UN peacekeeping missions tend to frame conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV) narrowly both in terms of who its victims are and who is best placed to address it. The victims of CRSV are usually assumed to be women and girls, and there is often an expectation that women peacekeepers will be better able to address CRSV […]
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While only a small percentage of men become involved in violent extremism, the majority of violent extremists are men. Across the ideological spectrum, violent extremist and terrorist groups exploit male sentiments of emasculation and loss of power and appeal to ideas of manhood in their recruitment efforts. Yet policymakers rarely focus on gender to help […]
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There are several common assumptions about how women peacekeepers may impact public opinion in the countries from which they deploy. Women peacekeepers may boost public support for peacekeeping by increasing the perceived legitimacy of peacekeeping missions. They may also boost public support for women’s rights by challenging norms around the roles women should perform. Finally, […]
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On May 18th, IPI’s Women, Peace, and Security team hosted a virtual policy forum on “Perceptions of Women Peacekeepers.”Policymakers and scholars claim that women peacekeepers will improve the credibility and legitimacy of peacekeeping operations. However, public perceptions of women peacekeepers can vary greatly across contexts, and assumptions that women will improve perceptions of peacekeeping operations […]
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While all UN multidimensional peacekeeping operations are mandated to prevent and respond to conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV), the missions in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and South Sudan, as well as in the Central African Republic, are also mandated to protect civilians from sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV). While SGBV is often used […]
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From May 3-5, IPI’s Women, Peace and Security Program co-hosted a three-day workshop with the Dallaire Institute for Children, Peace and Security. The workshop, titled “Gender, Childhood, and Community Engagement in Peacekeeping,” took place at the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC) in Accra, Ghana.Community engagement is essential for UN peacekeeping missions; however, practical […]
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It is commonly assumed that the main threats to uniformed peacekeepers originate from outside of peacekeeping missions. However, many women (and some men) deployed as military or police peacekeepers are subjected to sexual abuse by other members of the organizations they serve. Until now, there has been little research specifically focused on this sexual abuse […]
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Initiatives to increase gender equality or implement the women, peace, and security agenda in peace operations routinely fail when they lack support from leadership. Gender-responsive leadership is thus essential to the UN’s efforts to promote gender equality in UN missions and the countries where these missions are deployed. While the phrase “gender-responsive leadership” is not […]
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On January 11th, IPI’s Women Peace and Security team hosted a virtual policy forum to launch the recently published policy paper, “From Female Engagement Teams to Engagement Platoons: The Evolution of Gendered Community Engagement in UN Peace Operations.”This forum featured panelists who discussed the paper’s findings and policy recommendations for UN military decision makers and […]
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The military components of UN peacekeeping operations have used engagement teams (ETs) to conduct community engagement activities since at least 2015. While ETs were initially ad hoc initiatives, the UN has recently begun to institutionalize gendered community engagement, including through an ongoing shift from ETs to engagement platoons (EPs). Yet despite a general recognition that […]
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