On Action Plans and Anniversaries

Under the heading of More Encouraging News, two more countries have made progress in the last few weeks on National Action Plans for the implementation of UNSCR 1325 in the past few weeks!  On October 5^th, Canada’s foreign minister, Lawrence Cannon announced Canada’s Action Plan for the Implementation of UN Security Council Resolutions  on Women, Peace and Security (full plan available here in PDF).  After being a strong force behind the development of 1325, Canada’s action plan demonstrates its continued commitment to protecting and empowering women in armed conflict and through peace and reconstruction processes.  While there is no new money attached to the action plan, the actions and indicators are strong, measurable and time-bound.  Moreover, the process of developing the action plan, though rapid, was refreshingly inclusive as input from civil society and other experts – including yours truly – was sought at a number of key points.  In my opinion, the document is much better for it and the government should be congratulated in this regard.

Not to be outdone, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton announced earlier this week that the United States will develop its own National Action Plan, using the indicators set out in the Secretary General’s report on Women, Peace and Security.  Given the US’ continued importance in global affairs, having their leadership on this issue is extremely important and likely to both draw further attention to the challenges women face in conflict and post-conflict situations, as well as encourage other countries to draft their own action plans.

For those of you who aren’t quite as immersed in the women, peace and security milieu as some of us, you may be wondering why all the fuss now?  Well, this Sunday, Oct 31^st, isn’t just Halloween (in some parts of the world), it’s also the tenth anniversary of 1325 and a time for reflection on what we have accomplished in the last decade, a time to celebrate our achievements to date and a time to gather our strength to address the enormous challenges we still face in the decades to come.

At Centre Stage

Apologies for  the lack of posts on the blog of late — I’ve been busy working on something inspiring!

At the Margins of Security Sector Reform: Gender and Informal Justice

Last week, the results of six months of research and organizational effort took centre stage and performed beautifully!  At a policy roundtable on issues “At the Margins of Security Sector Reform: Gender and Informal Justice” (co-hosted by NSI and CIGI), Research partners Victoria and Caroline presented the preliminary results of our research project to a group of policymakers, academics and civil society representatives in Ottawa.  Representatives from local universities as well as the Canadian development agency, foreign ministry, justice ministry, interior ministry and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police engaged with our colleagues on questions around the challenges donors face in meeting the language requirements of police trainees, differences in levels of corruption between male and female police officers and the links between DDR and police reform.

Technical aspects of research aside, we were also treated to a conversation

Participants listen attentively to presentations from African partners' presentations via videoconference.

with two female police officers, Jartu from Liberia and Martha from Southern Sudan.  From them, we learned of their motivations for joining the police – employment in Jartu’s case, to reduce crime in Martha’s – and how their families reacted to their career choices.  In a demonstration of the power of women even in challenging situations, Martha’s comment about how she told her future husband that she wasn’t going to be dominated by a man brought a smile to everyone’s face!  Martha and Jartu answered questions from the audience on morality laws in Sudan, recruitment of women into policing and how community members respond to policewomen on patrol.

Participants learned about new work that the Geneva Centre for Democratic

DCAF's Kristin Valasek answers questions while I listen intently and moderate the debate.

Control of Armed Forces and the Centre for International Governance Innovation are leading on surveying how ECOWAS countries have integrated a gender perspective into their main security institutions and the interface between SSR and “informal” justice systems, respectively.  DCAF’s preliminary results reminded us that while many countries’ policies and practices are largely gender-blind, some countries could serve as role models even for developed countries on issues such as break time for nursing mothers.  The CIGI-led panel on “informal” justice systems led to lively debate around entry points to working with “informal” structures and reconciling (or not) international human rights principles with the need to contribute to improving the lives of people living in conflict-affected contexts.

Missed the event?  Not to worry!  Victoria and Caroline’s presentations are available on our website and a short video of presentation highlights will be posted in the coming weeks.  For those of you eager to sink your teeth into something more substantial, our research reports are currently being finalized and we plan to have a small book ready for distribution late this year or early in 2011.

Watch this space!

News reel

A number of stories have caught my North-South eye over the last couple of weeks.  Also, I’m busy trying to a) overcome the summer doldrums, b) plan for an event in the fall, c) continue contributing to the refinement of Canada’s National Action Plan on 1325, and d) being distracted by this, this, this, this and, most happily, this.  All of which means I’m not spending a lot of time thinking about bloggable stuff.

Instead, I present to you the North-South Jennifer news reel of interesting and related (to the blog, not each other) news items:

1.  An Anonymous Colleague pointed out that I should have given more credit to the Government of Canada and its various agencies in their promotion of gender equality in response to these two stories:

Canadian CO relieved of Kandahar duty (CBC)

Canadian Commander in Haiti relieved of duty (CBC)

OK, it was a fair point and the system is clearly working.  That said, a number of things occurred to me today, such as:

• how many of these instances go unreported/undetected?
• what would have been the response to a relationship between two men or two women? (i.e. is this about power, gender, sex, control, hierarchy or some combination of them?)
• what more can be done on the prevention side of this equation?

2.  Any thoughts on the implications of this for Canada’s support for SSR overseas?

Top RCMP staff complain about boss (CBC)

3.  One sympathises with the sentiment of the following, while of course not endorsing wholly their tactics…

Wear a pink sari and carry a big stick (Slate)

Think Pink.

To quote a respected professor, Questions? Comments? Outrage?

Out of the frying pan, into the fire.

Just back from two weeks’ of hard-earned vacation, largely spent trying to think of anything other than work – even intrepid researchers need a break! – and the first piece of news I read this morning was this:

Sexist cartoons pulled from military teaching materials

The Long Haul, or SSR: not just for developing countries!

I came across this story a couple of days ago and it reminded me that security system reform is a process that goes on not only in conflict-affected countries, but also in those countries that are models of human development, even if it doesn’t go by the name “SSR”.  This raises two points for me. The first is about humility.  I think it’s good to be reminded that our security institutions aren’t perfect and that at times they – like their counterparts in other countries, developed and developing – fail those people who are most vulnerable and most need their protection.  It’s good to be reminded that we need to continuously monitor, evaluate and develop our own institutions rather than become complacent and turn a blind eye to inadequacies in the system.  And, I think that is especially something to remember when we want to help other countries – who are trying to create security in vastly different socio-historical contexts than our own – by sending our personnel to assist in developing their security institutions.

The second point is about the challenge of doing that.  Earlier today I participated in an experts’ consultation on the development of a Canadian National Action Plan on UNSCR 1325 (2000) on Women, Peace and Security.  1325 was the first UN resolution to acknowledge the specific roles that women play in conflict and the resolution of conflict.  It calls on member states to develop national action plans for its implementation.  To date, fewer than 20 states have completed their action plans.  Since 2000, 1325 has been reinforced by three other resolutions, 1820, 1888 and 1889.  But enough about that, my point is more about the conversation on Canada’s action plan which brought out how challenging it is to develop this kind of policy tool and get it approved by four different government ministers – the bureaucracy alone is astounding, let alone fostering the political will in the civil service, in government and in Canadian society at large.  Turning that into something which can be sustained over the long term is even more challenging.

So, if we think we have it bad in the developed world, just think about how challenging these processes would be in a developing country that has few resources, ongoing low-level conflict, widespread poverty, systemic illiteracy, unclear legal frameworks, weak institutions, etc, etc, etc.

No wonder SSR is a long-term process.

Seeing the forest and the trees

In a superb counterpoint to my trip to Africa working on women and policing, I spent the last week at the Peacebuilding and Development Institute at American University in Washington, DC, taking this course, on women and peace processes.  The curriculum, developed and implemented by the wonderful folks over at the Institute for Inclusive Security, takes you through peace negotiations, DDR and SSR, transitional justice and strategic planning for peace activities.

One of the ways the course structure helps make those connections is by inviting AU and other students as well as practitioners to participate.  In our course, we had people working on peace and reproductive rights in Pakistan, peacebuilding in Kenya, peace and development in Sri Lanka, women and peacebuilding in Liberia and others who – though currently students – brought perspectives from Ethiopia and Ghana.  AU runs the program every year on issues beyond the one-week class that I took.  I highly recommend it and hope to go back in the future!

After the rollercoaster and messiness that Liberia and Sudan were at times, this was a refreshing way to get back into a focused, structured analysis and begin to make sense of what I and my research partners learned during our interviews and focus groups.  The course structure was focused on participation and learning from each other.  Students and facilitators shared their personal experiences in very powerful ways, relating, to quote one, “how my country died” and the impact of armed conflict on women and women’s bodies.  All of which very much helped to facilitate linking those micro-level processes that our policy research focuses on and the larger, interconnected struggles (both formal and informal) for peace and equality that are going on as I type this.  And, most importantly, those inspiring and quite personal stories from my classmates and the opportunity to be challenged and to reflect on the bigger picture renewed my commitment to these issues and the importance of development research.

In a superb counterpoint to my trip to Africa working on women and policing, I spent the last week at American University in Washington, DC, taking this course, on women and peace processes.  The curriculum, developed and implemented by the wonderful folks over at the Institute for Inclusive Security, takes you through peace negotiations, DDR and SSR, transitional justice and strategic planning for peace activities.

One of the ways the course structure helps make those connections is by inviting AU and other students as well as practitioners to participate.  In our course, we had people working on peace and reproductive rights in Pakistan, peacebuilding in Kenya, peace and development in Sri Lanka, women and peacebuilding in Liberia and others who – though currently students – brought perspectives from Ethiopia and Ghana.  AU runs the program every year on issues beyond the one-week class that I took.  I highly recommend it and hope to go back in the future!

After the rollercoaster and messiness that Liberia and Sudan were at times, this was a refreshing way to get back into a focused, structured analysis and begin to make sense of what I and my research partners learned during our interviews and focus groups.  The course structure was focused on participation and learning from each other.  Students and facilitators shared their personal experiences in very powerful ways, relating, to quote one, “how my country died” and the impact of armed conflict on women and women’s bodies.  All of which very much helped to facilitate linking those micro-level processes that our policy research focuses on and the larger, interconnected struggles (both formal and informal) for peace and equality that are going on as I type this.  And, most importantly, those inspiring and quite personal stories from my classmates and the opportunity to be challenged and to reflect on the bigger picture renewed my commitment to these issues and the importance of development research.

Reflections

I know a lot of people who travel a lot.  Seasoned travelers, particularly when they’re irritable and jetlagged, get tired of answering the same question over and over, usually an excited “what was the best part of your trip?!”  So, to shake things up I sometimes ask people, what was the worst part of your trip? (And then I ask them what was the best part!)

Consequently, the extremes of any give trip are something I think about regularly.  This time around, now that I’ve recovered from being violently ill and am determined not to think on it any more (and, it could have been a lot worse), I think the worst part is the disappointment that comes with the inability to overcome prejudices despite one’s best efforts at openness, transparency and engagement.

I’m still processing the whole experience, but suffice to say that on a couple of occasions, I was met with very plain resistance to answer truthfully the questions I and my research partner were asking.  I don’t want to speculate about why or what might have contributed to that reaction and I can certainly – as I’ve mentioned before – understand the reluctance to be free with one’s trust after having lived through a civil war.  But perhaps it’s exactly because it was so infrequent and in such stark contrast to the willingness to share both information and experiences that we received from the vast majority of the people we met with that makes it rankle a bit.  And the positives – all the best parts of the trip – in addition to our research method (which means we’re not reliant on only one source for data) more than make up for it.  In fact, the response in itself is interesting data and, I think, speaks volumes about how long it takes to reestablish trust and consolidate peace in a society.

On the other side of the balance sheet – the best parts – is a list far too long to include here, but I will share two of the major highlights.  The first is about getting to work closely with two inspiring young female researchers and being able to provide them with a modest opportunity to work on these issues, broaden their networks and really lead on some cutting edge work.  The sense of empowerment that we all got from working on the project was only expanded by the second highlight which was having the value and importance of this modest project reinforced just about every day. Whether through the words of one of our interlocutors or through witnessing or hearing about an incident, we were reminded daily of the need to better understand how women and the police interact in these societies and how that interaction might be improved so that women in conflict-affected contexts have the space – in terms of a range of opportunities and a safe space in which to pursue them – to fully realize their rights.

So, Dear Reader, I give you the extremes of my three weeks in Africa.  What falls between them is voluminous and I hope that, through this blog, I’ve given you some insight into the challenges faced in parts of these societies as well as the value and importance of development research.  Now that I’m back in the office, my goal is to blog once or twice a week.  The gender and police reform project is by no means over, so I’ll certainly post more about how that progresses.  Thanks again for your comments and please don’t hesitate to get in touch if you have any questions!

All the best,

North-South Jennifer