scholarly journals The Women, Peace and Security Agenda: The Unfinished Story of Feminist Revolution versus Compromise in Global Politics

2019 ◽  
Vol 54 (4) ◽  
pp. 47-65
Author(s):  
Míla O'Sullivan
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Security Council ◽  
United Nations Security Council ◽  
Security Council Resolution ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
Global Order ◽  
Security Governance ◽  
Peace And Security ◽  
The United Nations

The adoption of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security (WPS) in 2000 has prompted the development of an extensive WPS scholarship within the field of feminist International Relations. The dynamic scholarly debate is characterised by certain tensions between two feminist groups – the radical revolutionary one which advocates a redefinition of the global order and is more sceptical of the agenda, and the pragmatist one accentuating the compromise towards the existing peace and security governance. This article explores the two main subjects of the WPS research – the discourse and implementation, as they have been informed by the revolutionary and pragmatist approaches. The article shows that while the academic inquiries into the WPS discourse reveal disappointment with the compromises made regarding the revolutionary vision, this disappointment is also present in the literature on implementation. The latter literature nonetheless acknowledges feminist pragmatism as a way forward given the realities on the ground.

scholarly journals World Peace and Gender Equality: Addressing UN Security Council Resolution 1325’s Weaknesses

2021 ◽  
pp. 247
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Griffiths ◽  
Sara Jarman ◽  
Eric Jensen
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
Gender Equality ◽  
Security Council ◽  
International Community ◽  
United Nations Security Council ◽  
Security Council Resolution ◽  
World Peace ◽  
International Peace ◽  
Peace And Security ◽  
The United Nations

The year 2020 marks the twentieth anniversary of the passage of United Nations Security Council Resolution (“UNSCR”) 1325, the most important moment in the United Nations’ efforts to achieve world peace through gender equality. Over the past several decades, the international community has strengthened its focus on gender, including the relationship between gender and international peace and security. National governments and the United Nations have taken historic steps to elevate the role of women in governance and peacebuilding. The passage of UNSCR 1325 in 2000 foreshadowed what many hoped would be a transformational shift in international law and politics. However, the promise of gender equality has gone largely unrealized, despite the uncontroverted connection between treatment of women and the peacefulness of a nation. This Article argues for the first time that to achieve international peace and security through gender equality, the United Nations Security Council should transition its approach from making recommendations and suggestions to issuing mandatory requirements under Chapter VII of the U.N. Charter. If the Security Council and the international community believe gender equality is the best indicator of sustainable peace, then the Security Council could make a finding under Article 39 with respect to ‘a threat to the peace’—States who continue to mistreat women and girls pose a threat to international peace and security. Such a finding would trigger the Security Council’s mandatory authority to direct States to take specific actions. In exercising its mandatory authority, the Security Council should organize, support, and train grassroots organizations and require States to do the same. It should further require States to produce a reviewable National Action Plan, detailing how each State will implement its responsibilities to achieve gender equality. The Security Council should also provide culturally sensitive oversight on domestic laws which may act as a restraint on true gender equality.

scholarly journals The COVID-19 test of the United Nations Security Council

2021 ◽  
pp. 002070202098689
Author(s):  
Bruno Charbonneau
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United Nations ◽  
International Cooperation ◽  
Security Council ◽  
United Nations Security Council ◽  
Global Order ◽  
Multilateral Cooperation ◽  
The United Nations

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has failed the COVID-19 test, unable to promote or facilitate multilateral cooperation in dealing with the outbreak. This is worrying given its relevance as a principal organ of the United Nations (UN) that could enable or constrain international cooperation and given the need for such cooperation in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. The failure of the UNSC to respond adequately to the COVID-19 pandemic highlights the historical limits of the UNSC as a forum for international cooperation. It also suggests that highlighting and debating UNSC reforms are not sufficient or even productive ways to move forward, especially in the context of the challenges that pandemics and climate change represent for global cooperation. It is far from clear if the UN system can change the global structures on which it was built. What does seem clear is that the UNSC is not where one will find the seeds of change for reimagining global order.

WPS and Adopted Security Council Resolutions

2018 ◽  
pp. 97-109
Author(s):  
Laura J. Shepherd
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
Security Council ◽  
Security Council Resolution ◽  
Policy Framework ◽  
Future Directions ◽  
Representational Practices ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
Peace And Security ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Over Time

This chapter outlines the architecture of the Women, Peace, and Security agenda at the United Nations. Building on the explanation of the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 provided earlier in the volume, it explores the meanings of “women,” “peace,” and “security” that are constructed through the WPS policy framework. The chapter traces the continuities and changes to the central concepts in the resolutions and reflects on the implications of these representational practices as they affect the provisions and principles of the WPS agenda in practice. Moreover, the chapter draws out the key provisions of each resolution to explore the tensions that have arisen over time regarding the types of energy and commitment that have become manifest in the architecture supporting WPS implementation. This in turn enables a brief analysis of likely future directions of WPS practice and a comment on the ways in which Security Council dynamics might affect and effect certain possibilities while excluding or proscribing others.

United Nations Security Council Resolution 2498

2020 ◽  
Vol 59 (3) ◽  
pp. 417-427
Author(s):  
Milena Sterio
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
Security Council ◽  
United Nations Security Council ◽  
Security Council Resolution ◽  
Revenue Sources ◽  
The United Nations

On November 15, 2019, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 2498, which extended the mandate of the previously established Panel of Experts of Somalia by an additional year; the Resolution also expanded the scope of the Panel's inquiry by specifically tasking the Panel to investigate Al-Shabaab's revenue sources and illegal taxation schemes.

In the name of democracy: UNSC reform at the intersection of discourse and governmentality

2020 ◽  
pp. 095792652097038
Author(s):  
Bjarke Zinck Winther ◽  
Laura Bang Lindegaard
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Security Council ◽  
United Nations Security Council ◽  
Democracy Promotion ◽  
Reform Process ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Reform Debate

Both scholars and practitioners are frustrated by the complexity of United Nations Security Council reform. Most research on the reform process is situated within international relations, and almost no attention is granted to the discursive dimensions of the reform. This article approaches democracy promotion as a governmental rationality within the United Nations, and it traces how this governmentality is co-constituted and negotiated discursively in the reform debate. The analysis focuses on argumentation and topoi in statements from debates about reform during 2015 to 2016 by two groups: The Group of Four and The Uniting for Consensus. The analysis demonstrates how the two groups utilise a topos of majority and a topos of equality, respectively, and how the groups thereby in different ways co-constitute and negotiate the governmental rationality of democracy. Through this, the article unravels the subtle ways in which the rigidity of the reform process is co-constituted through discourse.

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