Towards inclusive peace: Analysing gender-sensitive peace agreements 2000–2016
| Published date | 01 January 2019 |
| Date | 01 January 2019 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/0192512118808608 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/0192512118808608
International Political Science Review
2019, Vol. 40(1) 23 –40
© The Author(s) 2018
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DOI: 10.1177/0192512118808608
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Towards inclusive peace: Analysing
gender-sensitive peace agreements
2000–2016
Jacqui True
Monash University, Australia
Yolanda Riveros-Morales
Monash University, Australia
Abstract
The presence of gender provisions in peace agreements affects women’s participation in post-conflict
societies as well as the chances that a post-conflict society will move towards gender equality. While
there is an overall upward trend in the number of references to women’s rights and gender equality in
peace agreements, gender-sensitive agreements are not a given. Why and how are peace agreements with
gender provisions adopted? We use statistical analysis to explain why some peace agreements adopt gender
provisions while others have no such provisions. Based on an analysis of 98 peace agreements across 55
countries between 2000 and 2016, we find that peace agreements are significantly more likely to have gender
provisions when women participate in elite peace processes. Our study also shows that the likelihood of
achieving a peace agreement with gender provisions increases when women’s representation in national
parliaments increases and when women’s civil society participation is significant.
Keywords
Peace agreements, women, peace and security, women’s political participation, inclusive peace processes,
gender equality norms
Introduction
The record of women’s participation and representation in peace talks is extremely poor. Until the
adoption of United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325 on Women, Peace and
Security (WPS), few peace agreements mentioned women’s rights or contained commitments to
achieving gender equality in post-conflict settlements. Until recently, peace processes have been
Corresponding author:
Jacqui True, Centre for Gender, Peace and Security, Monash University, 20 Chancellors Walk, Clayton, VIC 3800
Australia.
Email: jacqui.true@monash.edu
808608IPS0010.1177/0192512118808608International Political Science ReviewTrue and Riveros-Morales
research-article2018
Article
24 International Political Science Review 40(1)
almost wholly the preserve of security providers understood to be men and armed groups as
opposed to security stakeholders understood to be civilian women, girls, boys and men.
Almost two decades after the introduction of the WPS agenda, there has been some progress in
state commitments to ensuring the full, equal, and meaningful participation of women in peace
processes. However, the implementation of these commitments is judged by experts, non-govern-
mental organisations (NGOs), states and the United Nations itself, to have been extremely slow
(UN Women, 2015). Women are not consistently engaged in negotiating peace and are still fre-
quently excluded from many peace processes (Aggestam and Svensson, 2018). The United States
Council on Foreign Relations (2018) has found that in all major peace processes between 1990 and
2017 just 8 per cent of mediators, 8 per cent of negotiators and 5 per cent of witnesses and signa-
tories to peace agreements were women.1 These trends in gender inclusion in peace processes take
place in the context of two global trends: the intensification of armed violence and conflict across
the world over the last decade, in which nearly 90 per cent of those killed are civilians, many of
them women and children; and the contemporary failure of half of all peace processes, where most
ongoing civil wars are the result of previous, recurring conflicts.2
Given the intensifying, gendered impacts of conflict as well as the recurrence of civil wars,
women’s participation in peace processes and the attentiveness of peace agreements to gender
inequality issues is imperative. In particular, the presence or absence of gender provisions in peace
agreements affects women’s post-conflict participation and the chances that a post-conflict society
will move towards gender equality. Gender inequalities within states are known to affect state and
non-state armed groups behaviour including the instigation of conflict, the escalation and severity
of violence during crises and the prevalence of conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence
(Caprioli, 2005; Davies and True, 2015; Melander, 2005). Moreover, harnessing both women and
men’s capacities is crucial to efforts to promote recovery from conflict (True and Hewitt, 2018).
While there is an overall upward trend in the number of references to women’s rights and gender
equality in peace agreements since 2000, gender-sensitive agreements are not a given. To give a
sense of the mixed progress in this area, the most recent annual report of the UN Secretary-General
on WPS observed a decline in all areas of establishing gender-sensitive peace processes including
the participation of women, the use of gender technical advisors, and the inclusion of gender provi-
sions in peace agreements.3 Why then are peace agreements with gender equality and women’s
rights provisions adopted? What are the factors that give rise to agreements with explicit gender
provisions?
This article aims to shed light on these important questions by adopting a theoretically informed,
quantitative approach.4 All peace agreements are different, as case-specific analysis reveals, with
respect to their process design, the levels of public transparency (Jeong, 2005), and the nature of
participation in negotiating agreements and the opportunities for women or any other social group
to participate (Paffenholz, 2014h). The conditions leading to adoption of peace agreements with
gender provisions may also differ widely across cases. Given such diversity, in this study we seek
to establish whether there are patterns across peace agreements (and their processes) that might
differentiate those with gender provisions from those without such provisions. It is crucial to know
whether there are common factors in peace processes where gender-sensitive agreements are nego-
tiated, in order to further understanding of the pathways to more gender-inclusive agreements and
of the strategies to achieving gender-equal and lasting peace.
Gender inclusion in peace processes
The 2000 preamble to the landmark UNSCR 1325 stresses the importance of women’s ‘equal par-
ticipation and full involvement in all efforts for the maintenance and promotion of peace and
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