How and When has SCR 1325 (2000) on Women, Peace and Security Impacted Negotiations Outside the Security Council?

Security Council resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security was unanimously adopted in October 2000 under the Presidency of Namibia. This thesis examines how and when norms contained in that resolution have been diffused from the Security Council to
other security arenas, using negotiations on landmines, small arms and nuclear weapons as case studies.

Opening with ten preambular paragraphs covering a broad range of principles, the resolution's eighteen operational paragraphs address the narrower set of issues on the Security Council agenda. Despite this fact, the resolution has had a broad impact outside the Security Council, largely due to the advocacy of civil society actors working in cooperation with sympathetic governments and UN agencies. Holding governments accountable to their own rhetoric, NGOs have played a leading role in generating awareness and linkages between this Security Council resolution and other international and national policy making arenas through their persistent presence, research and advocacy.

Weapons negotiations have been more resistant to gender equality norms and mainstreaming efforts than policy arenas focused on peace agreements, post-conflict peace-building, reconstruction or elections. Feminist IR theory has illuminated why this resistance is not surprising; what requires explanation is the fact that inroads have been made. Using regime theory, feminist IR theory and analysis of the increasing role and impact of NGOs, working collaboratively with UN agencies and sympathetic governments in international negotiation, this thesis examines the limited but significant diffusion of gender norms in these more hostile policy environments to determine the conditions under which norms are
diffused.

The dependent variable for this paper is disarmament negotiating fora, the independent variable is resolution 1325, and the intervening variables are the strategies and impacts of NGOs working with sympathetic governments and UN agencies.