Feminist peace or state co-optation? The Women, Peace and Security agenda in Myanmar

Abstract

This article engages with emerging debates about feminist peace and uses this concept to assess the ability of the Women, Peace and Security agenda to achieve gender-just change. We advance a conception of feminist peace as political conditions that allow women affected by conflict to articulate their visions of change and influence the construction of post-war order. Applying this to a case study of Women, Peace and Security practice in Myanmar, we demonstrate that features of how international aid is organised, combined with the Myanmar government’s interest in excluding critical voices, limit the ability of Women, Peace and Security practices to contribute to feminist peace. This highlights the potential for illiberal post-war states to obstruct and co-opt the Women, Peace and Security agenda, and shows how the women most directly affected by armed conflict are often the least able to participate in, benefit from and inform Women, Peace and Security practices.<br /><br />Key messages<br /><ul><li>The article examines to what extent Women, Peace and Security practices in Myanmar contribute to feminist peace.</li><br /><li>Feminist peace is theorised as political conditions that allow women’s experiences and priorities to inform peacebuilding.</li><br /><li>Findings show that Women, Peace and Security support is least likely to benefit the women most affected by war.</li><br /><li>This is compounded by illiberal government efforts to exclude critical voices.</li></ul>

Moro Women's Participation and Legitimation in the Bangsamoro Peace Process

“…More recently, during the peace process in Myanmar following the 2011 transition to a semi-civilian government up until the 2021 military coup, the women's rights activists used the WPS to advocate for gender justice (Hedström and Olivius 2021). However, limited recognition of military-perpetrated sexual violence against women, uneven distribution of the WPS funding, and exclusionary representation of ordinary local women in the structure of women's committees in various sub-national levels are all symptoms of the co-optation of the WPS agenda in an illiberal state (Olivius, Hedström, and Phyo 2022). These experiences from other Southeast Asian peace processes guide my inquiry into women's participation.…”

“…Since the WPS, reference to women in the context of peace agreements jumped from 11% to 27% (Bell 2015). The WPS language itself subscribes to a liberating, feminist peace, or the political conditions that allow women's experiences and priorities to inform peacebuilding (Olivius, Hedström, and Phyo 2022, 25). In fact, peace advocates are using the WPS to push for progressive feminist content in the international and national security architecture (Hudson 2017).…”

“…For example, governments and international actors (including bilateral donors) pay lip service to women's concerns but are not supporting them in interventions (Anderlini 2010, 5). Olivius, Hedström, and Phyo (2022, 38) highlighted how the organisation of international aid mixed with illiberal post-war states can obstruct and co-opt the WPS and ‘make it hard for the women most directly affected by armed conflict and insecurity to participate in, benefit from, and inform WPS practices’. Moreover, the successful lobby to expand the WPS to counter violent extremism risk commodification, agenda hijacking, and only deeper gender insecurity (Ní Aoláin, 2016, 277).…”

Introduction

“…1 Feminist peace research has provided important insights in this regard, exploring the everydayness and lived experiences of peace and possibilities of transforming conflicts through transformation of relationships (see e.g. Confortini 2010;McLeod and O'Reilly 2019;Wibben et al 2019;Björkdahl and Mannergren Selimovic 2021;Cárdenas 2022;Olivius et al 2022). 2 The conflict transformation perspective is also central to scholarship on agonistic peace.…”