Gender is Happening

Interview with Hanaa Edwar Busha from the Iraqi Al-Amal Association

What do you take with you from this conference?
It was a very good opportunity for me to meet women of different countries and I discovered different perspectives not only on gender but also on conflict and gender in conflict situations, which is the main thing that I am working in Iraq on. The fact that we can make an exchange of our experiences in Iraq, Afghanistan, Congo and other parts of the world is very important for us.

What advice would you give to people interested in the subjects of the conference that want to get involved?
It is very important –regardless if you are a student, an academic or any “ordinary” person- that you work with the people and that you make your own opinion on what is going on and make that opinion heard. What is happening to the people? You also have to question the intervention of your government in different matters. You have to have an opinion on that: is it correct? Does it need modification? Is it on the interest of your people? Is it on the interest of other people? These questions are essential when you speak about consolidating democracy or democratic regimes in the world.

Interview with Rebecca Stubblefield from medica mondiale Liberia.

What do you take with you from this conference?
I received a lot of solidarity and information from across the globe, vital information and critical analysis of the different situation of different places. Alone the fact of seeing different people from all around the globe understading what you are talking about and where you are standing, feeling the same way, is a huge boost for me.

What advice would you give to people interested in the subjects of the conference that want to get involved?
The essence of the issue of gender centers around justice, equality, respect and human rights. If those things are your interests, you have already taken the first step. Basically it is always good to have a good understanding of the culture in which you want to venture with your work because people understand different things from different perspectives at different levels and you have to be very careful that the message that you carry across is very especific and stands against discrimination and disrespect. Our messages have to clarify those things we fight for and those we are against. In the meantime, start with respecting diversity and respecting the views of others.

The conference is coming to an end. Time to undertake the painful endeavour to summarize the feelings, debates, sometimes heated discussions and proposals that have piled up over the last three days. On the board is Petra Bläss-Rafajlovski from the German Women’s Security Council in
Berlin. And it all starts with a number: 6922.

6922 is what you get when you add 1325 + 1820 +1888 +1889.

But the real tricky question remains: can we make that all these resolutions actually add up to gender security policies?

Here is a summary of the thoughts that we gathered during this conference. "A math lesson" vollständig lesen »

Day 3

Sit down, close your eyes, relax. Now imagine that all the armies in the world have been abolished and the world community has changed its neoliberal ways in favor of a more environmental friendly, sustainable living. The south hemisphere has gone feminist and the Berlusconis and Sarrazins of the world are even considering saving the whales.

Amidst the very serious dicussions that have taken place in the last couple of days, Ute Scheub invited us to an experiment. A haven where instead of tragic events we could discuss the ideals and visions that keep us going even when the news and the leaders tell us nothing but how bad, unequal and tragic by nature the world and the people are. “We are told that utopias and visions are naive, but medicine against the prevalent cynism is everywhere”, she said, before adding that even in the middle of all the crises the world is facing, efforts are still being made and places of resistance and agents of change are found everywhere.

Journalist Andreas Zumach, Scheub herself and Anuradha Chenoy from the Jawahar Lal Nehru University in New Delhi read stories that
made the audience laugh, think and even cry but above all dream and believe, even if it was for a little while, that another world is indeed possible. Then they woke up and got ready to keep fighting for it.

P.S. The stories read today, together with 14 more will be available on the net in english and german tomorrow, when www.visionews.net launches at 13:25 to –you guessed it- conmemorate the 10th anniversary of the UNSCR 1325.

So, the workshop on Iraq was real mind opener. It was conducted by Hanaa Edwar Busha one of the most active fighters for women’s rights in Iraq, general secretary of the Iraqi Al-Amal Association (IAA) and a founder of the Iraqi Women's Network (IWN) and facilitated by Ambara Abu Ayach from the Heinrich Boll Stiftung (hbs) in Beirut. The point of the workshop was to discuss the challenges there have been in Iraq in trying to implement the 1325 and the strategies that women’s organisations have used to achieve it.

First, it was vital to understand that we are talking about a country that was dismantled as recently as 7 years ago. The discussion appointed 2003 as “year zero” in the creation of a new Iraq. Among the main obstacles to be found in implementing the UNSCR 1325 is that the UN has lost credibility among the iraqies and local actors perceive women rights as something “from the west” and as a foreign agenda being inforced. This is very difficult to overcome. Also a big challenge is the dissolved government. The new government even tried to abolish old laws that were major achievements from the iraqi population and that had been in place since the 50’s. The vaccuum created by the government dissolution created a shift in power relationships, groups that did not have any power before (for example certain tribes and islamic movements) now gained some and that has lead to serious issues.

The issue of lip service was also addressed. If before the protection of women’s rights was a major banner under which the occupation was
justified the american government is now singing a different tune in which “the establishment of a rule of law” is the major concern. This has lead to less funding and bargaining with political actors that are not concerned with women’s rights. Additionally, the existing regime stands against international rights that have lost credibility due to the UN intervention in the occupation. And let’s not leave out that Iraq finds itself in a constant state of poverty, war and embargo since the 80’s and suffers from endemic corruption. The oppresion and state of conflict has also lead to a shifting of masculinities, some of them even promoted by women themselves, which has led to an increase in domestic violence and depression. Finally, even if a movement for women’s rights has existed in Iraq for almost 50 years, there was a lack of an active civil society before 1991. After 2003 many NGOs emerged and there was a lot of trial and error by foreign donors. A lot of money was wasted and this led to the creation of artifical networks, many of which have failed to work with the local activists and organizations and therefore to achieve better results.

The fact that most of the obstacles are of a soft component makes them hard to describe, difficult to attack and overcome.

So what can (and must) be done? First, Iraq needs to be put in the media –yes, even if we now think that it is overexposed- so that there is international pressure to improve and create a government with serious emphasis on rule of law and rights. A civil and not a religious state has to be built. As for the donors, they should focus in spending money where it is really needed and building capacity that will be used longterm. Activism must be grassroots but also include partnerships with people in the government and promote natural sinergies. Finally, 50% of iraqies are around 18 years old, so the youth needs to be addressed directly. On this matter Hanaa had to say: “We are still dreaming of the change that can take place in Iraq after a bloody dictatorship. We are still optimistic. Young women are the hope of creating peace”.

So, here we are on the second and longest (though not boring at all) day of the conference. After a short welcome from Gitti Henschel, the Director of the Gunda Werner Institute, who suffered a coup d’etat in hands of the translating equipment and managed to still maintain grace under fire while holding her presentation in english is off to the workshops. The workshops are small work teams in which the different strategies –and challenges- for implementation of the UNSCR 1325 in specific countries are going to be discussed. One gets the feeling that the most visited will be the Israel/Palestine and Liberia ones, due to the introduction to them we got yesterday during the panel discussions.

I am attending the Iraq one, so expect a full review on that later.

17:30
Time for the introductory presentation “Critical Revision of the Implementation of UN Res. 1325 and future perspectives for (inter)national work at the EU and UN Level”. Katariina Leinonen from the Council of the EU, Human Rights Unit in Brussel, took it upon herself to both acknowledge that the European Parliament’s work is “not to be underestimated” and voice the aspects that still need to be improved. Among the things to applaud: the Comprehensive Approach to the UNSC Resolution 1325 that has already been developed and is a great document to start from, the creation of a specific EU taskforce to develop indicators to measure the implementation of the resolution (among other things funding after conflict, women’s participation in peace negotiations and sexual abuse from the staff stationed in conflict zones). She also praised the succesful incorporation of a gender perspective in the planning, execution and follow up of 13 missions all over the world and an increase in participation from the civil society. However, Leinonen was not afraid to express criticism and listed the following points as room for improval: the need to increase awareness of gender and women rights as a security issue, the lack of training (needs to be more sistematic and should be compulsory for the people sent to intervene in conflict zones), need for reinforcement of gender maistreaming and the lack of National Action Plans (“we can”t afford to not have one”). The question of whether an ant can move an elefant or not is the one that seems to be posed when it comes to the implementation of the Resolution 1325. The answer that Leinonen had was a big “yes”: she just has to be smart and find a way.

We closed the day yesterday with two panels and a round of
Q&A.

The first panel was held by Rebecca Stubblefield, advocate person for medica mondiale Liberia. The point of discussion was if Liberia is a unique best practice example or a repeatable exercise. Stubblefield started by telling about how Liberia is really almost one of a kind in the amount of laws, institutions and monitoring organisms created to implement the UNSCR 1325, which she described as a “very important tool that shows the importance of women as agents of change, shifts the focus from women as victims and gives them an outlet to extern their claims”. She did not hesitate to extern that even apart from the resolution, there are plenty of organisations working towards the same objectives even if they do not use the resolution as flag. But this panel was about being open to criticism and Stubblefield gave an insightful review of how many of the instruments that they have have yet to be set in place. She then shed some light about the biggest problems that are to be tackled on the field: she regretted the lack of importance given to cultural issues when criticizing implementation, issues such as a long history of patriarchy that has made of women’s silence a cultural practice or the “paralysis of initiative” that is a mark of a culture used to concentrating on surviving the day and not more. Finally she refered to the limited training of women in Liberia to be mediators and the support of the UN that copious as it may be, can sometimes be considered feeble and in many cases lacks of proper gender training amongst its peacecorps.

Panel two, which was aboutIsrael/Palestine: Civil Society Cooperation Beyond Borders was held by Zahira Kamal, Minister of Women’s Affairs from Palestine and Anat Saragusti, Journalist, Executive Director of Agenda and Member of IWC from Israel. Zahira started with a very comprehensive historical background, up until the current situation of Palestine, as an introduction to the question of the situation of women rights and the lack of awareness among palestinan women about UNSCR1325. “One month after the passing of 1325 the second Intifada started and during the next five years the women were too busy dealing with their kids, their disabled or killed husbands”, she explained. Zahira explained that currently she is involved with Jerusalem Link, a grassroots organization established in 1992 that seeks a two State solution. Their main goal is the establishment of an international women commision for just peace between palestinians and israelis. Jerusalem Link already met with the palestinian president to pressure him into adopting the UNSCR 1325.

Anat, who is also a member of Jereusalem Link and works together with Zahira, was up next and she gave a very articulated and powerful review of things on the other side. Israel was the first UN member to integrate the resolution and turn it into law of the land. However, Anat said, “Israel refuses to abide its own law”. The lack of feminine representation in government institutions opens the room for many other questions, among the most pressing are the selection criteria from groups that are varied as the women that form them and the goals they pursue. How do we promote women of diverse groups? How do we NOT promote the already strong women? Who can bring a feminine voice and perspective ? What is a feminine view at all? These where only a few of the polemic questions she raised before urging us listeners to realize the importance of getting educated women to the decission tables, not only women per se. She closed with another challenging question: seeing that the number of women at the decision table in Israel does not amount to a quantity that can really influence or balance the decision making process in an organism that is dominated by “alfa male military discourse”, should we accept female representation even if in the praxis it is a mere token? Or do we choose to stay outside? What do you think?

Questions, questions, questions...