{"id":14246,"date":"2025-09-03T10:09:34","date_gmt":"2025-09-03T08:09:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.prif.org\/?p=14246"},"modified":"2025-09-03T10:21:44","modified_gmt":"2025-09-03T08:21:44","slug":"the-women-peace-and-security-agenda-the-african-union-and-its-citizens-a-people-centered-agenda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.prif.org\/en\/2025\/09\/03\/the-women-peace-and-security-agenda-the-african-union-and-its-citizens-a-people-centered-agenda\/","title":{"rendered":"The Women, Peace and Security Agenda, the African Union and its citizens: A People-Centered Agenda?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Women, Peace and Security Agenda stands as both an achievement and a contested project on the African continent. This article pays tribute to the countless individuals and collectives within the African Union, national institutions, civil society, and local communities that have worked tirelessly to bring WPS to life. By tracing its genesis, taking stock of institutional milestones, and shedding light on the often\u2011overlooked daily efforts that sustain it, we celebrate the WPS Agenda\u2019s enduring relevance for the African continent \u2013 despite a track-record that tells a more complex story.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Twenty-five years after the institutionalization of the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Agenda<\/a>, it stands as both an achievement and a contested project on the African continent. A landmark in acknowledging the importance of gender for building sustainable peace, the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (UNSCR 1325) and its follow-up resolutions<\/a> emerged as a global framework for advancing gender equality within peace and security institutions. The WPS Agenda emphasizes the \u201c3Ps\u201d \u2013 prevention, protection, and participation of women \u2013 while also addressing post-conflict reconstruction, humanitarian assistance, and transitional justice.<\/p>\n

Civil society in Africa has been central to bringing the WPS Agenda<\/a> to life, while the African Union (AU) has championed its translation into continental policies and programs. The agenda\u2019s adoption by intergovernmental and government organizations and its subsequent embedding within liberal institutional frameworks has fueled criticism that it is a state-centric project. In addition, a persistent gap remains between AU policies and the lived realities of women \u2013 and people more generally \u2013 in Africa.<\/p>\n

This disconnect does not make the WPS irrelevant but requires the development of more innovative strategies for reaching those it is meant to serve. The WPS is a shared yet diverse agenda \u2013 shaped across scales, localities, and experiences \u2013 and sustained daily by activists, community organizers, politicians, and bureaucrats. All these experiences need to be harnessed and amplified.<\/p>\n

This article highlights African contributions to the WPS Agenda, briefly sketches its anchoring within the AU, and argues that the WPS Agenda remains a crucial reference point for peacebuilders. It also draws attention to the often unacknowledged daily efforts that give the agenda life and looks ahead to consider the WPS Agenda for the next 25+ years.<\/p>\n

Roots and Postcolonial Critique<\/h2>\n

Civil society and African women\u2019s organizations in particular have been at the forefront of advocating for, implementing, and contributing to the WPS Agenda. However, while these inputs are rooted in the lived experiences and political activism, they have been largely absent<\/a> from mainstream accounts of the WPS Agenda.<\/p>\n

Along with the ideas of Women\u2019s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), the Kampala Action Plan on Women and Peace<\/a> (1993) informed the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action\u2019s Chapter 4 E on Women and Armed Conflict. The Kampala Action Plan had already linked peace and security to economic and social justice, noting priorities, such as the need for peace education in schools, as well as the need to reduce defense expenditure. The Windhoek Declaration on Mainstreaming a Gender Perspective in Multi-Dimensional Peace Support Operations<\/a> (2000), ushered in when Namibia chaired the UNSC, was also an important precursor to the adoption of UNSCR 1325.<\/p>\n

Although African perspectives clearly shaped the development of UNSCR 1325, these are not reflected in the dominant perception of the WPS Agenda. Therefore, from a critical feminist perspective, the WPS Agenda \u201chas faced criticism for its colonial and imperialist framing of the Global South<\/a>\u201d. The substance of the critique is that portraying women from the Global South as \u201cother\u201d in need of protection, saving, and refuge reduces<\/a> the diversity of roles and experiences of women and undervalues their knowledges, while also making invisible their substantial role in peacebuilding.<\/p>\n

According to the scholar and feminist activist Amina Mama<\/a>, intergovernmental and state institutions, are rooted in colonial state formation and continue to exhibit \u201cthe lingering effects of colonial political institutions that relied on a gendered separation of the private and public spheres.\u201d Similarly, scholar Soumita Basu<\/a> argues that, as a locus of the formal adoption of the WPS Agenda, the UN system has dominated its framing and implementation \u2013 all very much shaped by Western liberal ideas. While the WPS Agenda was initially championed and transmitted from civil society to intergovernmental organizations such as the UN and AU, the rich repository of women\u2019s intellectual engagement and activism in relation to peace and security before, during, and after the adoption of UNSCR 1325 has often been neglected in the WPS Agenda.<\/p>\n

The African Union: Spearheading the WPS Agenda?<\/h2>\n

After the adoption of UNSCR 1325 in 2000, the emerging WPS Agenda has seen strong institutional anchoring at various levels within the AU, from the continental level to regional organizations, and to national action plans. The AU has taken the lead in developing policies, concentrating on the prevention of sexual violence against women and children in armed conflict and post-conflict situations. Also, of great significance has been the push for full, equal, and effective participation of women at all stages of peace processes, as well as the setting up of institutional mechanisms to promote the WPS Agenda.<\/p>\n

The commitment to integrating the WPS Agenda into its overall policy architecture is reflected in the AU\u2019s adoption of gender equality as a core principle in its Constitutive Act <\/a>(2000) and the gender parity principle<\/a> \u201cat all levels and structures of the Union<\/a>\u201d (2002). This followed the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People\u2019s Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa<\/a> (2003), the Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality in Africa<\/a> (2004), and the AU Gender Policy<\/a> (2009). More recently, the AU Strategy<\/a> for Gender Equality & Women\u2019s Empowerment (2018-2028) with the Continental Result Framework<\/a> on the Implementation of the Women, Peace and Security Agenda in Africa (2018-2028) guides the AU\u2019s work on the WPS Agenda.<\/p>\n

Within its African Peace and Security Architecture, the AU works through dedicated structures, such as:<\/p>\n