Mainstreaming gender in peace building and post-conflict reconstruction processes: a systematic approach to peaceful conflict resolution/Integration du genre dans les processus de renforcement de la paix et de reconstruction apres les conflits: une approche systematique a la resolution pacifique des conflits.

• Author: Matovu, Vero. I.D.
• Position: Essay

Gender mainstreaming is: "a strategy for making women as well as men's concerns and experiences an integral dimension in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies and progammes ... so that women and men benefit equally" (UN Economic and Social Council). It is aimed at bringing about gender equality and advancing women's rights which is in line with Millennium Development Goal number three.

Gender mainstreaming is crucial during peace-building and post-conflict reconstruction processes because conflict affects women and men differently, whether as victims or combatants. Women are vulnerable to gender differentiated violence, so they are disproportionately affected by conflict as compared to men. For example, women/girls are raped, exposed to HIV/AIDS, tortured, massacred or considered part of the war booty (Shaba, 2002; Juma, 2005) as was the case in Rwanda, Sierra Leone and former Yugoslavia.

In Northern Uganda, they are abducted by LRA rebels as wives, sex slaves or warriors. Paradoxically, even peacekeeping missions sexually abuse and exploit women/girls they purportedly protect. A case in point are the UN peacekeepers in Democratic Republic of Congo but more especially in Korea and other Asian countries, where between 100,000-200,000 women were forced into military prostitution, the so-called "comfort women", by Japanese soldiers during World War II (Chinkin, 1993; Mackie, 2000).

The plight of women in armed conflict is succinctly summed up by Mander (2004:16) that: "Their bodies (become) bottle fields to avenge, subjugate and even eliminate an entire community". Even relief aid providers sometimes exploit and sexually abuse women/girls. Rape victims are marginalized by society so are their off springs, just like ex-female combatants (UAF, 2007).

Despite the hardships they experience and regardless of the roles they play during peace resolution and construction, women are marginalized. For instance, female "war veterans" are often not given powerful posts in the army or their service is terminated at the end of the wars as experienced during liberation wars in Uganda and Zimbabwe. Furthermore, women are noticeably absent from formal peace negotiations (Juma, 2005; Luswata-Kawuma, 2005). Their voices are rarely heard, their views are hardly sought or considered and crimes against them are trivialized during conflict management and post-conflict reconstruction.

I opine that men's negotiating positions be feminized and balanced through gender equality; because women as mothers, mediators within their families, as well as custodians of traditions and values, are peace lovers and peace builders. Consequently, they are more likely than men to employ non-violent conflict resolution (Sweetman, 2005), as Professor Hansungule observes:

If the search for peace is left in the hands of men, there will never be peace in Africa.... Peace treaties...