Peacebuilding and reconstruction
Gender, peace and peacekeeping: lessons from Southern Africa
Is violence against women during conflict on the decline?
Authors:
A. Pillay
Publisher:
Institute for Security Studies, South Africa, 2005
This document discusses the relationship between gender and peacekeeping in Africa. It draws on evidence from two Southern African peacekeeping experiences: the United Nations Observer Mission to South Africa (UNOMSA) and the Organisation Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC)
The author argues that conflict is, amongst other things, a motor of transformation. Conflict, though fraught with gender-based violence, presents an opportunity for women to seek to change from existing gendered power relations. However, while it is undeniable that profound and positive changes in the status and roles of women have occurred in the past 50 years in all spheres of human life, violence against women continues in all parts of the world.
Some of the key lessons include:
- if we are serious about peace then we are also serious about gender equality and the way forward is far beyond the declarations, instruments and incorporation of gender perspectives
- it is time to take big steps, to look deeply into the bedrock of what holds society together and to unearth the issues that lie beneath the surface
- encouraging and training society to critique, question and discard harmful practices must be done boldly, without fear of stepping on sacred ground. The longer we delay, the more women die.
