Post-conflict Political Institutions and the Women, Peace and Security Agenda: A Feminist Institutional Analysis

31 October 2017 | Bath

13.15-14.05 

Speaker:  Dr Jennifer Thomson 
Discussant: Dr Sophie Whiting

Since the inception of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (UNSCR 1325) in 2000, feminist academia has been closely interested in the developing Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda in international affairs. The majority of this work has emerged from within feminist international relations (Mcleod, 2015; Shepherd, 2008) and feminist legal studies (Bell and O’R ourke, 2010; Ni Aolain, 2016). Yet less attention has been paid to the WPS agenda by feminist political science. As a result, little consideration has been given to political institutions within the WPS framework. 

This paper argues that the design and implementation of post-conflict political institutions in divided societies is an important component of the WPS agenda, and one which deserves greater attention. It demonstrates that using certain tenets of feminist political science, and feminist institutionalism in particular, can offer key insights into greater understanding of the importance of political institutions within post-conflict societies. It shows how feminist institutional theory can help to understand the gendered nature of post-conflict institutions in divided societies, and the ways in which they might be made more gender-friendly both in terms of their policy-making and their practices.