from Canterbury, United Kingdom
Introduction
‘Women can and must play a leading role in political participation, conflict resolution and the transition from conflict to peace’. With this statement, Head of UN Peacekeeping Hervè Ladsous emphasized the importance of promoting gender equality and achieving more effective solutions in restoring fractured societies. With Resolution 1325, the UN officially proclaimed itself in favour of incorporating gender analysis into its field-based operations. However, the application of the latter remains characterised by holistic approaches that continue to promote stereotypical gender roles and the subordination of female peacekeepers. Despite the rising awareness that the shift from national security to human security in global politics has opened new channels through which women can actively participate (Hudson 2015), the field of international peace and security remains male-dominated.
If we look at the number of female peacekeepers in 2017, only 3% (out of 125.000 military personnel) is involved in the military and 10% constitutes UN police corps (UN 2017). As a result, policies and existing literature on PKOs have for long ignored the role of women and gender approaches. Instead, they have simply considered as main indicators for operational success, the mandate performance, the facilitation of the conflict resolution, the conflict containment, and the number of casualties (Bratt, 1996; Brown, 1993). This exclusionary character towards women has been investigated, in these past few years, as being one of the main causes of the failures of PKOs in terms of increasing levels of sexual exploitation, HIV/AIDS, and sexual violence. Yet, the different interpretations of the causes and effects of such exclusion have led to a divide in feminist academic works.
Holistic approaches to gender integration
Supporters of essentialist theories argue that women are essentially more peaceful, emotional, and caring, thus not suited for the brutality and violence of conflicts (Gutmann 2000). DeGroot (2001) has emphasized the idea of gender integration in the military as something effective due to the evolving nature of modern warfare in which states deploy their troops for peacekeeping or disaster relief reasons. The mandates of humanitarian missions have started requiring essentialist gender stereotypes, including “a gentle nature, conciliatory attitude and the ability to control aggression” (Degroot, 2001: 24). Because male UN peacekeepers are rarely trained for the function of peace support, the presence of female soldiers can lead to more effective peacekeeping operations which could be characterized by a decrease in the assertion of male dominance and resemble more civilian society (DeGroot 2001).
Similarly, the UNSCR 1325 implied that the rationale for including women in peacekeeping was that their stereotypical gender roles would improve the behavior of male peacekeepers in a conflict setting and, reduce recurrent episodes of sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) against the local population. However, no significant correlation was found between the mere inclusion of female personnel and a decrease in cases of HIV/AIDS and prostitution. On the other hand, studies have shown that a higher number of military peacekeepers- from countries with better levels of gender equality- are correlated with lower incidents of SEA allegations against male peacekeepers (Karim and Beardsley, 2016). As Hunnicutt (2009) argues, the variations of patriarchy across the social landscapes are correlated with low levels of physical security for women. And, on average, individuals, from more patriarchal societies, deployed in PKOs are more likely to perpetrate SEA (Karim and Beardsley, 2016).
The militarization process
As Cynthia Enloe argues “a peace that involves sexual exploitation and sexual violence is no peace at all” (Enloe, 1993:35). In this sense, also those PKOs that are generally considered a success or, at least, a moderate success, such as UNTAC in Cambodia (Bratt, 1996), have lost their credibility once the crimes committed by peacekeepers emerged. Accordingly, the deployment of 17,000 military personnel on 23,000 peacekeepers into a country with a weak rule of law only led to high inflation, a rise in prostitution to service UNTAC peacekeepers, the increase of HIV/AIDS cases, and several allegations of SEA offenses (Whitworth, 2004).
This leads us to question the legacy of militarization and whether the very presence of soldiers is the appropriate solution to promote peace. On the one hand, many have argued that UN peacekeeping missions are qualitatively different from state military or even humanitarian interventions. Here, we do not see the deployment of troops for the purpose of national goals but rather in the name of ‘The Responsibility to Protect’. As the UN seems to increasingly authorize the use of offensive force as a mean to protect civilians and the personnel deployed take on a more active role in the conflict setting (Karlslurd 2015), PKOs have become indirectly more entrenched with militarism meaning that the differentiation between the military culture of international peacekeeping and that one of conventional soldiering have become less evident. Militarism is then fueled by racism, unrestrained capitalism, and authoritarian states (Cockburn and Enloe, 2012).
Construction of male military masculinities
The absence of this differentiation seems to suggest that the presence of soldiers implies a high risk for violence against their UN female peacekeepers colleagues and local populations. This is attributed to the artificial construction of militarized masculinities (Goldstein,2001). These are defined around “a culture’s need for brave and disciplined soldiers” (Ibid, 2001:283). For PKOs, a UN soldier’s military identity is formed in their respective patriarchal countries. In most cases, the militarization process occurs as a “celebration and reinforcement of some of the most aggressive, and most insecure, elements of masculinity” (Whitworth 2004:3). The recruit’s individuality is replaced with hypermasculine traits that favor his complete subordination to the institution he is called to represent (Whitworth, 2004).
Karim and Beardsley (2016) describe the presence of episodes of sexual abuse and violence as the result of an ‘identity crisis’. The latter is triggered when the male peacekeeper is expected to fulfill some tasks, such as the promotion of human rights and the organization of elections, that are not usually in line with robust approaches learned during his military training. It is important to note, however, that the presence of soldiers who do not commit SEA is evidence of the fact that there must be other explanations to the causes of these violent episodes.
A postcolonial contribution to peacekeeping
As a narrative of power, peacekeeping is exclusionary for some groups. Those who do not recognize this struggle over meaning are the same ones that on several occasions have considered women as being ‘beside the point’ (Whitworth, 2004). The same discourse was behind the thinking of resolution 2242 which legitimized Western counter-terrorism strategies as a way to protect women’s rights. The lack of a postcolonial approach has simply reproduced political violence and terrorism in countries with a colonial legacy. In these cases, the UN has not employed gender as a tool to challenge this structure of power. On the contrary, gender was simply used to reproduce Western dominance (Heathcote, 2018).
If we consider the Somalia Affair, the torture, and murder of Shidane Arone can be interpreted as one of the potential violent outcomes of modern PKOs. Postcolonialism highlights the construction of superior middle-power nations who have the duty to bring civilization and discipline to the barbaric third world (Razack, 2004). According to Razack (2004), this narrative has become prevalent with the introduction of humanitarian missions in the aftermath of the Cold War. Western humanitarian interventions did not take into account their historical role in colonialism and the promotion of disintegration and violence. Razack explains the Somalia Affair as a “peacekeeping trauma” which transforms the peacekeeper- through the confrontation with so much ‘savagery’- into the traumatized victim of the story. This is the reason why such violent actions become soon forgotten with the emergence of new stories highlighting the heroism and traumas of peacekeepers in ‘saving’ these countries.
Postcolonial contribution to gender approaches
Razack’s unveils the narratives of power inherent in peacekeeping operations. However, he does not offer practical steps to increase their effectiveness in terms of reducing SEA and other forms of violence. His contribution implies that the UN liberal feminist approaches neglect the legacy of colonialism that shapes international laws and perpetuates an exclusionary discourse of power. And within this framework, UN feminist approaches risk to make gender a tool for domination and civilization (Heathcote, 2018)
On the other hand, a feminist postcolonial analysis considers the “peripheral” as a concept that can raise awareness of marginalized groups. In particular, on “those voices located in the peripheries of global affairs and are rendered peripheral to the work of women, peace, and security dialogues despite their connection to the policies and outcomes at the local level” (Heathcote 2018: 392). In other terms, a postcolonial critique acknowledges the socio-cultural and historical determinants of women’s local realities where PKOs are deployed. Only with the awareness that the UN reproduce structures of gender determined by its own gender expectations, it becomes possible to promote international peace and security in a way that recognizes the transformative features of gender perspectives. More importantly, in a way that allows women to become the main contributors to the political and legal changes and overcome the narrative that women need to be saved by gender experts.
Towards a better future?
In 2019, Resolution 2493 demonstrates some concrete advances in the understanding of women’s role in PKOs and nuanced focus on context-specific approaches. In regard to the former, there is an important shift in the use of terminology. Whilst Resolution 1325 still considers women as victims (often compared to children) Resolution 2493 recognizes women as fundamental actors to foster international peace and security. Furthermore, the latter emphasizes the importance of regional organizations as tools for the identification of practical steps for the implementation of the WPS agenda. Yet, also this resolution does not mention gender training as mandatory requirements for recruitment. This would enhance the understanding of the local gender situation and improve soldiers’ effectiveness at creating peace as a result.
A gender training should promote an androgynous soldier identity which advocates for the inclusion of feminine qualities to the professional figure of the soldier. In order to ensure compliance of TCCs with the ‘zero-tolerance policy’ the UN should improve the accountability of peacekeepers who commit human rights violations. The UN Model Memorandum of Understanding established a legal regime to maximize the accountability of the perpetrators and the involvement of the UN in the investigations. Yet, it remains difficult for the UN to exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction as it is the TCC’s decision to enable the UN to conduct on-site court-martial (Deen-Racsmány, 2011). As a result, the UN should encourage member states to adopt domestic laws that allow them to intervene in the investigations and persecution.
Conclusion
To conclude, this essay has argued that the mere inclusion of women in the military peacekeeping personnel does not increase the likeliness of PKOs. Increasing the success of peacekeeping operations means assessing the negative effects of militarization which consists of the construction of toxic masculinities. The mandates of peacekeeping missions are not in line with the aggressiveness and the hypermasculine attributes that soldiers are expected to develop during the recruitment. Ultimately, this can lead to an identity crisis that can take the form of SEA and other human rights violations. Finally, the postcolonial critique enriches the argument of militarization with an understanding of local realities and of the narratives of power inherent in PKOs.
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Autore dell’articolo*: Ginevra Canessa. Studentessa in Politics and International Relations, BA (Hons), University of Kent (Regno Unito). Addetta alle questioni di Global Gender Justice del Think Tank.
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