Women, Peace, and Security in Africa: An Agenda beyond a Place at the Peace Table?

Abstract

Already in 1993, the forerunner of the African Union (AU), the Organization of African Unity (OAU, 1963–2001), was instrumental in establishing what became known as the Women, Peace, and Secu-rity (WPS) agenda. This theme was further developed by the 4th United Nations World Conference on Women (Beijing, 1995) and finally led to the adoption of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (2000) on the role of women in the prevention, management, and resolution of conflict. Since then, two debates have dominated the field: (1) the prevention of sexual violence against women and children in armed conflict and post-conflict situations and (2) the full, equal, and effective partici-pation of women at all stages of peace processes. In practice, the AU Panel of the Wise was key to establishing institutions and launching related AU policies. In 2014, the Office of the Special Envoy on Women, Peace, and Security (OSE WPS) was established, a five-year Gender Peace and Security Pro-gramme (GPSP) was launched, and the African Network of Women in Conflict Prevention and Peace Mediation (FemWise-Africa) was founded. This working paper reviews the development and relevance of the WPS agenda in the wider field of non-military AU conflict interventions.1 In the next section of the paper, the emergence of the international WPS norm is briefly discussed. In the third section, the institutionalization of the WPS agenda by the AU is reconstructed. In the fourth section, the management of the agenda is examined. And, finally, the implementation of the WPS agenda is analysed with an empirical view on (1) women participation in peacebuilding and (2) recent debates around sexual harassment, abuse, and exploita-tion. This is followed by conclusions. 1 For a background, see U. Engel, “African Union Non-Military Conflict Interventions”, in: F. Onditi et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Diplomatic Thought & Practice in the Changing World, London: Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming 2023.

Biographical Note

Ulf Engel (SFB 1199 & Leipzig University, Germany)

Ulf Engel is the professor of politics in Africa at the Institute of African Studies, Leipzig University (Germany). He is also a visiting professor at the Institute for Peace and Security Studies at Addis Ababa University (Ethiopia) and a professor extraordinary at the Department of Political Science at Stellenbosch University (South Africa). Since 2006 he is advising the AU Peace and Security Department (as of 2021: Political Affairs, Peace and Security) in the fields of conflict prevention, early warning, and preventive diplomacy. Currently, he is coordinating a research network fi-nanced by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) on African non-military conflict interven-tion practices (see https://ancip-project.de).