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1325 Sandbox

Resolution

Acts

The operational items in resolution 1325 address broadly calls upon member states to address the needs of women and girls in armed conflict and support their participation in peace negotiations. The key components of resolution 1325 are:

• Preventing sexual and gender-based violence: resolution 1325 calls upon all parties to conflict to take special measures to protect women and girls from violence in armed conflict, particularly sexual and gender-based violence. It also calls for states to end impunity for crimes against humanity, particularly sexual violence, and prosecute offenders.
• Peace negotiations: The resolutions calls for including a gender perspective in peace negotiations and increasing women's participation in peace negotiation, with particular attention to supporting local women's peace initiatives.
• Protection of women and girls in refugee settings: The resolution calls upon parties to conflict to consider the special needs of women in girls in designing and administering camps.
• DDR: It also calls for considering gender in DDR, particularly the different needs of male and female ex-combatants.
• Women's political participation: The resolution calls upon member states to increase women's participation at all levels of decision-making in national, regional and international institutions.^[4]
• Peacekeeping: To incorporate a gender perspective into peacekeeping operations; ^[5] to consider gender in Security Council missions and consult with international and local women's organizations.
• Provide training for the UN and Member States on the protection, rights and needs of women; gender sensitivity and the importance of involving women in peacekeeping and peace-building measures.
• Gender balancing in the UN: Increase women's representation as Special Representatives and envoys; and in field operations, particularly among military observers, police, human rights, and humanitarian personnel.
• [reporting]

The resolution also calls upon all countries to fully respect international law applicable to the rights and protection of women and girls, in particular the obligation under the Geneva Convention of 1949 and Additional Protocol thereto of 1977, the Refugee Convention of 1951 and the Protocol thereto of 1967, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and its Optional Protocol, the Convention on the Rights of the Child and Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, as well Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography, to bear in mind the provisions of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.

History

The resolution was passed unanimously in October 2000, after extensive lobbying by the NGO Working Group on Women, Peace and Security (NGO WG) and United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM). The resolution was initiated by Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, then Minister of Women's Affairs in Namibia, when the country took its turn chairing the Security Council. Ambassador Anwarul Chowdhury, representing Bangladesh on the Council, also made significant contributions by using Bangladesh's role as Council President by bringing attention to women's contributions to peace and security. Chowdhury has remained a vocal and active advocate for full implementation of UNSCR 1325.

The Beijing Platform for Action developed in 1995 contained an entire chapter focused on women, peace and security. The Beijing Conference's 5th anniversary (Beijing+5) provided critical momentum for progress on women, peace and security issues at the UN. During the 1990s, the NGO community was increasingly concerned about the negative impacts of war on women, particularly widespread sexual violence seen in civil wars in Bosnia, West Africa and Rwanda. Activists were also outraged by the barriers for women to entering peace talks and the negative impacts that women experienced post-conflict.

The resolution's history and passage is notable for the level of involvement by NGOs and civil society, who helped draft the resolution. The two day debate on the resolution was also the first time the Council dedicated a discussion to women.

Implementation

United Nations

Broadly, the UN has implemented 1325 in the areas of sexual violence in armed conflict and increasing women's participation in peace processes and political institutions. Within the UN, 1325 has led to an increased attention to gender mainstreaming, or assessing a policy's different impacts for women and men. The main UN programs implementing 1325 are: UN Women and Department of Peacekeeping Operations, although many other programs also apply 1325 to their work.

Four Pillars of Implementation

In 2009, Resolution 1889 called on the Secretary-General to develop a set of indicators to track the implementation 1325. The indicators developed are the four pillars of prevention, protection, participation and relief and recovery.

• Prevention focuses on preventing sexual and gender-based violence, as well as gender awareness in conflict prevention and early warning systems. This includes preventing sexual exploitation and abuse by peacekeeping forces.
• Protection involves improving women and girls' safety, physical and mental health, economic security and overall well-being. It also focuses on improving the rights of women and girls and their legal protections.
• Participation refers to promoting women's participation in peace processes, increasing the numbers of women at all levels of decision-making institutions and increasing partnerships with local women's organizations. Participation also includes increasing women's participation in the UN in senior positions, as Special Representatives and in peacekeeping missions and operations.
• Relief and recovery efforts should ensure the equal distribution of aid to women and girls and incorporate gender perspectives into relief and recovery efforts.

Specific indicators include tracking numbers related to outcomes, such as the number of women in peace negotiations, the number of military manuals that include measures on women's protection or the number of cases investigated on violence against women.

National Action Plans

Since 2000, 48 countries have adopted National Action Plans (NAP) on Resolution 1325, outlining policies that the country will take to fulfill the resolution's objectives. As of 2014, exactly half of the countries with National Action Plans are in Europe and 14 are in Africa. While the number of countries with NAPs increased rapidly leading up to and following the ten-year anniversary of UNSCR 1325, less than one-fourth of the UN member states have implemented NAPs.

Most NAPs come from developed countries, which use NAPs to prescribe how foreign aid should support the pillars of 1325, and developing and conflict-affected countries, which use NAPs to support women's participation in politics and peace processes, as well as make commitments to the protection of women from SGBV. A major gap is in troop contributing countries (TCC) to peacekeeping missions -- the top four TCCs do not have national action plans.

NAPs address political, social and security policies and often require interagency coordination. While many countries have implemented NAPs, few are actively monitoring and evaluating programs or reporting outcomes.

Several regional organizations have adopted 1325 Regional Action Plans, including the European Union, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Economic Community Of West African States (ECOWAS) and the Pacific Islands Forum. NATO has used the UNSCR to increase the levels of women in the military and has influenced seven NATO member states to have increasing women's participation in the military as a goal in implementing UNSCR 1325.

Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO)

NGOs play an important role in implementing UNSCR 1325. NGOs have lobbied their national governments to develop National Action Plans and many NAPs have a NGO oversight body to hold governments accountable to their commitments. Grassroots NGOs, particularly women's organizations, also use UNSCR 1325 in conflict-affected countries to lobby their governments to comply with 1325 on issues like including women in conflict negotiations or holding peacekeeping missions accountable for sexual abuse and exploitation. Established, international NGOs play an important role by disseminating information on UNSCR 1325 to grassroots organizations and training local actors in the resolution and how to use it.

Impact

Increased Awareness and Recognition

Resolution 1325 is used around the world as a policy tool to implement gender-sensitive conflict-related policies. It has also been use as an organizing framework for actors outside of the UN, such as states, NGOs and researchers, in a way that no other Security Council resolution has. For example, it is the only resolution to have its anniversary celebrated with reports, conferences and special sessions of the Security Council. Furthermore, there has been a significant change in rhetoric, with more and more UN agencies, representatives and member states discussing how gender inequality impacts peace and security.

Within the UN, the resolution led to increased attention to the issue of women and conflict. Prior to resolution 1325, the Security Council rarely considered women with the occasional passing reference to women and children as vulnerable groups in conflict in need of protection. In fact, prior to 2000, only 33 out of 225 Security Council resolutions mentioned gender at all. By 2013, 76% of Security Council resolutions referenced women, peace and security. Since its passage, the Security Council has passed six more resolutions related to the topic of women and armed conflict.

Outcomes

DPKO conducted a ten-year review of 1325 implementation looking at twelve UN peacekeeping missions and reported outcomes across the components of 1325. It found the following:

• Women's political participation had largely positive outcomes, with host countries seeing higher rates of female voters and politicians, as well as increased legal provisions to support gender equality.
• There continued to be low levels of women in peace negotiations, with women comprising less than 10% of those formally involved across all missions. Academic research found that women were significantly more likely to be mentioned in peace processes and agreements after UNSCR 1325.
• Security sector institutions saw limited gains in female uniformed personnel, despite increases in the number of uniformed women in peacekeeping missions.
• There were mixed results in gender mainstreaming in DDR -- some missions increased the numbers of women demobilized, but these gains were uneven across missions and reintegration remained a challenge.
• Sexual and gender based violence continues to be widespread with impunity for those who commit it, despite increases in training and legislation. Reports of sexual abuse and exploitation by peacekeeping forces continue to rise, despite increased attention to this problem within the UN.
• Missions made a greater effort to protect women in refugee and IDP settings through increased patrols and escorts, but resources for these protections were limited.

The 2014 Secretary-General's report on 1325 implementation found that challenges remained in implementing UNSCR 1325 at the operational level. UNSCR resolutions increasingly mention gender, UN Mission reports frequently mention women, peace and security; and there is increased reporting on these issues in UN bodies. However, there continued to be widespread reports of sexual abuse and exploitation by peacekeeping operations, despite increased attention to the issue within the UN.

For the resolution's 15th anniversary in 2015, the UN has announced a high-level review of implementation of 1325 to assess progress made at the international, regional and national levels.

Criticisms

Gender Essentialism

Feminists criticize 1325 for relying on essentialist portrayals of women, which assume that women are victims at the hands of aggressive men. These portrayals render women as perpetual victims (reports of violence against civilians tend to emphasize that "women and children" as victims to illustrate the brutal nature of violence) and ignore women's agency to bring about both violence and peace violence. Conversely, this framing also implies that men are not victims, particularly male victims of sexual violence or the gender-based violence of killing men because they are men.

Gender essentialism also assumes that women are innately peaceful and peacemakers, usually due to their experiences of motherhood, which is one of the main reasons that people use to argue for including women in peace processes. Another frequently cited gender essentialist argument is that women are natural coalition builders and are more likely to build coalitions with members of other groups. During the lobbying for 1325, activists argued for the Council to recognize women's agency in conflict situations, but in the final version of 1325, women's agency was essentially defined to be women's agency as peacemakers.

Resolution 1325 is based on these assumptions and they are frequently cited in the Secretary-General Reports, advocacy movements, and National Action Plans. For example, the United States Department of State 1325 Implementation Plan makes explicit reference to women's ability to form coalitions. These results are problematic because first of, they are based on stereotypes and not research or facts. The result is that women often feel the need to conform to certain stereotypes and that women who do not fit these ideals are marginalized in politics and policy.

Lack of Evidence

Despite the attention to implementing 1325 and developing indicators, there is little evidence of impacts in conflict-affected countries. The UN's own evaluations show limited progress only in a few areas, most notably women's political participation. Furthermore, 1325 depends on many unproven assumptions, such as the potential for women's participation to have a transformational effect on peace and security. However, recent initiatives have emphasized the need for more data to track results, including the upcoming High-Level Review of 1325.

Related Resolutions

Resolution 1325 is related to several other resolutions related to the topic of women, peace and security, passed since 2000. These include:

• Resolution 1820 (2008), condemning sexual violence as a weapon of war and declares rape and other forms of sexual violence as war crimes.
• Resolution 1888 (2009), which mandates the peacekeeping missions prevent and respond to sexual violence and led to the creation of the Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Armed Conflict.
• Resolution 1889 (2009) on increasing women's participation in peace processes and requests that the Secretary-General develop indicators to track the implementation of 1325.
• Resolution 1960 (2010) focuses on ending impunity for sexual violence in armed conflict by calling on the Secretary-General to "name and shame" armed groups that perpetrate sexual violence and for sanctions to deter conflict-related sexual violence.
• Resolution 2106 (2013) to address impunity on sexual violence in armed conflict and operationalize past resolution. It also recognizes that sexual violence in conflict can also affect men and boys, as well as the community-wide trauma that sexual violence can inflict.
• Resolution 2122 (2013) reaffirms the Council's commitment to combating sexual violence in armed conflict and the full implementation of resolution 1325 and other resolutions on women, peace and security.

External Links

USIP Guide to 1325