Deepening the Conversation: Feminism, International Policing and the WPS Agenda

Citation:

Huber, Laura K., and Natalie F. Hudson. 2019. “Deepening the Conversation: Feminism, International Policing and the WPS Agenda.” International Peacekeeping 26 (5): 579–604.

Authors: Laura K. Huber, Natalie F. Hudson

Abstract:

Scholarship on international police reform and Women, Peace and Security (WPS) has flourished in the last decade and the potential for engagement across these two bodies of literature is promising. Given the increased use of police personnel in international peace missions and emphasis on gender mainstreaming policies, the need for assessing the impact of these two trends has never been greater. Thus, this paper seeks to bridge gaps between the mainstream policing scholarship and feminist scholars focused on post-conflict peacebuilding police reforms. We explore how feminist scholars can engage with policing literature’s technocratic language and ‘in the field’ experience as well as how policing scholars can interact with feminist scholars to transform traditional approaches to security in the context of the WPS Agenda. We demonstrate the benefits of increased dialogue and interaction by highlighting the common and diverging challenges in both fields in three areas: the design, implementation, and evaluation. Finally, to illustrate the dynamic intersection of these areas of study and practice, we examine the transnational policing efforts to gender mainstream the Liberian National Police (LNP) in the context of the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL).

Keywords: feminism, police, Gender, security sector reform (SSR), peacekeeping

Topics: Feminisms, Gender, Women, Gender Mainstreaming, International Organizations, Peacebuilding, Peacekeeping, Post-Conflict, Post-Conflict Reconstruction, Security, Security Sector Reform, UN Security Council Resolutions on WPS Regions: Africa, West Africa Countries: Liberia

Year: 2019