Reconstruction and Peacebuilding

The Reconstruction and Peacebuilding theme focuses on the application of a gender perspective to peacebuilding. The response of local, national, and international systems to women’s priorities in post-conflict situations can significantly impact stability and development.

The realisation of women’s right to full participation in preventing, resolving and recovering from conflict, is critical to building sustainable peace and the fulfilment of human security. Furthermore, the response of local, national and international systems to women’s priorities in post-conflict situations, can significantly impacts the stability and development of communities.

The engagement of women in early stages of peacemaking can increase gender analysis in post-conflict planning, lead to improved outcomes for women, and enhance their capacity to participate in longer-term peacebuilding. However, women’s rights and concerns should not be dependent on the presence of women in peace processes. Systems must be in place to ensure their inclusion is standard operating procedure.

In SCR 1325, the Security Council recognises that addressing the unique needs of women and girls during post-conflict reconstruction requires integrating a gender perspective at all stages (1325,OP8). The Security Council acknowledges the need to counter negative societal attitudes regarding women’s equal capacity for involvement, and calls for the promotion of women’s leadership and support for women’s organizations (1889,OP1). In addition, the Security Council requests training on the protection, rights and needs of women in all peacebuilding measures (1325,OP6).

To achieve this, the Security Council tasks the Secretary-General to report on challenges and make recommendations relevant to the participation of women and gender mainstreaming in peacebuilding and recovery efforts (1888,OP19). In response, the Secretary-General issued a report on women’s participation in peacebuilding in 2010. The report details the challenges obstacles women must confront in participating in recovery and peacebuilding efforts, and advocates for a Seven-Point Action Plan to respond to these challenges.


First, the plan calls to increase women’s engagement in peace processes and to address gender issues in the context of peace agreements. Secondly, the plan urges for the inclusion of gender expertise at senior levels in the UN’s mediation support activities. Thirdly, the plan notes that, while the international community cannot control the gender composition of the negotiating parties, it must investigate strategies for the inclusion of more women. Fourthly, the plan calls for the establishment of mechanisms to ensure that negotiating parties engage with women’s civil society organisations. The Action Plan’s fifth commitment involves increasing the proportion of women decision makers in post-conflict governance institutions. The sixth point addresses rule of law, emphasising the importance of issues such as women’s access to justice and a gender perspective to legal reform. The Action Plan’s seventh commitment is concerned with women’s economic empowerment. The Action Plan’s implementation remains the challenge.

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ZIMBABWE: Gender and security sector reform

IT is both ironic and tragic that policy debates on the need to reform the security sector in post-conflict societies such as Zimbabwe do not address gender-based injustices, especially the trials and tribulations of women in conflict situations, yet at the turn of the 21st Century, a lady parliamentarian invigorated this critical debate.

AFRICA: Africa Embraces its Women

By Ellen Johnson Sirleaf


Monrovia. Of the world's 1.3 billion poor people, nearly 70 per cent are women. According to reports by UN Women, women perform 66 per cent of the world's work and produce 50 per cent of the world's food, yet earn only 10 per cent of the world's income and own only one per cent of land.

KENYA: Kenyan Women Set to Take On Men in Elections

Brian Ngugi interviews Winnie Lichuma, chairwoman of the National Gender and Equality Commission.

As Kenya gets ready for voter registration this month, ahead of the country's Mar. 4, 2013 polls, women's rights organisations are hoping that the provisions for gender equality in the new constitution will mean significantly increased representation in the government.

SOUTH SUDAN: South Sudan Women End Consultations on Policy Framework

Championed by the Ministry of Gender and Child Welfare, the consultations brought the UN family organizations dealing in gender issues, other organizations and the South Sudan civil society women activists in the country for the validation of the document.

KASHMIR: Kashmir Women Seek Justice in Mounting Cases Surrounding 'The Disappeared'

On August 30, 2012 on the eve of International Disappearances Day, numerous Kashmir families took a pledge that they would fight the legal battle to prove that enforced disappearances in Kashmir have occurred over the past two decades. Women who have husbands or sons who are part of the ‘The Disappeared' have also promised they would continue to work and not shy away from bringing justice forward.

SOMALIA: The Launch of a Policy Brief On Women's Rights Within the Somali Provisional Constitution

IIDA Women's Development Organization today launched a policy brief report detailing how Somali women's two decades of struggles have been crystalized in the Provisional Constitution.

PAKISTAN: Many Swat Women Share Misery

Several of them are regular visitors to Peshawar High Court where their respective cases have long been pending.

They usually book a van in Swat to reach Peshawar and once in the provincial capital, they stay together for hearing into their cases.

ZIMBABWE: Zimbabwe Women Fight For Rights In New Constitution

For long Zimbabwean women have played second fiddle to their male counterparts in all spheres of life but a new constitution is set to change all this.

The new constitution contains the equality and non-discrimination clause, making it different from the current Lancaster house constitution, agreed in London in 1979 and amended 19 times since independence in 1980, where equality rights are not clearly stated.

SOMALIA: Somalia is revamping its police force and cracking down on crime

In 1979, newly recruited policewoman, Asha Hassan Hussein, was the first female to ride a police motorcycle to patrol the streets of Mogadishu. Three decades later in a nation devastated by conflict, now a Captain, Asha specialises in tackling violence against women as head of the Somali Police Force's (SPF) Gender Based Violence Department.

ARMENIA: 100 Years Later Armenian Women Continue to be Haunted by Genocide

In a searing, impact-filled letter written to Swiss Armenian woman filmmaker Suzanne Khardalian, human rights activist Odette Bazil reached out to reveal her insights to the hidden depth and true story of countless Armenian women who faced atrocity during years of cultural genocide. It revealed the same suffering described in Khardalian's 2011 debut film “Grandma's Tattoos.”

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