Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security

Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Editor-in-Chief: Prof. Alpaslan Özerdem | Coventry University, UK Co-Managing Editors*: Dr. David Curran | Coventry University, UK Dr. Sung Yong Lee | University of Otago, New Zealand Laura Payne | Coventry University, UK Editorial Board*: Prof. the Baroness Haleh Afshar | University of York, UK Prof. Bruce Baker | Coventry University, UK Dr. Richard Bowd | UNDP, Nepal Prof. Ntuda Ebodé | University of Yaounde II, Cameroon Prof. Scott Gates | PRIO, Norway Dr. Antonio Giustozzi | London School of Economics, UK Dr. Cathy Gormley-Heenan | University of Ulster, UK Prof. Paul Gready | University of York, UK Prof. Fen Hampson | Carleton University, Canada Prof. Mohammed Hamza | Lund University, Sweden Prof. Alice Hills |University of Leeds Dr. Maria Holt | University of Westminster, UK Prof. Alan Hunter | Coventry University, UK Dr. Tim Jacoby | University of Manchester, UK Dr. Khalid Khoser | Geneva Centre for Security Policy, Switzerland Dr. William Lume | South Bank University, UK Dr. Roger Mac Ginty | St Andrews' University, UK Mr. Rae McGrath | Save the Children UK Somalia Prof. Mansoob Murshed | ISS, The Netherlands Dr. Wale Osofisan | HelpAge International, UK Dr. Mark Pellling | King's College, UK Prof. Mike Pugh | University of Bradford, UK Mr. Gianni Rufini | Freelance Consultant, Italy Dr. Mark Sedra | Centre for Int. Governance Innovation, Canada Dr. Emanuele Sommario | Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna, Italy Dr. Hans Skotte | Trondheim University, Norway Dr. Arne Strand | CMI, Norway Dr. Shahrbanou Tadjbakhsh | University of Po, France Dr. Mandy Turner | University of Bradford, UK Prof. Roger Zetter | University of Oxford, UK The Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security is published on behalf of the Centre for Strategic Research and Analysis (CESRAN) as bi-annual academic e-journal. The articles are brought into use via the website of CESRAN (www.cesran.org). CESRAN and the Editors of the Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security do not expect that readers of the review will sympathise with all the sentiments they find, for some of our writers will flatly disagree with others. It does not accept responsibility for the views expressed in any article, which appears in the Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security. * The surnames are listed in alphabetical order. Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Vol.6 | No.1 | April 2017 Indexing & Abstracting  EconLit  Genamics JournalSeek  Index Copernicus  Index Islamicus  Peace Palace Library The Journal of Conflict Transformation and Security (JCTS) provides a platform to analyse conflict transformation and security as processes for managing change in non-violent ways to produce equitable outcomes for all parties that are sustainable. A wide range of human security concerns can be tackled by both hard and soft measures, therefore the Journal’s scope not only covers such security sector reform issues as restructuring security apparatus, reintegration of ex-combatants, clearance of explosive remnants of war and cross-border management, but also the protection of human rights, justice, rule of law and governance. JCTS explores the view that by addressing conflict transformation and security holistically it is possible to achieve a high level of stability and human security, requiring interventions at both policy and practitioner level. These would include conflict management, negotiated peace agreements, peacekeeping, physical reconstruction, economic recovery, psycho-social support, rebuilding of primary services such as education and health, and enabling social cohesion. Other macro-level governance issues from constitution writing to state accountability and human resource management also need to be considered as part of this process of change. Peer-reviewed | Academic journal By CESRAN International (Centre for Strategic Research and Analysis) Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Vol.6 | No.1 | April 2017 Table of Contents Articles 7 35 55 79 101 Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace By Eliška Jelínková Non-state Actors and the Diffusion of the Human Security Agenda By Eduardo Gonçalves Gresse, M.A. Building Human Security through Humanitarian Protection and Assistance: the Potential of the International Committee of the Red Cross By Dr. Christy Shucksmith Reassessing the Sunshine Policy in the Light of Conflict Transformation Theory By Mi-yeon Hur Field Report Navigating Identities and Emotions in the Field: a Local Researcher’s Strategies in Northern Ireland By Rachel Rafferty Book Reviews 120 123 125 127 Nick Cheesman and Nicholas Farrelly (Eds.) Conflict in Myanmar: War, Politics, Religion By Aidan Gnoth Stephanie Phetsamay Stobbe Conflict Resolution and Peacebuilding in Laos: Perspective for Today’s World By SungYong Lee Isak Svensson International Mediation Bias and Peacemaking: Taking Sides in Civil War By Prakash Bhattarai Helen Young, Lisa Goldman (Eds.) Livelihoods, Natural Resources, and Post-Conflict Peacebuilding By Christina Koch www.cesran.org CENTRE for STRATEGIC RESEARCH and ANALYSIS CESRAN Int. is a think-tank specialising in international relations in general, and global peace, conflict and development related issues and challenges. The main business objective/function is that we provide expertise at an international level to a wide range of policy making actors such as national governments and international organisations. CESRAN International with its provisions of academic and semi-academic publications, journals and a fully-functioning website has already become a focal point of expertise on strategic research and analysis with regards to global security and peace. The Centre is particularly unique in being able to bring together wide variety of expertise from different countries and academic disciplines. The main activities that CESRAN International undertakes are providing consultancy services and advice to public and private enterprises, organising international conferences and publishing academic material. Some of CESRAN International’s current publications are (www.cesran.org):  Journal of Global Analysis (biannual, peer reviewed)  Journal of Conflict Transformation and Security (biannual, peer reviewed)  CESRAN Paper Series  Turkey Focus Policy Brief  CESRAN Policy Brief  China Focus Network April 2017 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace By Eliška Jelínková* Abstract Unarmed Civilian Protection (UCP) deserves to be considered as a valid approach to peacebuilding, and gender mainstreaming should also form an essential part of all future peacebuilding efforts. This article compares the success of missions that have used armed approaches with those where UCP was employed. The benefits and limits of both approaches and their probability of achieving self-sustainability are assessed along with the factors that have contributed to successful UCP missions. All-female UCP units, a recent example of gender mainstreaming, are identified as being in a unique position to contribute to the sustainability of peace. Further, UCP is recognized as having the potential to replace an armed approach thanks to the variety of methods through which it helps to address the roots of conflicts, work towards conflict prevention, and build local resilience. Keywords: Peacebuilding, Peacekeeping, Conflict, Gender mainstreaming, Unarmed Civilian Protection, Sustainability. www.cesran.org * Eliška Jelínková has a bachelor degree in Social Sciences for Globalization from the University of Milan. She is a member of IAPSS Student Research Committee on Human Rights and Gender Studies. She is also a monthly editor for Pax Politica, an online platform for young human rights activists and peace journalists. She will start her MA in Gender Studies with a focus on Postcolonial Transitions and Transitional Justice at Utrecht University in September 2017. Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Vol. 6| No. 1 April 2017 Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security 8 Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Introduction Peacebuilding is vital in a world where the number of people in need of humanitarian assistance and protection has nearly doubled in the past decade: figures have risen from an average of 30 to 40 million people per year to an average of 50 to 70 million. The Global Peace Index, which is produced annually by the Institute for Economics and Peace, noted in 2015 that while “levels of peace remained stable over the last year *… they+ are still lower than in 2008. The indicators that have deteriorated the most are the number of refugees and IDPs *internally displaced persons+, the number of deaths from internal conflict and the impact of terrorism”;1 in fact, the only two indicators out of 23 that show noticeable improvement are those that count the number of external conflicts fought and the amount of funding being spent on UN peacekeeping.2 The nature of conflicts has significantly changed in the last 100 years, and in today’s conflicts, which are predominantly intra-state, the overwhelming majority of casualties—between 75 and 90 per cent—are women and children. Perpetrators have understood that the most effective way to break up communities, to prevent the restoration of peace, and to postpone the return of normalcy is to target women, who are still left out of most peace processes. It is essential that peacebuilding mechanisms are developed to respond to these changes in conflict and the new challenges they pose. This article begins by asking whether the current peacekeeping approach taken by the United Nations (UN) could be substituted or complemented by the approach taken by Nonviolent Peaceforce and Peace Brigades International, two organizations which engage in Unarmed Civilian Protection as an alternative method for addressing conflict. I go on to consider whether the involvement of women helps to sustain peace and whether or not the mentality with which we approach conflict has a significant impact on the outcome of the conflict itself. While conflict is inevitable, violence can be significantly reduced if armed approaches, the reliance on armed threat for deterrence, and the employment of power are replaced by an inclusive, arms-free strategy that focuses on the building of relationships and conflict prevention. In fact, the abuse of power decreases drastically if unarmed approaches are employed and multiple armed actors are excluded from the scene of conflict. The status quo of UN peacebuilding UN peacekeeping operations In 2007, the Secretary General’s Policy Committee described peacebuilding as: A range of measures targeted to reduce the risk of lapsing or relapsing into conflict by strengthening national capacities at all levels for conflict management, and to lay the foundation for sustainable peace and development. Peacebuilding strategies must be coherent and tailored to the specific needs of the country concerned, based on national ownership, and should comprise a carefully prioritized, sequenced, and relatively narrow set of activities aimed at achieving the above objectives.3 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Chart 1.1. The top 10 providers of assessed contributions to United Nations peacekeeping operations in 2013-2015. Source: United Nations http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/operations/financing.shtml Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace The first-ever UN peacekeeping mission was an unarmed military observer mission that the UN Security Council deployed to the Middle East to monitor the Armistice Agreement between Israel and its Arab neighbours in 1948. In total, there have been 71 peacekeeping operations worldwide since then, the vast majority of which have been carried out within the last 20 years. The basic principles of UN peacekeeping involve the consent of the parties involved, impartiality, and the non-use of force except in self-defence or in defence of the mandate. UN Peacekeeping has unique qualities: these include legitimacy, which stems from political consensus in the Security Council and international legality; burden sharing; and an ability to deploy and sustain the presence of troops and police drawn from anywhere around the world. UN operations are able to call on large numbers of readily available peacekeepers who are contributed by member countries on a voluntary basis to advance the organization’s increasingly multidimensional mandates. In the UN’s earliest interventions, its work involved monitoring ceasefires, setting up demilitarized zones, and ensuring post-conflict security (For the composition of UN peacekeeping forces see Charts 1.1., 1.2., and 1.3). 9 Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security 10 Chart 1.2. Total number of UN personnel in peacekeeping missions (2015) Source: United Nations http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/resources/ statistics/factsheet.shtml Chart 1.3. Uniformed personnel composition (2015). Source: United Nations http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/resources/statistics/ factsheet.shtml Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Interventions that lack impartiality might be justified in certain cases; however, they represent a dramatic shift away from the doctrine that the United Nations does not wage war. The generally agreed principle has been that UN peace operations should not include a mandate to enforce peace out­side of limited circumstances. UN forces have been expected to focus instead on assisting countries as they shift from con­flict to negotiated peace and from peace agree­ments to legitimate governance and development. These principles have been discarded at times, and the more aggressive UN missions that are required in these circumstances demand significantly more resources, management, and per­sonnel than less complex operations. Since the beginning of the 21st century, the UN has been conducting analysis of its peacekeeping experience, and it has been introducing, though not always implementing, a series of reforms to strengthen its capacity to manage and sustain peace operations. The success of peace missions should be evaluated in terms of a number of considerations which might include the sustainability of the peace that exists after the withdrawal of peacekeepers, cost-efficiency, the number of civilian and uniformed fatalities, whether the aim of the mission was achieved, and whether peacekeepers followed their code of conduct. A crucial measure of achievement for today’s multidimensional missions, which often include a high degree of collaboration with the local population, must also be that peace missions should be perceived as legitimate and credible by the communities that they affect. All major stakeholders at national and local levels also need to be able to take ownership of the peace process in their countries if long-term peace, sustainable without outside involvement, is to be achieved. An effective political strategy that brings all adversaries together to work towards peace is essential, and clear, credible, and achievable mandates, carried out by welltrained personnel with adequate funding, are indispensable (See Chart 1.4 for the contributions made to UN peacekeeping budgets between 2013 and 2015 by the 10 highestcontributing countries). Any budget deficiencies could be compensated by unity of purpose within the United Nations Security Council, which is increasingly difficult to achieve, and active support for UN operations in the field is also necessary for their success. Addressing misconduct, mismanagement, and fraud The UN’s reputation has been tarnished since the 1990s by allegations that sexual abuse has been committed by UN peacekeepers. The UN has done very little to right its wrongs. Not only has it conducted investigations behind closed doors, but it has also prosecuted the UN workers who reported the abuse or brought new evidence to light. In theory, the UN welcomes whistle-blowers and protects the identities of people who are trying to expose problems within the UN’s mechanisms, but the UN’s Ethics Office, which examines complaints of retaliation against whistle-blowers, received 297 such complaints between 2006 and Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Today, UN peace operations also include more complex military interventions, civilian police duties, human rights interventions, election oversight, and post-con­flict reconstruction. Due to their flexibility, peace missions have been deployed in many types of situations over the past two decades, and, despite the principle of impartiality, UN peacekeepers have been tasked with offensive operations against designated enemy combatants in Mali and the Democratic Republic of Congo, two war zones where the UN’s operations did not secure the consent of all of the main parties.4 The success rate of peacekeeping missions is disputed; however, notably successful missions have included UNAMSIL in Sierra Leone (1999-2005), UNAMIC and UNTAC in Cambodia (1991-1993),5 ONUSAL in El Salvador (1991-1995), MINUGUA in Guatemala (1997), ONUMOZ in Mozambique (1992-1994), UNTAG in Namibia (1989-1990) and UNMOT in Tajikistan (1994-2000). Peacekeeping failures have included operations in Somalia in 1993, Rwanda in 1994, and Srebrenica in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1995. MINUSCA in the Central African Republic (2014-ongoing) is likely to be added to future lists of failed missions. 11 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace 2012.6 A recent case involved a director of field operations for the office of the high commissioner for human rights in Geneva. The director was suspended and investigated for breaching UN protocols on confidential documents because he had divulged to French authorities a confidential UN report which contained interviews with children who were abused.7 Instances like this remind us that the UN is far from perfect. In this particular case, media coverage helped lead to the complete exoneration of the whistle-blower after an internal UN investigation was conducted in January 2016.8 12 Chart 1.4. Civilian personnel composition (2015). Source: United Nations http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/resources/statistics/ factsheet.shtml Even though the UN has a code of conduct that UN peacekeepers are obliged to abide by, it is unable to prosecute them because peacekeepers are only accountable to their country of origin and not to the UN, this in despite of the fact that they are acting on orders from the UN Security Council. Article 46 of the 1990 Model Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) declares that all UN peacekeeping staff are immune from legal process in respect of acts that they perform in their official capacity; meanwhile, Article 47(b) states that if the accused is a member of the military, he or she “shall be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of their respective participating states in respect of any criminal offences which may be committed by them in *the host country or territory+.”9 As early as August 1996, a UNICEF report on the impact of conflict on children noted that, in six out of 12 country studies about the sexual exploitation of children during times of war, the presence of peacekeeping troops led to a rapid rise in child prostitution. As long ago as 1996, Mozambique’s former Education Minister, Graça Machel, expressed frustration with the treatment of peacekeepers who were known to be guilty of misconduct: “We immediately repatriate those troops to their countries. However, it’s up to the national authorities to take disciplinary action. The UN does not have, beyond sending them home pretty much in disgrace, any capacity to take disciplinary action.”10 A fairly recent event does seem to have provoked a shift in how the UN deals with allegations of sexual abuse. On 11 August 2015, the UN Secretary General requested the dismissal of the head of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic after serious allegations came to light in relation to abuse carried out by the United Nations Peacekeeping troops in the Central African Republic. The UN is currently trying to implement strategies to prevent future abuses, and new measures include the establishment of Immediate Response Teams within peacekeeping missions, the adoption of Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Mismanagement, corruption, and misconduct are some of the other problems that necessitate fundamental reform of the UN peacekeeping structure to improve its accountability and transparency. One continuing problem is created by the absence of a truly independent inspector gen­eral. This issue highlights the UN’s unwillingness to extend the mandate of the independent UN Procurement Task Force, which took steps to uncover mismanagement, fraud, and corruption in UN pro­curement. The UN needs more independent over­sight, especially since the volume of procurement it undertakes has increased rapidly in line with the expanding mandate of its peacekeeping missions. The Report of the Office of Internal Oversight Services Activities for the period from 1 July 2014 to 30 June 2015 shows that some progress has been made in managing staff vacancy rates overall, but they remain high, particularly in the Investigations Division. Efforts to recover fraudulently used funds and to prosecute perpetrators of these crimes have not yet been successful. Troubling reports also suggest that staff members in the organization avoid responding to allegations of misconduct and frequently avoid accountability altogether by taking paid sick leave.12 The sustainability of peace after armed interventions Armed interventions, such as those carried out by UN Peacekeeping missions, rely on armed threat for deterrence. These missions are often long term because their success relies on the ongoing presence of peacekeeping troops. The building of local capacities and improvements in resilience are crucial if permanent peace is to be achieved. Reliance on outside help is risky, especially if that help takes the form of an armed intervention, since harmful abuse is most likely to occur when weapons and armed actors are involved. When sustainability is established as a key measure of success, it becomes clear that peacekeeping operations need to be part of a multi-faceted peacebuilding strategy that is capable of bringing about conflict resolution and reconciliation through strategies such as mediation, negotiation, and unarmed peace enforcement. There are currently 18 ongoing UN peacekeeping operations deployed on four continents. The oldest of these is the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization (UNTSO), which has been in operation in the Middle East since 1948, and the most recent one is the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA), which began in April 2014. The UN has carried out half of its peacekeeping missions in the past 20 years, and the Department of Peacekeeping Operations’ budget, which accounts for less than 0.5 per cent of the world’s military expenditure, as well as its management capacities, are becoming increasingly strained. The department’s responsibilities initially involved its staff in providing political and executive direction to UN peacekeeping missions and staying in contact with all of the actors in a conflict during the implementation of Security Council mandates; it now also requires them to integrate the efforts of the UN, as well as governmental and non-governmental organizations, into that work. Staff are also expected to provide guidance and support to local military personnel and police organizations, deal with mine action, and tackle other issues that are relevant to UN political and peacebuilding missions. Gender mainstreaming in peacebuilding The unfulfilled promise of UNSC Resolution 1325 Dr. Saisuree Chutikul, current adviser to the United Nations sub-committee on Security Council Resolution 1325, which concerns women, peace, and security, has said that the Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace strict timelines for the completion of investigations into sexual exploitation and abuse, and the development of a complaint reception framework. This framework will ensure that mechanisms exist within host communities to empower people to come forward in confidence to raise complaints that relate to United Nations personnel.11 13 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace “Greater participation of women in peace and security can contribute to women’s empowerment across society.”14 Women who are actively engaged in peacebuilding are making a big contribution to women’s empowerment because they are changing the perception of a woman’s role in society and thus contributing to the advancement of gender equality. Resolution 1325, which was passed in 2000, calls for equal participation by women in the maintenance and promotion of peace and security; it also calls for gender perspectives to become part of the mainstream of work in relation to conflict prevention, peace negotiations, peacekeeping operations, humanitarian assistance, and post-conflict reconstruction. It was followed by Resolution 1820 (2008) which demanded that efforts should be enhanced to facilitate the equal and full participation of women at all decisionmaking levels. A further measure, Resolution 1889 (2009), called not only for the development of global indicators to track the implementation of Resolution 1325, but also for greater attention to be paid to the gender dimensions of post-conflict planning and financing. Progress has remained slow in all of these areas since these resolutions were passed. Women’s presence at peace talks provides one useful indicator of the levels of progress that have been made to date. Between 1992 and 2011, only nine per cent of negotiators at peace tables were women.15 In the past few years, some advances have been made in understanding the link between women and peace, and, in the summer of 2014, six women ambassadors served on the UN Security Council. This brought women’s representation to the unprecedented level of 40 per cent, and half of all peace agreements signed in 2014 included references to women, peace, and security.16 This is significant because, when women participate, the probability of peace agreements lasting at least two years increases by 20 per cent. Women’s involvement also increases the probability of a peace agreement lasting 15 years by 35 per cent.17 The percentage of UN field missions headed by women has fluctuated between 15 and 25 per cent since 2011.18 However, Radhika Coomaraswamy notes that “only 13 per cent of stories in the news media that covered topics related to peace and security included women as subjects, and women were central to the story in only six per cent of cases since the passing of Security Council Resolution 1325. Only four per cent of the stories reviewed portrayed women as leaders in conflict and post-conflict countries, and only two per cent highlighted gender equality issues.”19 In all fields of peacekeeping, women peacekeepers have proved that they can perform the same roles to the same standards and under the same difficult conditions as their male counterparts. While the UN encourages and advocates the deployment of women to uniformed functions, responsibility for the deployment of women in police and military roles remains with Member States; this explains why, in 2015, 97 per cent of military peacekeepers and 90 per cent of police personnel were men.20 Zainab Hawa Bangura, who is the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General on Sexual Violence in Conflict, has noted poignantly that “the new wars are being fought on the bodies of girls and women.”21 Today, women in conflicts are being targeted on purpose. As aggressors strive to break up communities and change ethnic ratios, women are being detained as sexual slaves or as bargaining chips by rebel groups in armed conflicts. Women and girls are disproportionately affected by sexual violence as is shown in reports from the Democratic Republic of Congo: they reveal the extent of conflict-related sexual violence which ranges from 18 per cent to 40 per cent among women and girls and between four and 24 per cent among men and boys.22 Data from 40 countries shows a positive correlation between the proportion of female police officers and the rates at which sexual assault is reported.23 Violence and other forms of conflict also have a serious impact on girls’ health and education. For example, girls in conflict situations are more likely to be married in childhood. 14 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Given that these problems and challenges exist, it is notable that women gain disproportionately less benefit from international aid efforts than men do. In 2014, women only received 35 per cent of the benefits that could be gained from the temporary employment activities offered through disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration programmes.30 “In 2014, only one per cent of bilateral official development assistance for security system management reform targeted gender equality as a principal objective, and only 26 per cent targeted it as a significant objective.”31 In Sierra Leone, when a survey asked predominantly male ex-combatants to identify those people who had played a significant role in helping them to reintegrate, 55 per cent named women in their communities.32 Women have different viewpoints about conflict situations because they experience conflict differently to men. They have distinct needs and context-specific priorities and are vulnerable in different ways; they also tend to take on roles in response to conflict that reflect those priorities. For example, women often choose to act as civilian ceasefire monitors because they are major stakeholders in their communities and the role is compatible to some extent with the traditional view of them as keepers of the community as well as care-givers. Where women have been deployed in a variety of police, military, and civilian positions, they have made a positive impact on peacekeeping environments and have been able to support the role of local women in building peace and protecting women’s rights. It is an operational imperative that the UN should actively recruit and retain female peacekeepers and thereby fulfil some of its obligations under Security Council Resolution 1325. Female peacekeepers act as role models in local conflict-affected environments, inspiring women and girls in often male-dominated societies to push for their own rights and for participation in peace processes. The increased recruitment of women is critical for the empowerment of women in host communities. The presence of women peacekeepers can help to reduce conflict and confrontation, and it also broadens the skill set available within a peacekeeping mission. Women peacekeepers can help to address the specific needs of women ex-combatants during processes of demobilization and reintegration into civilian life, and they can also help to make a peacekeeping force approachable to women within a conflict-affected community. Women peacekeepers are also able to facilitate interviews with survivors of gender-based violence; they can mentor female cadets at police and military academies; and they can also interact with women in societies where women are prohibited from speaking to men. The first all-female Formed Police Units were deployed to Liberia in 2007 and proved to be very successful. Survivors of sexual violence feel comfortable talking to female peacekeepers about their experiences, and often communities are quick to embrace female peacekeepers because they are seen to be less physically threatening than their male counterparts. There are many stereotypes attached to female peacekeepers, who are often regarded as being naturally nurturing, communicative, and unintimidating. These stereotypes can produce some advantages when they are interpreted as emphasizing the peacekeeper’s responsibilities to Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Approximately half of all children of primary school age who are not in school live in conflictaffected areas. Girls, whose adjusted net enrolment rate in primary education is only 77.5 per cent in conflict and post-conflict countries, are particularly affected.24 During the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, the average age for marriage for a girl was between 20 and 25 years. In the refugee camps during and after the genocide, the average age for marriage was 15 years.25 The rate of early marriage (below the age of 18) among Syrian refugee girls in Jordan is 51 per cent;26 this compares to a rate of between 13 and 17 per cent inside Syria before the war began.27 One in four households occupied by Syrian refugee families in Egypt, Lebanon, Iraq, and Jordan is headed by a woman.28 In Mali, more than 50 per cent of displaced families are headed by women.29 15 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security restore peace and stability without intimidating or taking advantage of the local population; however, they can also inhibit people’s recognition of the full range of roles that women need to play in peacebuilding work. Women, and particularly young women, who participate actively in their communities are often vitally important in helping those communities both to address the causes of particular conflicts and to avert new outbreaks of violence. Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Unarmed civilian protection 16 Background information Unarmed civilian protection (UCP) is a strategy that has been used successfully in peacebuilding operations since the 1990s, and it has already been successfully implemented in the Philippines, Sri Lanka, South Sudan, Colombia, Guatemala, and Nepal; however, it is only now being recognized by the UN and the international system as a relevant approach that can yield positive results. Civil society organizations such as Witness for Peace and Peace Brigades International have not only pioneered UCP but have helped to develop and refine it since the early 1980s. A recent study by the Mir Centre for Peace at Canada’s Selkirk College found that over 50 civil society organizations have applied UCP methods in 35 conflict areas since 1990.33 Recently, the European Union and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe have made successful use of unarmed civilian protection in operations that have included the deployment of unarmed civilians. Today, there are dozens of international civil society organizations engaged in unarmed protection in conflict zones around the world. Among them are Cure Violence, Nonviolent Peaceforce, and The World Council of Churches’ Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Israel and Palestine. The UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, convened an Independent High-Level Panel on Peace Operations in June 2015 to review UN peace operations, and the panel put forward unarmed protection as a strategy that should be at the forefront of efforts to protect civilians and to transform the way the world responds to conflict.34 How does UCP work? Unarmed Civilian Protection is executed without the use of weapons. It focuses on the building of relationships rather than the employment of power, and it seeks to achieve three goals: the direct protection of civilians, the prevention of violence, and the strengthening of local peace infrastructures.35 This approach is diametrically opposed to the classical militarized approach which involves either providing arms in conflict zones to moderate proxies whose behaviour can be very unpredictable, or relying on armed threat for deterrence as is the case in many UN peacekeeping missions. UCP methods are selected on a case-by-case basis to suit the specific needs of the local population, the type of conflict, the context, the mandate, and the capacity of the implementing organization. UCP works in situations where there are no UN peacekeepers as is the case in Colombia, Myanmar, and the Philippines, or it can work alongside them as happens in South Sudan. UCP in practice has the potential to temper both sides in a conflict, especially if the actors are armed. It can lead to reductions in shootings and killings and the elimination of retaliation killings.36 UCP places emphasis on key sources of guidance such as international humanitarian law, and it employs key skills such as humanitarian negotiation.37 UCP protectors are constantly engaged in networking and in building multi-layered relationships with key actors, including those who are armed, in order to open new channels of communication. Their perseverance and high levels of interaction increase their chances of being accepted by other actors, and this in turn makes their work in the field safer because they rely on the community’s protection. UCP can be applied at all stages of a conflict but can be particularly effective at an early stage when it can prevent or mitigate the escalation of violence. It is also valuable after violent conflict has subsided when it can support the transition to a peaceful society. Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security UCP involves an on-the-ground, hands-on approach. Unarmed protectors accompany civilians as active participants rather than as passive observers when negotiations are held; they can help to establish an environment in which peace talks can take place, and they also engage in “shuttle diplomacy”.38 Third-party mediation often offers the most suitable way to convey information back and forth between opposing factions, especially if the third party is seen to be unbiased. The position of UCP units right in the centre of a conflict gives them the opportunity to identify and understand the sensitivities and vulnerabilities of local actors; it also helps them to identify points of leverage. In addition, the link that UCP units offer to the outside world means that local actors may well start to take into consideration how their actions will be perceived elsewhere. When local actors are concerned about their personal or political reputations, fear legal prosecutions, worry about forfeiting international aid and political support, or want to avoid repercussions including blame, retribution, or sanctions, these factors can influence their behaviours over and above any individual, moral, or religious concerns they might have. The success of many UCP missions depends on gender mainstreaming, which is a strategy that places gender equality at its core. The practice involves careful consideration of how policies impact differently on men and women, and it focuses attention on the ways in which a conflict’s most vulnerable parties can best be protected. Civilian protectors pay particular attention to the needs of women and children and often focus on the issue of child soldiers as well as on the safety of women in camps for Internally Displaced Persons where women are at high risk of sexual violence. Special workshops are organized where women can share their views, and in these environments some women are able to talk freely for the first time about how they are affected by conflict. These workshops can offer individual women unique opportunities to talk to a neutral actor about their own security and to learn about nonviolent approaches to conflict resolution. They also offer a platform for human rights defenders who have an opportunity to connect with other local defenders and learn from their experiences. All of these participatory training models are organized in ways which allow them to be replicated by local UCP units; the re-use of these models is encouraged as part of peacebuilding efforts, and local people can continue to use them in other local contexts without outside help. One of the main goals of international UCP organizations is to ensure the sustainability of local UCP capacities. Local individuals and peace infrastructures are often well-informed in terms of the cultural knowledge that is needed when assessing what kind of approach to take, but they may lack knowledge and understanding of UCP strategies, or they may need to be trained in unarmed protection methods. Workshops help to build local actors’ confidence in their own abilities, so that they are able to make the best use of existing local institutions to pursue peaceful solutions in conflicts. Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Unarmed protectors live among the people that they have come to protect, often for long periods of time, so they can build high levels of trust and gain people’s respect. Their very presence sometimes serves as a deterrent to armed actors as it can change the dynamic of a conflict on a psychological level; it also helps civilians to feel that they are not alone. Armed actors who would not normally think twice about either engaging in conflict, putting civilian lives at risk, or actually targeting them, are less likely to attack if there is an international presence, even if it is unarmed. UCP units also help to raise the status of local humanitarian organizations. They enter a situation at the request of these groups and only respond to their requests for help if the local groups can demonstrate that they are themselves employing peaceful approaches to the conflict. The presence of UCP units and their peaceful actions in the middle of high-intensity conflicts show civilians that there are alternative ways of responding to tensions and violence. 17 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Nonviolent Peaceforce Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Nonviolent Peaceforce (NP) is an unarmed, paid, civilian protection force that employs thirdgeneration UCP (See Diagram 1). The organization, which was founded in 2002 and deployed its first team to Sri Lanka a year later, now has headquarters in Brussels and an office in Minneapolis. Their field teams are presently working in the Philippines, in South Sudan, Myanmar, the Middle East, and Ukraine. Their field staff comprises conflict zone veterans and experienced peacekeepers, as well as highly trained and skilled professionals. The organization’s credibility and its reputation for being unbiased is crucial to its work and so Nonviolent Peaceforce only responds to invitations proffered by reliable local organizations that are committed to non-violent solutions. Only after an invitation has been received and available funds have been secured is a mission dispatched. 18 Diagram 1. 3rd Generation UCP. Source: Nonviolent Peaceforce http://www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org/unarmed-civilianprotection The form of unarmed UCP employed by Nonviolent Peaceforce differs from that used by other organizations in that it relies solely on dialogues conducted with the armed actors themselves in a bid to help them behave in ways that will reduce violence and protect civilians. This approach depends on actors building relationships of mutual trust and understanding, and it forgoes the ‘naming and shaming’ method that other forms of UCP favour. Gender mainstreaming has formed a crucial part of NP’s efforts. Women’s peacekeeping teams have been formed and trained to carry out accompaniment, dialogue, rumour control, and early warning/early response work. Some women help with the return, integration, and protection of children who have been abducted, while others interrupt plans Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Chart 2.1. Donors by percentages to Nonviolent Peaceforce from July 2014 to July 2015. Source: Nonviolent Peaceforce http://www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org/background/funding Chart 2.2. Total expenses for Nonviolent Peaceforce - US$11.5 million for the time period from July 2014 to July 2015. Source: Nonviolent Peaceforce http://www.nonviolent peaceforce.org/background/funding Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace for child marriages, advocate for girls’ education, encourage women to report rape, and accompany them throughout the legal process that leads to prosecution of their abusers. 19 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Nonviolent Peaceforce was nominated for the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) in recognition of the organization’s continued commitment to violence prevention in conflict zones as well as for its work in relation to the protective accompaniment of children and human rights defenders.39 20 Case Study I: Nonviolent Peaceforce in South Sudan South Sudan offers a good example of a country where UCP methods have worked well while Nonviolent Peaceforce remains on site, even though South Sudan is a young and increasingly unstable country in the throes of a humanitarian crisis. NP initiated a project in what was to become South Sudan in 2010 after receiving a request from local organizations. Its initial mission was to stave off the violence that was in danger of erupting before an upcoming referendum. However, it became clear that a much greater threat to civilian safety was being posed by intra- and inter-clan clashes which, in 2012, turned into interethnic fighting in Jonglei and other regions. Three people were shot two days after NP’s forced evacuation from Pibor County in October 2012, and this violence made it clear that more time was needed to establish the foundations for self-sustainable UCP in the region. Despite worsening safety conditions, NP expanded its mission in South Sudan in 2013.40 There are now over 150 staff members operating across 11 field sites and at the Juba headquarters; of these, about 40 per cent are South Sudanese and 40 per cent are women.41 From the very beginning, NP’s aim was to establish a broad network of relationships in every region where it was at work. These relationships brought community leaders together to undergo early-warning and early-response training, and community protection committees were developed. NP has helped to negotiate peace agreements between fighting clans and sub-clans, and its staff have also engaged in patrols and protection work within IDP camps and accompanied people in and out of the camps. In the year from June 2014 to June 2015, NP provided over 1,000 accompaniments for vulnerable people, most of whom were women and children. Despite the best efforts of NP and other organizations, the situation in South Sudan continues to worsen. More than two million people have been displaced over the past three years and tens of thousands of people have been killed. A new unity government has been formed and a fragile peace deal is in the process of being implemented.42 According to the UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict, who visited South Sudan in May 2016, crimes of sexual violence during South Sudan’s brutal civil war have been so bad that they need to become a key focus of reconciliation efforts. Nonviolent Peaceforce has recognized the importance of strengthening women’s participation in peacebuilding and of reducing the prevalence and impact of conflict and gender-based violence. On International Women’s Day 2016, NP launched a new, $8 million project in partnership with the Kingdom of the Netherlands through the Dutch Embassy in South Sudan. The project seeks to build on the fact that women who are active participants in peacebuilding in their communities are less likely to experience gender-based violence. The project will be implemented in five sites in South Sudan. Peace Brigades International Another well-established organization engaged in UCP is Peace Brigades International (PBI) which was founded in 1981. PBI currently has seven field projects, 12 country groups, and an international office, all delegated by the General Assembly. It has carried out projects in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Sri Lanka, North America, Haiti, Nepal, and the Balkans, and it has current field projects in Colombia, Guatemala, Honduras, Indonesia, Kenya, Mexico, and Nepal. PBI’s vision is of “a world in which people address conflicts non-violently, where human rights are universally upheld and social justice and intercultural respect have become a reality.”43 They act on requests from local non-violent groups that are working for human rights and social change in regions where there is oppression and conflict. Chart 3.1. Peace Brigades International Total Income in 2014: US$2,864,157. Source: Peace Brigades International, “2014 Annual Review” Chart 3.2. Total Peace Brigades International expenditure in 2014: US$2,474,271 (Does not include the accounts of PBI country groups which are separate legal entities). Source: Peace Brigades International, “2014 Annual Review” PBI’s international presence serves “to accompany both political and social processes through a joint strategy of deterring violence and promoting active non-violence,”44 and its international teams of volunteers carry out protective accompaniment and peace education, as well as independent observation and analysis of conflict situations. Case Study II: Peace Brigades International in Buenaventura, Colombia PBI has carried out international accompaniment and observation work in Colombia since 1994. It has been present in an area that was made Colombia’s first designated urban Humanitarian Space in 2014, thanks to the efforts of local families. No illegals or armed actors Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security 21 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace are allowed in the area, which is located in a small neighbourhood called “La Playita” 45 on the poverty-stricken island of Buenaventura, and since the PBI arrived it has become the safest neighbourhood on the island. This follows years of violence that was caused by two paramilitary groups which occupied two different neighbourhoods. The groups were in control of most of the island and put 302 families in constant danger of erupting violence. The PBI came to the area at the request of the Inter-Church Justice and Peace Commission to help highlight the importance of defending human rights and the hard task of being a human rights defender in places like Buenaventura. 22 PBI’s principal requirement is that their employees have to be foreigners in the country where they work in order for their missions to be successful. This ensures that none of the workers are biased or are perceived to be so during a mission. The presence of international workers makes any aggressor think twice before attacking them or the people that they have come to protect, even if they are unarmed. However, there is still a protective police presence working alongside PBI’s staff in Colombia; it works to protect the Humanitarian Space from within and to fend off the threat that the neighbourhood might be taken over by one of the paramilitary groups. PBI puts a strong emphasis on the inseparability and equal importance of physical and psychosocial accompaniment if peace is to be built. People do not only need to be safe, it is also crucial that they feel safe, and PBI’s presence provides this umbrella of protection. Furthermore, an international presence increases the visibility and raises the status of the Inter-Church Justice and Peace Commission (ICJPC). PBI and ICJPC receive frequent threats because they are also engaged in political advocacy in relation to the security situation in the region. Jorge Molano, who is a lawyer and human rights defender, notes that “PBI’s accompaniment is extremely important in the country because the Colombian State has not provided guarantees for human rights defenders to carry out our work. PBI’s accompaniment enables many defenders to stay in the country and not have to abandon our work.”46 PBI strives to highlight this kind of community-based peaceful alternative to violence, and it aims to make these efforts self-sustaining by putting mechanisms in place which, it is hoped, the local population can make use of in the future. In September 2014, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights awarded protective measures to the 302 families that reside in the Humanitarian Space, and its success in Buenaventura is a great example of how UCP can work alongside a local NGO as well as in collaboration with armed protective police forces. Jose Alvear Restrepo from the Jose Alvear Restrepo Lawyers’ Collective (CCAJAR) has acknowledged the progress that has been made thanks to PBI’s presence: “For the 15 years that we have had PBI accompaniment, we have been able to become more respected in judicial and other spheres of our activity, a very important prevention mechanism. I believe that PBI’s presence and accompaniment in Colombia has saved many lives and prevented many attacks against human rights defenders, especially human rights lawyers.”47 All-female UCP units The deployment of all-female UCP units represents a relatively new phenomenon. Female protectors offer living proof that women can do jobs that were previously seen as too dangerous or complex for a woman to do. Female protectors can change the mentality of a whole community, and they are in a better position than men to address some issues that are particularly prevalent or relevant in conflict and post-conflict situations and were previously seen as taboo; these include child marriage, sexual violence, reproductive health, and girls’ education. In addition, female protectors are perceived to have more sympathy and a greater ability to relate to and help local women, some of whom have undergone diverse types of trauma during a conflict, very often including some type of sexual violence, intimidation, or family loss. All-female units are sometimes the only option where cultural barriers prevail, as Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security is the case when cultural norms mean that there is opposition to the idea of local women being accompanied by foreign male protectors. Also, on a psychological level, women might struggle to discuss the sexual violence they have experienced with male protectors. Female protectors can serve as role models for local women and girls because they demonstrate that women have a role to play in peacebuilding and in human rights advocacy. Over 40 per cent of unarmed civilian protectors today are women. Female UCP units, like the one discussed in this case study, are fully capable of building capacity to lessen tension, protect civilians, resolve conflicts, and work for peace in their own communities in a sustainable and non-militaristic way. Mindanao in the Philippines has been a point of conflict between the government of the Phillipines and Islamic insurgent movements such as the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) for a long time, and, despite the signing of a political agreement in 2014, the region remains very unstable. Under these circumstances, the Mindanao People’s Caucus (MPC), led by Mary Ann Arnado, a human rights lawyer from the region, set up an all-female peacekeeping unit which included women of Muslim and Catholic faiths as well as indigenous women from Mindanao. They faced significant scepticism and resistance on the ground, especially at the beginning, but the group has managed to develop strategies that allow its members to continue their work. One crucial factor in their success has been the unit’s strong working relationship with key actors in the region, including the MILF and the armed forces of the Philippines government. The all-female contingent has been able to have a positive working relationship with an all-male Islamist militant group that subscribes to traditional gender norms because this relationship developed over a decade of working together. The MILF values the MPC’s expertise and local network, and has relied upon them for assistance with interfaith consultations, and other aspects of the peace process.48 However, some of the women involved have reported that they were not being taken seriously by foreign soldiers who were on one-year deployments as part of the International Monitoring Team. Even some of the women protectors themselves were concerned that engaging with soldiers and militants might be against Islamic doctrine. One of the unit’s close partners said that women could not work as peacekeepers because it is prohibited by Sharia law. The group was accused of not conforming to local gender realities, not being tough enough, being incompetent, and lacking necessary military and security experience. All these accusations reflect exactly the kinds of gender stereotypes that women’s peacebuilding groups everywhere are trying to overcome. Despite these obstacles, the unit continues to play an important role in Mindanao. The group also proves to both men and women in the region that Christian, Muslim, and indigenous people can peacefully coexist and that women have a place on the front lines of peacebuilding. The limits of UCP So far, only the benefits of UCP methods and successful projects that use them have been mentioned. However, UCP is not a flawless strategy and it has its limits. UCP’s work is very often undertaken in the heart of what are generally armed conflicts where unarmed protectors are at high risk of experiencing direct violence. Involvement in these kinds of missions and environments, which are avoided by many other NGOs, requires UCP actors to remain constantly vigilant and engaged with local networks and to have fast safety response mechanisms in place. Unlike other international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs), which often make decisions about security far from the field, UCPs usually have to make Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Case Study III: An all-female UCP unit in Mindanao, Philippines 23 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace security decisions within the conflict situation itself. All possible risks are carefully calculated using systematic risk assessments, ongoing context analysis, and a close working relationship with other protection actors in the area who can sometimes be UN peacekeepers or specially assigned police units. UCPs use an interactive security model, and they are very conscious of security. The staff’s safety and security are based on the same logic that underpins UCP methods for providing protection to civilians. UCP units rely heavily on the efficacy of their extensive, multi-tiered network of relationships, and especially on the relationships they have with affected communities, to assure their own safety.49 24 Organizations that engage in UCP admit that one of the weakness of its methodology is that it renders them unable to work in environments where there is a strong political or religious ideology. Where ISIS or Boko Haram are operating, and in Syria and Yemen, for example, UCP cannot be deployed because units have to be able to connect to an existing network of actors who are willing to collaborate and/or negotiate in a peace process. UCP’s legitimacy comes from its deployment in response to an invitation from a civil nonviolent organization, and it cannot proceed without it. A local community also has to be willing to collaborate with and trust the UCP approach in order for the mission to be successful; communities might not be able to do this in cases where there is a context of protracted armed conflict. Despite these risks and limitations, Nonviolent Peaceforce began a train-the-trainers project in Syria in January 2016 with the aim of changing the norms which assume that violence is necessary to resolve conflict. NP partnered with TAMAS (The Syrian Civil Coalition), Madani (a Syrian civil society organization that promotes a peaceful and democratic Syria) and Cure Violence.50 In Ukraine in 2015, following a request from local civil society organizations, NP launched another project which took place over several months and involved 30 Ukrainians who were representing several civil society organizations, community members, and local authorities. The project participants received training on how to provide a protective presence for civilians. Unfortunately, due to insufficient funds, NP was not able to expand its work on the ground, but it continues to be involved in the region through the local partnerships that it has built.51 UCP is even more difficult to carry out when local police forces are non-collaborative or are part of the problem, or when UN peacekeepers have an overly broad mandate and undo the work done by NGOs and UCPs which are trying to build peace without the use of arms. When there are armed actors present, the possibility that power will be abused increases, as was the case with UN Peacekeepers in the Central African Republic. Still, UCP’s principles require the decentralization of power, conciliatory behaviour, and very limited means of coercion, and this means that any abuses that do happen occur on a much smaller scale; they tend to be due to personal rather than institutional failings and have less serious consequences than those of military action: “UCP may not be immune to all types of abuse, *but+ it is more likely to arrest war-cycles than feed into them.” The future of UCP—a combined approach The mentality with which we approach armed conflict must change if UCP is to be used instead of a traditionally militaristic approach. Neither armed nor unarmed approaches on their own offer the solution for all conflict types but, perhaps, if we change the habits of thinking with which we address conflict, we can redirect resources from armed missions towards developing better prevention mechanisms and therefore address root causes before violence takes hold. More use can certainly be made of UCP’s violence prevention methods which include proactive presence at potential or actual flashpoints, protective accompaniment of vulnerable individuals, community-based early warning and response mechanisms, rumour management, the creation of local-level safe spaces, and the use of grassroots mediation techniques. Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security Each conflict needs a different response; certain environments require the presence of armed peacekeepers and others do not. Decisions about responses should be based on the nature of conflict, the cost-effectiveness of each approach, the number of people that are likely to be affected, and the requirements of specific groups in a community, such as women, children, and minorities. Before a mission is dispatched, each environment requires rigorous analysis and a realistic and well-defined mandate. Now that, finally, the UN has formally recognized the legitimacy of non-violent approaches and has acknowledged the successes of organizations that have engaged in UCP over years and decades in some cases, UN Peace Operations should become more field-focused and people-centred. Unarmed protection is not about the presence or absence of arms in UN peacekeeping activities; instead it is about addressing the vulnerabilities of civilians in armed conflict. The UN should support a permanent roster of organizations and trained personnel from around the world who are available to provide unarmed civilian protection and training, particularly in relation to conflict prevention methods and the use of emergency response tools. If UCP is to become a well-used and successful approach to peacebuilding, we have to make sure that its key principles are kept intact. Non-partisanship, remaining unbiased, and being invited into a situation by a local peaceful organization are vital principles, and the building of self-sustaining local UCP units is also crucial to UCP’s success. Gender mainstreaming must also continue to be an integral part of each mission in order that the needs of the whole target population are addressed. It makes absolute sense that women should be involved at every step and at every level of peacebuilding. All-female UCP units have proven to be very responsive to and effective in tackling women’s gender-specific needs in conflict situations. It is clear that women’s contributions are crucial to the development of an approach that is safe for protectors and civilians, as well as being gender-sensitive, cost-effective, and sustainable in the long run. Conclusion There is no doubt that the nature of conflicts and of human rights abuses has changed. UN peacekeeping missions, the UN’s structure, and its peacekeeping mandates are struggling to keep up and evolve fast enough to meet a growing need for the protection of civilians. Meanwhile, outdated, inefficient, vague, and costly peacekeeping missions continue to be commissioned. There is an urgent need for a new and better-suited approach to civilian protection, one which can complement the current approach in certain cases and potentially replace it in some situations in the near future. Unarmed civilian protection offers innovative methods that can be chosen on a case-by-case basis and they have been proven to be effective over the past decades in a variety of different configurations. Unarmed accompaniment by international protectors has served as a Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Since UCP methods can easily be used alongside the work of local NGOs and in collaboration with armed actors such as UN Peacekeepers and police protection forces, the “UN should incorporate and scale up unarmed civilian protection in peace operations and development assistance in conflict-affected countries in the framing of mandates.”53 Any such developments also need to be accompanied by the enforcement and implementation of basic human rights by national governments. UCP works on the basis that an international presence serves as a deterrent for violence because international workers generate respect when they are in a foreign country. It should not be the case that, in their absence, perpetrators face no punishments for their crimes against the local population. Every state has a legal responsibility to protect its citizens, and it should not protect them only in cases where it wishes to avoid international embarrassment. 25 Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security deterrent and has worked in communities from South Sudan and the Philippines to Colombia. Uses of an unarmed approach have proven that arms are not required to protect civilians, even in situations of armed conflict. It is also clear that UCP methods can be employed by local peaceful organizations which are striving to build sustainable long-term peace. These organizations can be empowered to use mechanisms that can prevent conflict from becoming violent and they can also be equipped to put in place emergency response mechanisms that will help them to deal swiftly with any potential violence. Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Unarmed civilian protection changes the mentality that shapes how people respond to conflict. When force is not relied on, and instead relationships are formed with a network of different actors and stakeholders in the field, the local population sees that different ways of resolving differences exist; they also become increasingly confident that they do not need to rely on outside help to employ UCP methods. The mere presence of unarmed protectors changes people’s behaviour at a psychological as well as at a practical level. 26 UCP has made great strides in reducing gender-based violence thanks to its emphasis on an inclusive gender-mainstreaming strategy which is central to the success of a lot of its work, particularly in the area of protective accompaniment. As Security Council Resolution 1325 makes clear in its statements on the inclusion of women in peace processes, women’s participation in peacebuilding is not only a matter of women’s and girls’ rights; instead, “Women are crucial partners in shoring up three pillars of lasting peace: economic recovery, social cohesion and political legitimacy.”54 Where women are underrepresented in public office, or where women’s and girls’ rights can be violated with impunity, political legitimacy suffers. The result is declining trust in government, deterioration in the rule of law, and mounting difficulty in enlisting public support for collective action. Each of these conditions undermines any efforts to secure a sustainable peace. Female representation in UCP continues to rise with women today making up about 40 per cent of protectors and more than 50 per cent of volunteers in some of the organizations that employ UCP methods. It is only right that women should actively participate in greater numbers in peaceful protection methods such as UCP since they make up more than half of the world’s population. There needs to be a cultural shift away from traditional armed approaches and women can be the trailblazers of that change. Notes 1. Institute of Economics & Peace, “Global Peace Index 2015”, http:// economicsandpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Global-Peace-Index-Report2015_0.pdf (Accessed 11 February 2017). 2. Ibid. 3. United Nations Peacebuilding Fund, “What is Peacebuilding?”, http://www.unpbf.org/ application-guidelines/what-is-peacebuilding/ (Accessed 10 January 2017). 4. Renwick, “Peace Operations in Africa”, 15 May 2015, http://www.cfr.org/peacekeeping/ peace-operations-africa/p9333 (Accessed 10 January 2017). 5. United Nations, “Cambodia UNTAC Background Summary”, http://www.un.org/en/ peacekeeping/missions/past/untacbackgr1.html (Accessed 10 January 2017). 6. Caplan, “The Disheartening Truth of a UN Whistleblower”, 25 May 2015, http:// www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/the-disheartening-truth-of-a-unwhistleblower/article24603022/ (Accessed 10 January 2017). 7. Laville, “UN Aid Worker Suspended”, 29 April 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/ world/2015/apr/29/un-aid-worker-suspended-leaking-report-child-abuse-french-troopscar (Accessed 10 January 2017). 8. Laville, “UN Whistle-blower”, 18 January 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/ world/2016/jan/18/un-whistleblower-who-exposed-sexual-abuse-by-peacekeepers-isexonerated (Accessed 10 January 2017). 9. Wilson et al., “Human Rights Violations”, 2014, https://www.wcl.american.edu/ hrbrief/21/2wilson.pdf (Accessed 28 March 2016). 10. The Associated Press, “U.N. Focuses on Peacekeepers”, 9 December 1996, http:// www.nytimes.com/1996/12/09/world/un-focuses-on-peacekeepers-involved-in-childprostitution.html (Accessed 15 June 2015) 11. United Nations, “Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon’s Statement”, 13 August 2015, https:// www.un.org/sg/en/content/sg/statement/2015-08-13/secretary-generals-remarkssecurity-council-consultations-situation (Accessed 18 September 2015). 12. United Nations, “Report on the Activities of the UN Office”, 13 August 2015, https:// oios.un.org/resources/2015/09/9rnCCY3U.pdf (Accessed 8 February 2017). 13. United Nations, “Department of Peacekeeping Operations”, http://www.un.org/en/ peacekeeping/about/dpko/ (Accessed 10 May 2015). 14. Ó Súilleabháin, “Benefits Spread When Women Keep the Peace”, 7 April 2015, http:// theglobalobservatory.org/2015/04/saisuree-chutikul-peacekeeping-women/ (Accessed 16 June 2015). 15. United Nations, “Facts and Figures”, http://www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/peaceand-security/facts-and-figures (Accessed 2 July 2015). 16. Ibid. 17. Ibid. 18. United Nations, “UN Security Council Report of the Secretary-General”, 16 September 2015, http://www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/s_2015_716.pdf (Accessed 25 January 2017). 19. United Nations, “Facts and Figures”, http://www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/peaceand-security/facts-and-figures (Accessed 2 July 2015). 20. United Nations, “UN Security Council Report of the Secretary-General”, 23 September 2014, http://www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/s_2014_693.pdf (Accessed 12 February 2016), and United Nations, “UN Security Council Report of the Secretary-General”, 16 September 2015, http:// www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9% 7D/s_2015_716.pdf (Accessed 25 January 2017). 21. United States Institute for Peace, “Women and Violent Extremism”, 13 August 2015, https://www.usip.org/publications/2015/08/women-and-violent-extremism-growingthreat-demands-concerted-action (Accessed 29 January 2017). Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security 27 Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security 28 22. UNICEF, “Hidden in Plain Sight”, September 2014, https://www.unicef.org/publications/ index_74865.html (Accessed 12 January 2016) 23. UN Women, “Progress of the World’s Women”, 2011, http://www2.unwomen.org/-/ media/field%20office%20eseasia/docs/publications/2011/progressoftheworldswomen2011-en.pdf?vs=2106 (Accessed 25 March 2015). 24. UN Security Council, “Report of the Secretary-General”, 23 September 2014, http:// www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9% 7D/s_2014_693.pdf (Accessed 12 February 2016). 25. Women’s Refugee Commission, “Strong Girls, Powerful Women”, 15 July 2014, https:// www.womensrefugeecommission.org/resources/document/1036-strong-girls-powerfulwomen-report (Accessed 16 August 2015). 26. UN Women, “Gender-Based Violence and Child Protection”, 2013, http:// www.unwomen.org/en/digital-library/publications/2013/7/syrian-refugees (Accessed 25 September 2016). 27. UN Women, “Facts and Figures: Peace and Security”, http://www.unwomen.org/en/ what-we-do/peace-and-security/facts-and-figures (Accessed 2 March 2017). 28. UNHCR, “One Quarter of Syrian Refugee Women”, 8 July 2014, http://www.unhcr.org/ news/latest/2014/7/53bb77049/syrian-refugee-women-fight-survival-head-familiesalone.html (Accessed 28 March 2016). 29. Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, “Global Overview 2014”, May 2014, http:// www.internal-displacement.org/publications/2014/global-overview-2014-peopleinternally-displaced-by-conflict-and-violence (Accessed 26 March 2016). 30. UN Security Council, “Report of the Secretary-General”, 23 September 2014, http:// www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9% 7D/s_2014_693.pdf (Accessed 12 February 2016). 31. UN Women, “Facts and Figures”, http://www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/peace-and -security/facts-and-figures (Accessed 2 March 2017). 32. UN Women, “A Global Study on the Implementation of the UNSC Resolution 1325”, 2015, http://wps. unwomen.org/pdf/en/GlobalStudy_EN_Web.pdf (Accessed 21 March 2017). 33. International Peace Institute, “The Growth in Unarmed Civilian Protection”, 29 April 2015, http://reliefweb. int/report/world/growth-unarmed-civilian-protection (Accessed 30 August 2015). 34. Nonviolent Peaceforce, “Mukesh Kapila”, http://www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org/about3/about-12/505-mukesh-kapila-nonviolent-peaceforce-board-member-and-vice-chairadviser-on-world-humanitarian-summit (Accessed 12 September 2016). 35. Duncan et al., “The Growth in Unarmed Civilian Protection”, 29 April 2015, http:// theglobalobservatory.org/2015/04/unarmed-civilian-protection-south-sudan-mindanao/ (Accessed 16 March 2016). 36. Ibid. 37. Nonviolent Peaceforce, “Case Studies of Unarmed Civilian Protection”, July 2015, http:// www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org/images/publications/UCP_Case_Studies___vFinal_8-415.pdf (Accessed 12 June 2016). 38. Brahm et al., “Shuttle Diplomacy”, November 2013, http:// www.beyondintractability.org/essay/shuttle-diplomacy (Accessed 15 March 2016). 39. Moore, “NP Nominated for 2016 Nobel Peace Prize”, 24 February 2016, http:// www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org/about-3/about-12/549-nonviolent-peaceforcenominated-for-2016-nobel-peace-prize-2 (Accessed 28 February 2016). 40. Nonviolent Peaceforce, “Case of South Sudan”, July 2015, http:// www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org/images/publications/UCP_Case_Studies___vFinal_8-415.pdf (Accessed June 2016). 41. Ibid. 42. United Nations Radio, “Sexual Violence in Conflict”, 10 May 2016, http:// www.unmultimedia.org/radio/english/2016/05/sexual-violence-in-conflict-crimes-so-bad -in-south-sudan/#.WNpAPzuGNPb (Accessed 28 May 2016). 43. Peace Brigades International, “Vision and Mission”, http://www.peacebrigades.org/en/ about-pbi/vision-and-mission (Accessed 12 January 2017). 44. Ibid. 45. Peace Brigades International Colombia, “La Playita”, *Film+, 20 October 2014, https:// pbicolombia.org/2014/10/20/watch-our-latest-documentary-film-about-pbis-work-inbuenaventura/#more-2269 (Accessed 13 June 2016). 46. Peace Brigades International UK, “Alliance of Lawyers at Risk”, http:// peacebrigades.org.uk/country-groups/pbi-uk/alliance-for-lawyers-at-risk (Accessed 10 February 2017). 47. Peace Brigades International, “Field Projects”, http://www.peacebrigades.org/en/fieldprojects (Accessed 15 April 2016). 48. Central European University School of Public Policy, “Jenkins Studies All-Female Peacekeeping Units”, 4 May 2015, http://spp.ceu.edu/article/2015-05-04/jenkins-studies -all-female-peacekeeping-units-draw-conclusions-gender (Accessed 5 June 2016). 49. Nonviolent Peaceforce, “What We Do”, http://www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org/unarmedcivilian-protection (Accessed 16 June 2016). 50. 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Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security 31 Unarmed Civilian Protection and How Women’s Participation Increases the Sustainability of Peace Journal of Conflict Transformation & Security 32 United Nations Radio, “Sexual Violence in Conflict Crimes So Bad in South Sudan”, 10 May 2016, http://www.unmultimedia.org/radio/english/2016/05/sexual-violence-inconflict-crim es-so-bad-in-south-sudan/#.WNpAPzuGNPb (Accessed 28 May 2016). United Nations, “Report of the UN Secretary-General on Women’s Participation in Peacebuilding”, 7 September 2010, http://www.unwomen.org/en/docs/2010/9/ women-in-peacebuilding-report-2010 (Accessed 15 June 2016). United Nations, “Report on the Activities of the UN Office of Internal Oversight Services”, 13 August 2015, https://oios.un.org/resources/2015/09/9rnCCY3U.pdf (Accessed 8 February 2017). 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As an international refereed e-journal, edited by a group of acclaimed scholars indicated in the Editorial Board, the Journal of Conflict Transformation and Security is published at its own website http://www.cesran.org/jcts. It welcomes submissions of articles from related persons involved in the scope of the journal as well as summary reports of conferences and lecture series held in the social sciences. Submissions in comparative analysis, with case studies and empirical research are particularly encouraged. Prospective authors should submit 5.000 - 10.000 word articles for consideration in Microsoft Word-compatible format. For more complete descriptions and submission instructions, please access the Editorial Guidelines and Style Guidelines pages at the CESRAN website: http://www.cesran.org/jcts. Contributors are urged to read CESRAN’s author guidelines and style guidelines carefully before submitting articles. Articles submissions should be sent in electronic format to: Prof. Alpaslan ÖZERDEM - Editor-in-Chief - [email protected] Publication date: Spring issue — April Autumn issue — October ISSN: 2045-1903 J OURNAL