. This reality not only requires activists to enter new domains of work; it simultaneously urges us all to keep on pushing for a transformative agenda in all these spaces, if real peace and security is to have a chance.

Table of Contents

Introduction …………………………………………….. 3
by Isabelle Geuskens

Understanding Militarism, Militarization, and the Linkages with Globalization | Using a Feminist Curiosity
by Cynthia Enloe

Women’s Agency against Guns …………………………………………….. 10
by Jasmin Nario-Galace

Money, Masculinities, and Militarism | Reaching Critical Will’s Work for Disarmament ……………………………… 14
by Ray Acheson

Challenging Militarism in the Pacific | Women’s Efforts for a Peaceful Region ……………………………… 18
by Sharon Bhagwan-Rolls

Gender and Security Sector Reform | A First Step in the Right Direction, or Gender Mainstreaming Gone Wrong? ………………… 22
by Merle Gosewinkel and Rahel Kunz

No Statues, But Courage Still …………………………………………….. 27
by Shelley Anderson

“And the Enemy Was in Us” …………………………………………….. 30
by Rubén Reyes Jirón

Feminist Antimilitarism | Patriarchy, Masculinities and Gender Awareness in Antiwar Organizing ……………………… 33
by Cynthia Cockburn

A Note on Gender and Militarism in South Asia ……………………………. 36
by Dina Siddiqi

Claiming the Rights of Indigenous People in South Asia | Exposing the Effects of Militarization ……………………………… 41
by Sumshot Khular

The Founding Template | Male-Female Relations ………………………………. 44
by Valerie M. Hudson

Masculinities and Militarism, Academics and Activists …………………………………………….. 47
by Åsa Ekvall

Men’s Struggles for Gender Equality | Take Them with a Pinch of Salt ………………………………. 49
by Netsai Mushonga

Making it Personal | Unlearning Militarism in Kenyan Slums ………………………………… 52
by Dola Oluoch

Breaking Down the Effects of Militarization | Youth, LGBT and Queer Communities and Societal Tolerance …………………….. 55

An interview with Andreas Speck by Laura Eggens – Militarized Parenthood in Israel ………………………… 58
by Ruth L. Hiller

Gendered Conflict Prevention as a Strategy for Peace …………………………………………….. 62
by Gesa Bent

Women Beyond War | Employing Successful Alternatives to Militarism …………………………………. 66
by Ashley Armstrong

Imagining a Feminist Internet | Addressing the Militarization of ICTs …………………………………………….. 70
An interview with Nadine Moawad by Sophie Schellens

Financial Surveillance of Civil Society | The Missing Link in Discussing Our Enabling Environment ………………………………. 73
by Lia van Broekhoven

Financing for the Implementation of National Action Plans on UNSCR 1325 | Critical for Advancing Women’s Human Rights, Peace and Security ……………. 78
by Natalie Raaber

16 Days Campaign | Highlighting Linkages with Militarism ………………………………. 82
by Zarin Hamid

2014 International Directory of Organizations ……………………………… 85

You can read the interview with Nadine Moawad “Imagining a Feminist Internet: Addressing the Militarization of ICTs” here or download the interview in pdf format here

Nadine Moawad is a feminist organizer based in Beirut, Lebanon. Between 2009 and 2011, she conducted research for EROTICS on internet regulation in Lebanon, and she now coordinates the global EROTICS project with the Association for Progressive Communications (APC), which explores the intersections of sexual rights and the Internet.

Year of publication

2014

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