PAX has signed onto the Women, Peace and Security – Humanitarian Action (WPS-HA) Compact, which launches on Friday 2 July 2021 during the Generation Equality Forum.
The WPS-HA Compact is an inclusive global movement that aims at systematically and meaningfully including women and girls in peace and security and humanitarian processes.
It does so by bringing together and strengthening coordination between a wide range of actors – such as governments, civil society organisations, the private sector, and UN entities – to take concrete and transformative action for gender equality. In other words: moving from rhetoric to reality.
Gender, Peace and Security
“Over the last several decades, there has been increasing recognition that efforts to build sustainable peace are more effective if they are inclusive and gender-responsive,” says Anna Timmerman, General Director of PAX. “And yet, women and other marginalized groups continue to be excluded from most peace processes.”
PAX supports the WPS-HA Compact’s vision to dismantle discriminatory barriers that prevent women’s equal participation at the forefront of peace efforts, and to promote the important work of peacebuilders from marginalized groups.
As a signatory to the WPS-HA Compact, PAX commits to implementing several concrete actions over the next 5 years. Firstly, PAX will continue to engage men and boys as partners to reverse harmful gender norms and advance gender equality. This will include building on our existing work to address harmful notions of masculinities in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
Additionally, PAX commits to supporting women peacebuilders and women participants at all levels and at all stages of peace processes. This includes building feminist movements that harness women’s leadership from the ground up and include traditionally marginalized groups. In particular, PAX will continue to work with partners to empower local and international women change makers of all ages and backgrounds in their work for political transformation towards just, peaceful and inclusive societies.
Why is this important?
Gender, Peace and Security is a cross-cutting theme at PAX, as gender norms and relations that underpin discrimination, oppression, and violence play an important role in the dynamics of armed conflicts and peace processes.
PAX therefore aims to improve understanding and addressing harmful gender norms and masculinities as drivers of violent conflict. PAX also aims at supporting the meaningful political participation of women and other marginalized groups, including through grassroots peacebuilding efforts and nonviolent action. Signing the WPS-HA Compact will contribute to improving coordination and complementarity among the many different actors who need to play a role in advancing these objectives.
Generation Equality Forum
The WPS-HA Compact will be launched during the Generation Equality Forum, a global gathering for gender equality, convened by UN Women and co-hosted by the governments of Mexico and France, in partnership with civil society. It is being organized 25 years after the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and 20 years after the landmark UN Security Council resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security.