Policy Impact
The Gender and Security Sector Lab is funded by Global Affairs Canada. It was previously funded by DCAF The Geneva Centre for Security Governance. Both grants are a part of the larger Elsie Initiative. The grants have allowed for the lab to create a rigorous methodology and set of tools for different countries to measure the barriers to women’s meaningful participation in United Nations Peacekeeping Operations. For more information about DCAF and the Elsie Initiative, click on the button below.
Our Current Policy Outputs
Policy Brief #1: Moving Beyond Zero Tolerance: Preventing Sexual Exploitation, Abuse, and Harassment in UN Peace Operations
Authors: Sabrina Karim, Sky Kunkel, DeAnne Roark, Angie Torres-Beltran, Cameron Mailhot, Sumin Lee, Radwa Saad, Priscilla Torres, Emily Jackson
Abstract: The inaugural Gender and Security Sector Lab policy memo, “Moving Beyond Zero Tolerance: Preventing Sexual Exploitation, Abuse, and Harassment in UN Peace Operations,” brings together decades of academic research as well as utilizes the GSS’s lab’s survey data and interviews with uniformed personnel from ten countries to describe several problems with the current zero tolerance framework for preventing SEAH (sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment). It suggests different approaches to developing a policy framework to prevent SEAH. Then the brief evaluates three possible avenues through which SEAH can be prevented: punitive, professionalization, and victim-centered/health approaches. The policy brief is meant to provide policymakers and practitioners with evidence to make changes that move beyond the UN zero tolerance policy toward a more comprehensive, holistic approach to prevention.
Policy Brief #2: The Transition Home: Key Challenges for African UN Peacekeepers Upon Return
Authors: Sabrina Karim, Maggie Dwyer, T. Debey Sayndee, Clair MacDougall, Sky Kunkel, Addison Barton, and Mike Kriner
Abstract: In recent years, global shifts in peacekeeping contributions have led to African countries being some of the largest contributors of peacekeeping. Yet, many of the countries lack resources and have limited funding for their state security forces. On one hand, deployment to peacekeeping missions helps provide the country’s security forces with training, new experience, and funds. On the other hand, there is less information about the challenges that these peacekeepers face upon return. This policy brief explores four potential challenges for African peacekeepers after they return from operations: relationship, psycho-social, economic, and career challenges. The report finds that the main challenges for returned peacekeepers upon their return appear to be relationship and financial. Women were more likely to experience financial challenges and social stigma whereas men had more physical and mental health problems. Psycho social, mental health, and physical problems were more prevalent in the military than the police. The report ends with a series of policy recommendations.
Policy Outputs with DCAF
The Measuring Opportunities for Women in Peace Operations (MOWIP) Methodology is a rigorous and innovative tool to measure the degree to which women can meaningfully participate in peace operations from the perspectives of the troop- and police-contributing countries (TPCCs). It develops ten issue areas and measures the degree to which the issue areas constitute a barrier or create opportunities for women’s meaningful participation in UN peace operations.
You can learn more on DCAF’s involvement in the Elsie Initiative on DCAF Elsie Initiative webpage. The MOWIP Methodology is the standard methodology for assessments required for applications to the Elsie Initiative Fund.
The Measuring Opportunities for Women In Peace Operations (MOWIP) Toolbox provides all data collection tools, templates and Explainers necessary for conducting a MOWIP Assessment, using the MOWIP Methodology. All data collection tools, templates and Explainers referred to in the MOWIP Methodology are downloadable on this webpage.
The Gender and Security Sector Lab has helped to write and publish MOWIP reports for over ten countries. They can be found here.
The GSS Lab has also contributed to the Global MOWIP report. Produced under the umbrella of the Elsie Initiative, the Global MOWIP presents consolidated data using the MOWIP methodology from 4 Troop- and Police- Contributing Countries (TPCCs) with a focus on actionable recommendations for international peacekeeping policy and practice.
This policy brief series addresses salient issue areas in MOWIP assessments that emerge as barriers, or opportunities (or both), to women in peacekeeping. It aims to debunk policy myths that have failed to generate systemic change in peacekeeping and to introduce new narratives, based on fresh evidence and research findings across MOWIP data, that identify clear ways forward for key policy actors.
Overall, the series aims to promote a shift in policy frameworks and its corresponding policy actions, from “increasing participation” (in numbers) to “increasing meaningful participation” (via the transformation of structures, practices, and attitudes).