The Women Peacemakers Program (WPP) is active on several levels: Capacity building; networking and movement building; documentation and dissemination; and joint lobby and advocacy for the implementation of the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Agenda. Within our work, we work on the inter linkages of innovative and emerging issues within gender-sensitive peacebuilding, such as: incorporating a masculinities perspective within the Women, Peace & Security agenda; addressing the connections between gender and militarism; raising awareness on the impact of counterterrorism measures (CTM) on women’s civil society space; and the intersections of religion, peace and gender.
Please find hereunder a short description of the various activities of WPP, including highlights of activities we initiated since our independence late 2012. Jump to the following sections:
Capacity building for Gender-Sensitive Active Nonviolence (GSANV) is at the heart of WPP's empowerment approach. We organize regional Training of Trainers (ToT) Cycles on GSANV, which provide activists and their organizations with concrete tools to analyse conflict through a GSANV lens, as well as mobilize for nonviolent action in an effort to resolve conflicts in a peaceful and inclusive manner.
Trainees include female and male civil society activists, who are in a position to roll out GSANV initiatives in their own community and organization, as well as connect these activities on a national and often regional level. We welcome both women and men as trainees, following our successful Masculinities ToT Cycle during 2009-2010, which we initiated based on the feedback provided by the women activists in our network. Including men and introducing a masculinities perspective into our trainings has contributed to increasing men's understanding of, support for, and involvement in gender-sensitive peacebuilding; in addition to deepening our gender analysis by exposing the deeply gendered nature of armed conflict.
A WPP ToT Cycle consists of three parts;
Since our independence in 2012, we have implemented ToT Cycles in Asia and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. During the 2012-2013 WPP Asia ToT Cycle “Together for Transformation: Gender-Sensitive Nonviolence for Sustainable Peace”, activists from 10 different Asian countries were trained. In direct follow-up, the trainees organized GSANV projects in 9 different Asian countries, mobilizing hundreds of people, including youth and community leaders, government officials and NGO representatives.
In the framework of the program “Amplifying the Voices of Women in the MENA Region”, WPP, in close cooperation with ABAAD – Resource Centre for Gender Justice, initiated the 2015 MENA ToT Cycle “Together for Transformation: Gender-sensitive Nonviolence for Sustainable Peace”. Building upon an extensive WPP needs assessment on UNSCR 1325 in the region, this Cycle brings together men and women peacemakers from various organizations based in the MENA region, covering subjects such as active nonviolence, masculinities and UNSCR 1325. The second and final training week will take place early 2016.
We are currently developing a GSANV training manual, involving former trainees and trainers in the drafting process.
You can find some reports of our latest ToT Cycles in the WPP Report & Publications section.
Partnership, cooperation and mutual support are key for building a culture of peace through active nonviolence. With community building as one of our core values, we consider it important to invest in connecting our extensive network of community-based, regional, and international activist partners through the establishment of the WPP Community. Within the WPP Community, we link grassroots voices and activism to the international policymaking arena, advocate for a transformative WPS agenda and contribute to giving visibility to, and supporting the leadership of women in conflict prevention and resolution processes. More information about the WPP Community can be found here.
The organizing of Global Consultations on critical and emerging themes is an important element in building a global movement for gender-sensitive peacebuilding. Global Consultations serve as platforms to connect activists from around the world to jointly analyze, discuss, and develop new insights and strategies. Over the years, we have organized the following Global Consultations:
In light of the 15th anniversary of UNSCR 1325 and the Global Review, we organized a Global Consultation in Scheveningen during July 2015. During this meeting, 30 international civil society activists engaged in an in-depth reflection to strategize for transformative implementation of the Women, Peace and Security agenda. The consultation took place within the framework of the Research and Action Project “Candid Voices from the Field: Obstacles to Practical Implementation of UNSCR 1325”, which is a joint project of WPP, Cordaid and GPPAC.
Next to our Global Consultations, we regularly organize regional consultations (MENA and Asia) to enable the exchange of experiences from different countries; joint analysis of changing contexts; the development of new approaches and actions in response; and the overall strengthening of partnerships between activists within the region. Within the last five years, we have organized three Asia Network consultations (2011, 2013 and 2014) and two MENA network consultations (2012 and 2014), connecting activists from 22 countries.
We consider it important to document and disseminate activists’ experiences, perspectives and stories, to raise their visibility as well as awareness about the importance of women’s participation in peacebuilding. This is done via:
For a complete overview of our publications, visit our Resources section.
In run-up to the 15th anniversary of UNSCR 1325 in October 2015, WPP, together with GPPAC and Cordaid, published a series of 11 personal stories from women and men from around the world, who work on gender-sensitive peacebuilding within their communities. These stories are part of the joint Research and Action Project "Candid Voices from the Field: Obstacles to Delivering Transformative Change within the Women, Peace and Security Agenda". The aim of the research is to uncover the deep-rooted obstacles that hamper women’s participation in peacebuilding. Watch the first video of Fatima Outaleb.
We take part in (inter)national lobby & advocacy initiatives around the WPS agenda, for example by:
WPP works for the broadening of the gender, peace and security paradigm. This is done through a two-track approach, which involves the empowering of women peace activists as well as contributing to an enabling environment for women’s activism. We do this by including a masculinities perspective in our work, in order to increase male support for gender-sensitive peacebuilding. Applying a holistic gender analysis on conflict and peace, we consider it crucial to build bridges between different movements. From 2014 onwards, we have started to address the impact of counterterrorism measures (CTM) on women’s civil society space. Read the accompanying Policy Brief for more information.
In addition, we contribute to the development of manuals, policy briefs and academic papers, and regularly provide training for students as part of summer schools organized by other organizations. Since 2014, WPP has been co-organizing the Summer School “Women, Peace and Security - Challenges and Achievements”, together with Oxfam Novib, Leiden University and WO=MEN.
“The WPP Asia Training of Trainers changed me; I now make a conscious effort to be nonviolent in any way”
Jo Genna Jover, Kutawato Council for Justice and Peace Inc - the Philippines
“I would like to once again thank you for inviting me to the global consultation which was a very inspiring experience indeed. I was happy to interact with all those wonderful people from different parts of the world and to learn from them. I am still processing the May 28th event, which was such a humbling experience for me. All I can say is, keep up the good work!”
Jane Ngugi, Community Education and Empowerment Centre - Kenya
