* Any views expressed in this opinion piece are those of the author and not of Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Let’s call on govts and international bodies to ensure that women activists are prioritised as agents of change with the power to bring peace to their countries
This International Women’s Day, the global community will take stock of progress made and challenges remaining since the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action was developed 20 years ago. The Platform for Action imagined a world where all women could live free from violence, participate in decisions, and exercise their freedoms.
The benchmarks of success we see now are the results of decades of perseverance. Women activists worldwide are looking back at those who came before, finding inspiration and practical tactics to advocate for change.
From Liberia to South Sudan
In 2002, Leymah Gbowee spent day after day in a football field along with thousands of
women praying for peace. For 14 years, their country, Liberia, had been ravaged by war and they paid the price with their homes, families, and bodies. They were tired, but hope for a better future kept them going.
Gbowee led hundreds of women to City Hall in the capital Monrovia. When then-President CharlesTaylor agreed to a meeting, Gbowee and her colleagues called for an unconditional ceasefire, an intervention force, and a peace discussion between the government and rebel forces. Their efforts paid off, and in 2003 the Accra Peace Accord was signed, bringing peace at last to Liberia.
Now, more than 10 years later, Gbowee sees parallels between her story and that of women in South Sudan. There, women are working at the grassroots level to support survivors of violence and to pave the way to a more peaceful future.
“The women of South Sudan need the support of their leaders and the international community to maintain this momentum,” she wrote in The Guardian.
From Bosnia to Syria
A continent away on the Syria-Turkey border, women gathered to watch the PBS documentary series Women, War & Peace. They were particularly inspired by the film I Came to Testify about 16 courageous women whose testimony about sexual assault experienced during the Bosnian war led the International Criminal Court to prosecute rape as a crime against humanity for the first time in history.
The Syrian women were struck by the parallels to their own experiences living through conflict with rampant violence against women and little, if any, accountability ascribed to perpetrators or support available for survivors. In a report to Peace is Loud, the women noted that they asked their group’s leader for guidance in increasing awareness-raising and advocacy activities. Most of all, they wanted to end the stigma and shame surrounding female survivors of violence in their communities, armed with the knowledge that other women had fought this battle before, and won.
These stories demonstrate that time and time again, women have been on the frontlines of conflict and at the forefront of peacebuilding.
This October marks the 15th anniversary of UN Security Declaration 1325, a landmark commitment to increasing women’s participation in peace and post-conflict negotiations worldwide and safeguarding women and children wherever conflict erupts. For this resolution to be implemented, UN member states must develop and put into practice their own national action plans. Yet, according to the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), as of January 15, 2015 only 48 countries have done so.
It’s incredible what we’ve accomplished with limited resources, and even more so to consider how much more we could do with greater support. This International Women’s Day, let’s call on governments and international bodies to ensure that women activists are prioritized as agents of change with the power to bring peace to their countries and communities.
Their potential has already been proven. They’ve laid the groundwork for a brighter future, and now it’s our turn to build.
Angie Wang is executive director of Peace is Loud, a nonprofit organization that encourages a global culture of peacebuilding through media, social action campaigns and live events.
