12 Aug 2009: Summary Report: ISS Seminar, Pretoria: Sights Through the Hourglass: A Critical Review of the Progress of Women in Africa

Report

ISS Women`s Day Seminar: Sights Through the Hourglass: A Critical Review of the Progress of Women in Africa, Pretoria, 12 August 2009

Hosted by the Security Sector Governance and Peace Missions Programmes
 

Presenters:

 

Dr Cheryl Hendricks: Senior Research Fellow, Security Sector Governance Program, ISS - Chair

 
Mr Henri Boshoff:  Peace Missions Programme Head, ISS – Welcome Remarks
 

Mr Javu Baloyi:  Commission for Gender Equality - Strengths, Weaknesses and Challenges of the Implementation of Gender Equity in South Africa
    

Professor Heidi Hudson: University of the Free State: Gender, Peace-building and Post-conflict Reconstruction in Africa

    
Rear Admiral Laura Van Vuuren: Transformation Management Directorate, SANDF - Leadership for Women in Law Enforcement

 
Dr Monica Juma: Research Director, AISA - Discussant

Mr. Henri Boshoff, head of the Peace Missions Programme, welcomed the audience.

There has been tremendous progress in the recognition of the need for gender equality and the development of legal instruments to attain equity. But, women are still the predominant face of poverty and underdevelopment, violence against women has increased, women are targeted during conflicts and much still needs to be achieved in honouring the 50% representation of women in decision-making. UNSCR 1325 was a milestone for acknowledging the importance of women in peace-building initiatives. We are months away from its 10th anniversary. What is the status of its implementation? It is against this background that the ISS sought to host a lunch-time seminar, celebrating women’s day.  The speakers addressed these issues, from their own vantage points as academics, practitioners and in both the South African and larger African contexts.

In her opening remarks, Dr. Cheryl Hendricks reiterated the gendered differential effects of conflict and the attempts by women to address the issue. She noted that the seminar was  titled sights through the hour glass as an indication that women instituted policies and programs that had time frames attached to make them more measurable.  

Highlighting the situation in South Africa, she recalled that the journey since 1956, when women marched  to the Union Buildings, has been long and the equity rights enshrined in South Africa’s constitution  hard won.  South Africa has set up the necessary architecture to implement gender equality. A new addition is the Ministry of Women, Children and People with Disability. South Africa now ranks 3rd on the list of countries with the highest number of women in parliament, but how has this translated into more prosperity and security for ordinary women? Furthermore, she noted that the security sector is one in which many of the stereotypes of women still loom large, where the transformation in terms of representation may be far easier to achieve than the transformation of the dominant culture. It is also a sector where the fundamental question still remains whose security matters most and how are we going to create that security? It is therefore imperative that we continue this debate in the comfort of a safe space, acknowledging the urgency, depth  and quality of the debate.

Mr. Javu Baloyi, of the Commission on Gender Equality, affirmed that while an institutionalised approach to promoting and protecting gender equality is gaining prominence, the situation of women has yet to be seriously addressed. In particular, we need strong leadership on this issue. While the focus of the first presentation was on South Africa, it is a reality in most African countries that the nexus between gender debates and attaining larger democratic benefits is mediated by the persistence of a patriarchial society.

Rear Admiral Laura Van Vuuren highlighted an enabling constitutionalist environment which promotes gender equality as one of the key elements of the government’s transformation agenda. In specific terms, chapter six of the South African White Paper on Defence (1996) underscores the principle of equality within the SANDF and states the requirement of “representativeness in terms of racial and gender composition of the SANDF” as fundamental to the legitimacy of this institution.  While the normative definitions appear to have been accepted as political goals, it is crucial that the operationalisation of such policies take into account consensus building and understanding that the achievement of gender equity is not a zero sum game implying loss for men and victory for women. Ultimately,  it is about women and men being given equal opportunities, rights and  resources to enable them to realise their full potential.

In her contribution to the debate, Professor Heidi Hudson, noted that the coming tenth anniversary of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 is an appropriate time for stock-taking.  In hindsight, the drafters of the ground breaking United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 may not have realised the radical feminist intent of the text.  She noted that a key challenge is to make women’s informal peacebuilding role count as part of formal processes. To do this we need to make the link between exclusion and deprivation, and exclusion and the perpetuation of violent discourses which sustained the conflict in the first place. There is a link between not acknowledging the impact of war on women and the continued culture of impunity.

Dr. Monica Juma’s final thoughts as a discussant to the three presentations noted the need to link the experiential, strategic and theoretic levels of engagement. We need to continue to define the notion of public safety and understand that the simple indicators, like seeing women walking at midnight, free from fear, provide a better understanding of normative debates. The allocation of resources, or lack thereof, critically shapes the scope of mandate, or operalisationalisation of gender frameworks, and may arguably roll back the gains of the last decade.

In her closing remarks, Dr. Cheryl Hendricks offered her sincere appreciation for the participation of the audience and presenters, highlighting the need for continued debate that will shape the operationalisation of a sustainable gender machinery at national and continental levels.