The Role of the United Nations Women, Peace and Security Agenda in Promoting Gender Justice in Post-Conflict Societies: Is the Agenda Transformative?
The Role of the United Nations Women, Peace and Security Agenda in Promoting Gender Justice in Post-Conflict Societies: Is the Agenda Transformative?

Summary/Abstract: United Nations Security Council’s (UNSC) Women, Peace and Security agenda created an optimism among the feminist scholars, although some of the scholars approached cautiously and criticized the agenda for being an instrument for the UNSC to broaden its authority and power. This paper is in line with the latter view. It mainly aims to bring forward the problems within the agenda by questioning its accountability mechanisms. The most significant accountability mechanism of the agenda is the National Action Plans (NAPs) which are supposed to be adopted by each UN member states to implement the agenda within their domestic sphere. The paper illustrates the implementation of the agenda by applying to the Bosnia and Herzegovina’s NAPs in order to demonstrate the disconnections and continuities between the UNSC agenda (international law) and Bosnia and Herzegovina’s NAPs (domestic law), both are precluding the transformation of women’s roles in postconflict reconstruction process. It has been suggested that in order to create gender mainstreaming, the NAPs should go beyond the prescribed solutions under the WPS resolutions and should even challenge the WPS agenda for its silence on militarism and armament.

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