Hybrid Workshop: In person and online on 26 – 27 January 2023.
National Action Plans for the global Women Peace and Security (WPS) agenda have now been created for 98 states across the world and implementation is increasing year-on-year. However there remains a significant lack of data on how the WPS Agenda is being realized globally. While there are an increasing number of case studies related to the implementation of the Women Peace and Security (WPS) agenda at local levels, there remains little cross-fertilization and knowledge accumulation in this field.
Empirically the WPS agenda has evolved from a focus on conflict situations to application across multiple governance challenges: The responsibility to protect (R2P); protection of civilians (POC); countering violent extremism and counterterrorism; and transitional justice; climate change; disaster risk reduction and recovery (DRRR); internally displaced persons (IDPs); and indigenous rights. Prior research has shown that in the implementation of WPS, various factors inhibit women’s participation including: differences in knowledge construction of WPS at the international and local levels; over-reliance on expert knowledge from the global north by development and humanitarian agencies; and insufficient political commitment by states.
With the support of a network grant from Global Transformations and Governance Challenges Programme at Leiden University, we will host a workshop on this topic at Leiden University on 26 – 27 January 2023. This will be in hybrid format, both in person and online. It will bring together academics working on the Women Peace and Security Agenda to address the following interrelated questions:
- What do WPS implementation processes look like at the local level?
- What ideas and assumptions on the one hand, and resource constraints on the other drive WPS implementation processes?
- How are new norms and institutions created by this process?
- What conditions challenge WPS implementation?
A key focus will be how local communities and organizations respond to and make sense of larger policy changes and how, in the process of implementation, WPS policies are adapted to local contexts.
The workshop is open to scholars who work on WPS implementation in the Global South. Applicable regions will be Sub-Saharan Africa, MENA, South Asia, Asia Pacific and Latin America and the Caribbean and we strongly encourage local applicants with regional expertise. Submissions from varied academic disciplines are encouraged including: history, area studies, gender studies, anthropology, international relations, international law, comparative politics and political science. Empirical topics can include the environment, the economy, justice and the rule of law, transitional justice, and human security. Contexts of particular interest will be: criminal activity, environmental destruction [natural or human-made], disaster response and recovery, post-conflict societies and militarised societies.
Conference paper
For the workshop itself you will be required to present a conference paper of up to 5000 words outlining an argument or piece of research related to the topic of ‘Localizing the WPS Agenda’. Please submit to Dr Vanessa Newby, on [email protected] before 17:00 (CET)on 30 September 2022.
- An abstract (maximum of 300 words)
- Your contact details and institutional affiliation
- A short bio of no more than 100 words.
More information about this research project can be found here. If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to contact Vanessa Newby by email.
