Women, Peace and Security beyond Institutional Silos: The AU Panel of the Wise and the AU WPS Agenda.

At the African Union, the Women, Peace and Security Agenda has been institutionalized both through dedicated new structures and through mainstreaming into existing structures. In this blog article, Camille Vern sheds light on an instance of the latter, examining the AU Panel of the Wise as an actor implementing the WPS agenda as part of its conflict prevention mandate. How does the panel mainstream gender through its activities and the wider African Peace and Security Architecture? What lessons can be learned from the panels’ activities to mainstream gender beyond silos?

Since its establishment, the African Union (AU) has committed to the principle of gender equality, enshrining the norm in its founding documents, policy frameworks, and institutions. At the AU, the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Agenda has been implemented by actors, such as the Special Envoy on Women, Peace and Security and her office, or the coordinator of the Gender, Peace and Security Programme, established at the Political Affairs, Peace and Security Department (AU PAPS). In this blog article, I want to shed light on an actor engaging in WPS activities, despite not being solely dedicated to the issue: The African Union Panel of the Wise.

Established as part of the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA), the AU Panel of the Wise was conceptualized as an independent pillar dedicated to conflict prevention, supporting the AU Peace and Security Council, as well as the other three APSA pillars of conflict resolution efforts. Institutionalized in 2007, the panel consists of five eminent members, representing Central, East, North, South, and West Africa. The members are appointed for a mandate of three years by the AU Assembly of Heads of States and Governments.

The case I’m putting forward in this article is that we can consider the AU Panel of the Wise as an actor engaged in WPS and an example of how to advocate for women’s rights despite representing an institution whose mandate does not solely depend on gender equality. In a political arena organized in discrete silos, like the African Union, gender is often treated and acted upon as something that has been ‘added-on’ through the creation of dedicated structures, rather than as a crucial, cross-cutting, and integral aspect of human security. Pushing back against this view, I want to show how the AU Panel of the Wise has incorporated women’s rights in their work on conflict prevention and identify some lessons learned.

Toni Haastrup (2019) has explained that, in the context of the African Union, gender equates to women. Therefore, in this text, the terms ‘gender’, ‘gender equality’, ‘gender parity’ or ‘gender mainstreaming’ are used in the narrow and binary sense of the authors of AU documents. In the majority of cases, AU gender policies address the inclusion and rights of women according to traditional binary gender roles. This understanding of gender can be criticized from a poststructural feminist perspective, as this does not account for the lived experiences of many, and may even reinforce harmful gender norms and stereotypes.

Raising Awareness through Thematic Reflections

From its inception, the AU Panel of the Wise has been pursuing gender parity in its membership. There have always been at least two female members sitting on the panel. During the tenure of the third (2014-2017) and fourth (2017-2022) panel, three out of the five members were women. Amongst them were former Vice-President of Uganda, Speciosa Wandira Kazibwe, and former President of Liberia, Ellen Johnson. However its activities concerning Women, Peace and Security started with its third thematic reflection, before women held the majority on the panel.

The members of the first (2007-2010) AU Panel of the Wise established this practice in their first programme of work (2008), with the aim of raising awareness around topics relevant to conflict prevention—often neglected by the leadership of the African Union. After dealing with election-related violence and transitional justice, the panelists decided to dedicate their thematic reflection for the year 2010 to the issue of women and children in armed conflict. Experts were contracted to draft a report which was discussed during two workshops in November 2009 and May 2010 as well as an expert’s meeting in October 2011. These reflections were taken up by the AU Peace and Security Council (AU PSC), leading to the council’s first open session on Women, Peace and Security on 30 March 2010, dedicated at the time to the situation of women and children in armed conflicts.

The AU PSC open sessions on WPS are a testimony to the relevance of the panel, giving women’s rights advocates access to the AU and sparking numerous discussions and initiatives. This move constituted the basis for lobbying inside the AU Commission, for example to advocate for a Special Envoy on Women, Peace and Security. Bineta Diop was the first appointed Special Envoy in 2014 and has since contributed to the establishment of National Action Plans across the continent. With her office, they have engaged in solidarity missions, high-level forums, and created the African Women Leaders Network (AWLN) in 2017. Diop is followed by Liberata Mulamula, one of the founding members of FemWise Africa.

The AU Network of African Women in Conflict Prevention and Mediation

In 2017, the AU Network of African Women in Conflict Prevention and Mediation (FemWise-Africa) was founded. The network was established to work towards the participation of women in mediation. Taking inspiration from the power of collectives on the continent and beyond, the mediator’s network was conceived as an effective strategy to showcase the vast and varied expertise of women engaged in conflict management. Establishing the network as a subsidiary mechanism of the AU Panel of the Wise made it part of the African Peace and Security Architecture, thereby institutionalizing the WPS agenda at the African Union.

In the first years of the network’s existence, hundreds of members were accredited while gaining access to training, mentors and, most importantly, to the high-level political arena of the African Union. This first cohort of the network was a testament to the AU’s efforts to create new participatory dynamics by including women from all over the continent and from various backgrounds in its peacebuilding efforts. In practice, however, there were not enough human resources to sustain the momentum of the network’s creation and deploy all of these members. Engaged in political activities at the level of so-called Track One Diplomacy, the AU PAPS could deploy only a small number of members in its activities. The most prominent and active FemWise-Africa members are its co-chairs, currently the two female members of the AU Panel of the Wise: Lady Justice Effie Owuor from Kenya, and former South African Vice-President, Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka. They are advocating for women’s rights at the continental and high-level political scale, while engaging in election observation or assessment, or in the AU mediation process in Ethiopia.

Being aware of the challenge of not engaging the majority of its members, the AU PAPS leadership and coordinator of the network decided to initiate a restructuration in 2024. Recalibrating its operations, the coordinating team is now addressing the inclusion of grassroots women by creating national chapters, anchored in government structures of member states. So far, FemWise chapters have been established in Uganda, Ethiopia, Malawi, South Sudan and Morocco. At the same time, a new cohort was launched in early 2025 creating a mediator and expert roster for the AU PAPS to turn to when deploying peacemakers. By adapting their strategies, the coordinating team of FemWise-Africa is affirming the domain and context of the African Union, engaging in high-level activities and relying on individuals with a certain status and influence.

What Can we Learn from the AU Panel of the Wise?

FemWise-Africa represents the most prominent and effective tool created by the AU Panel of the Wise to include women in AU activities and make their expertise and experience visible. It has given the opportunity to some individuals to be seconded as a Mediation Officer in an AU Liaison Office, or to monitor gender provisions during an AU Election Observation Mission. The two co-chairs are advocates for women’s rights and inclusion, often being the only communication channel for women at negotiation tables or in high-level spaces.

With their mandate of conflict prevention, representatives of the institution have used their platform and practices to advocate for women’s inclusion beyond and between institutional silos. Directorates and positions created on the basis of UNSCR 1325—such as the AU’s Gender Programme, the Special Envoy on WPS or the Directorate for Women, Gender and Youth at the AU Commission—are essential. Dedicated solely to the protection of women’s rights, ensuring their participation and preventing gender-based violence, these actors are holding the powerful to account, creating monitoring mechanisms, and making sure matters are discussed with the urgency they deserve. If we acknowledge the need for these institutions, then we must also recognise that the AU Panel of the Wise represents a valuable model to engrain gender equality and the objectives of the WPS agenda in the broader field of conflict prevention.

Operating in a strictly normative and institutional context, the representatives of the AU Panel of the Wise—its members, supporting actors, coordinators of its secretariat or staff at the Mediation and Dialogue Division of the AU PAPS—have positioned themselves as strategic actors capable of pushing the WPS agenda forward. By engaging in a thematic reflection, producing knowledge in formal reports, and creating an institution showcasing the amount of female mediators and experts on WPS on the continent, the AU Panel of the Wise legitimizes women leaders in Africa and advocates for women’s participation at the African Union Commission. Staying true to its institutional nature, the panel is creating opportunities for elite women to get a seat at the table, working at the scale of representation and aspirational politics, creating normative legitimation and delegating grassroots activities and movements to local communities.

In sum, the true potential of an institution like the AU Panel of the Wise lies in integrating issues of gender equality in their mandate of conflict prevention, making sure women’s voices are heard and empowering women to fill leadership positions where they can influence government policies. Gender mainstreaming has become a buzzword because it is a necessary strategy on top of the institutionalization of the WPS. To this end, every directorate of the AU Commission should incorporate gender provisions. Every mediator should be mindful to include women’s voices. Every government should uphold the law and make sure women are protected. Let’s add the 18 years of experience of the AU Panel of the Wise to the lessons learned in the past 25 years since the adoption of UNSCR 1325.