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2. Expanding the Reach of the Special Forces with a Gender-Mixed Deep Development Capability (DDC): Identifying Challenges and Lessons Learned
- Author:
- Nina Wilen
- Publication Date:
- 02-2021
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- EGMONT - The Royal Institute for International Relations
- Abstract:
- Driven by the need to adapt to a changing security environment, the Belgian Special Forces Group has developed a new gender- mixed capability in 2020, including female soldiers in the operational detachment of the unit for the first time. This brief examines the development and implementation of the project and identifies challenges for future similar capacities. It points to the need for clarification of tasks and employment conditions, while attracting male candidates is necessary to maintain the ‘mixed’ character of the capability. In conclusion it argues that overall, efforts to avoid gender instrumentalization have been successful and the creation of the capability is a first step in the direction to diversify the composition of the Special Forces, a step that is necessary to remain relevant in a complex security context.
- Topic:
- Security, Defense Policy, Gender Issues, and Military Strategy
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Belgium
3. What Belgium Can Do: Proposals for the National Security Strategy
- Author:
- Sven Biscop and Nina Wilen
- Publication Date:
- 04-2021
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- EGMONT - The Royal Institute for International Relations
- Abstract:
- Belgium has never had a National Security Strategy: a single strategic vision outlining how to safeguard its national interests from external threats and challenges and to prevent the exploitation of its internal vulnerabilities. Many in Belgium intuitively feel that none is needed: Are we not shielded by the EU and NATO? And what could the world expect from this small country anyway? But the fact is that the Kingdom of Belgium is not such a small player. The geopolitical heart, and the host, of the EU, it ranks 9th out of 27 in terms of population and GDP; worldwide, it is the 12th exporting country. Hence recurring tensions between Belgium’s own – often low – level of ambition as a security actor and the expectations of its allies and partners.
- Topic:
- Security, NATO, Military Strategy, European Union, and Strategic Interests
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Belgium
4. Inclusion is Not Enough to Achieve Gender and Racial Equality in Global Peace and Security
- Author:
- Signe Marie Cold-Ravnkilde, Marsha Henry, Robin May Schott, and Nina Wilen
- Publication Date:
- 12-2021
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS)
- Abstract:
- In January 2021, the Danish Ministry of Defence launched a new plan setting out how Denmark should implement United Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325 of 2000, which is the cornerstone of the Women, Peace, and Security agenda (WPS). The plan contains concrete steps for incorporating gender and diversity perspectives into the Danish defence forces, ranging from recruitment to solving peace and conflict-related tasks globally. Indeed, the timing is right. As Denmark prepares its candidature for a non-permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) from 2025, gender equality has been identified as one of the key priorities in the country’s contribution to global peace. Against this backdrop, how can the Danish contribution to this field avoid previous pitfalls and help to open up a broader space for equality in global peace and security? Twenty years ago, women’s movements across the world put women and human security on the global peace agenda. With UNSCR 1325, member states committed themselves to mainstreaming a gender perspective into matters of conflict and peacebuilding. While the WPS agenda is sometimes presented as an achievement of the Global North, many countries from the Global South have made contributions to gender equality, and there is now a growing global ownership of this normative agenda. The WPS’s focus on women’s experience in conflict was an important step in moving away from their invisibility in conflict. The attention of journalists and international courts to war practices that harm women specifically, including rape and sexual abuse, have had enormous significance for public awareness and the sense of justice. However, the past twenty years have also exposed major gaps in the WPS agenda. Focusing on women alone is not sufficient for understanding how practices and values in organisations and cultural contexts reinforce both gendered and racialised power hierarchies in the civilian and military worlds. Experiences from international peacekeeping since 2000 foreground the need for an epistemological and practical shift. To understand the challenges to equality in the global peace agenda, an intersectional lens is needed to examine how multiple systems of power, including gender, race, North-South axes of power, age, class and religion, co-exist and interact with each other.
- Topic:
- Security, Peacekeeping, Violence, Inclusion, and Gender
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
5. Improving Peacekeeping Performance – Dilemmas and Goals
- Author:
- Nina Wilen
- Publication Date:
- 10-2018
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- EGMONT - The Royal Institute for International Relations
- Abstract:
- The recent adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 2436 on UN peacekeeping is the latest development in an ongoing debate on how to improve peacekeeping performance. Africa’s status as both the largest provider of troops and the continent hosting most current peace operations, positions it at the heart of this discussion. This policy brief critically examines two of the options identified to improve peacekeeping: more troop contributions from states with advanced military capability and better training for peacekeepers. Specifically, it highlights challenges with training troops from (semi-)authoritarian and post-conflict states and points to the importance of improving civil-military relations in order to enhance peacekeeping performance.
- Topic:
- Security, United Nations, Military Strategy, Conflict, and Civil-Military Relations
- Political Geography:
- Africa