INTERNATIONAL: Women and Men Building Bridges for Peace

“It is important to build bridges, not only to connect different government ministries or women's organizations but also across all the sectors and areas of responsibility to connect different stakeholders in different countries to reach our goal for the full implementation of the Resolutions on women peace and security.”

Martha Rubiano Skretteberg, director of Norwegian NGO FOKUS, reminded the participants of the UN-INSTRAW and FOKUS international conference of the need for NGOs, government ministries, UN officials, militaries, researchers to establish a common language and understanding to exchange good and bad experiences to reach our goal for the full implementation of the UN Security Council Resolutions 1325, 1820, 1888 and 1889 on women, peace and security. The bridges built at the event “Putting Policy into Practice: Monitoring the implementation of UN Security Council Resolutions on Women Peace and Security,” which took place in Oslo, Norway from 11 to 13 November, resulted in strong contextual developments, where participants called for context specific actions as well as in specific policy recommendations.

Gry Larsen, State Secretary of the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, opened the conference by speaking about the importance of full protection, prevention and promotion of the rights of women in line with the Resolutions.

The conference resulted in several recommendations from the over 140 representatives of international women's organizations, networks, the United Nations and governmental organizations who participated in the event. While acknowledging the Secretary-General's call for the development of global indicators to measure the implementation of the resolutions, participants stressed the need to take context into account in the formulation of monitoring and evaluation frameworks. Participants worked in small groups to identify actual indicators for women's protection, representation and participation at national, regional and local levels.

In addition, participants suggested key resources, challenges and capacities that would improve the on the ground ability to implement the resolutions. Key among these identified needs were:

• Improved networking collaboration and information sharing mechanisms;

• Greater emphasis on capacity-building for national-level reporting instructions;

• Integration of gender as a cross-cutting and multi-sectoral issue;

The event addressed the need for local level actions to back up international commitments. Representatives from several of the 16 countries who have publicly released National Action Plans (NAP) on Resolution 1325 shared their recommendations for improving the scope and function of the plans. UN-INSTRAW presented a forthcoming study documenting good practices and lessons learned in developing these National Action Plans. The participants in the discussions of NAPs placed emphasis on garnering resources for developing and implementing plans in a way that is inclusive, collaborative and widespread. Several attendees note that an NAP is only useful when it is known and owned by the members of the community and throughout the government. This is one step towards improving on the ground implementation of international commitments.

“By bringing together actors across countries, institutions and backgrounds we can begin to address the crucial link between policy developed at Headquarters and its full implementation at the local and national levels,” highlighted Kristen Cordell of the Gender Peace and Security Programme at UN-INSTRAW.

The upcoming tenth anniversary of SCR 1325 next year will be a watershed year for evaluating the process on security for women around the world.

“As SCR 1325 floats upwards and into the haze of bureaucracy and language of governments, we must take care not to lose the most important elements of the Resolution. To me, the issue of widening peace processes to include non-state actors as partners in the process is profound, fundamental and world-changing,” said Sanam Anderlini, of Massachusetts institute of technology and the International Civil Society Action Network.

The event will have several next steps, as suggested by the participants themselves, such as improved and dynamic information sharing with input and resources for improved monitoring. A new platform for exchange, hosted by UN-INSTRAW, will allow sharing of best practices, and improved planning of collaborative efforts. As a response to the request for improved lobbying materials for Monitoring and Indicator work, FOKUS and INSTRAW will produce a fact sheet to inform stakeholders on the importance of improved evaluation processes. Finally a fully conference report will be available at the end of December and available on the INSTRAW website.