The Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Agenda is a global policy framework that seeks to increase the roles, rights, and protection of women in conflict and peace processes. Launched at the turn of the 21st century by the United Nations, it acknowledges that armed conflicts affect women and girls uniquely and that women’s inclusion is vital for lasting peace. Over the past two decades, the WPS agenda has grown into a broad international movement involving UN resolutions, national action plans, and grassroots initiatives. However, it has also been criticized by some scholars, and there are still gaps in its implementation. Because of that, there is a need for renewed international action in favor of women’s roles in issues of international peace and security.
Summary
- The WPS agenda is a framework, within the United Nations, to emphasize the protection of women in times of war, the prevention of gender-based violence, and the participation of women in peace efforts.
- It originated from decades of women’s advocacy, notably the 1995 Beijing Conference’s call to address feminine issues related to armed conflicts.
- Its beginning can be traced back to the UN Security Council Resolution 1325, from 2000, which recognized women’s roles in peace and security efforts.
- Since 2000, the UN Security Council has adopted several resolutions expanding the WPS Agenda, and over half of UN member states have created National Action Plans to implement it locally.
- However, critics note challenges such as the Western character of the WPS Agenda, the securitization of feminine issues, the superficial inclusion of women in peace initiatives (tokenism) and the lack of sufficient efforts to address inequality between women — for instance, between those of different nationalities, ethnicities or social classes.
What is the WPS Agenda?
The Women, Peace, and Security agenda represents a transformative approach within international relations that links gender equality with global peace and security. At its core, WPS recognizes that women have historically been marginalized in peace negotiations and security institutions, and seeks to correct that by ensuring women’s full and meaningful participation in peace processes and conflict resolution. It also stresses protecting women and girls from the endemic violence that often accompanies war — especially sexual violence — and preventing it through early warning and accountability measures. In essence, WPS aims to reform peace and security efforts to be more inclusive and effective by integrating half of the world’s population into decisions of war and peace.
The agenda was born from long-running advocacy by women’s rights activists and organizations worldwide. A key catalyst was the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995, where governments pledged to increase women’s role in peace and security decision-making (the conference’s Platform for Action included “Women and armed conflict” as one of its critical areas). This global consensus laid important groundwork, but it took another five years — and additional lobbying — to move the issue squarely onto the UN Security Council’s agenda. In October 2000, under the presidency of Namibia and with strong support from Bangladesh and other nations, the Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1325. This was a watershed moment: for the first time, the world’s highest security body formally recognized the critical importance of women’s equal participation in peacekeeping, peacemaking, and post-conflict recovery, and the need to protect women’s rights during conflict. Resolution 1325 urged UN Member States and all parties to conflict to take specific actions — from including more women at negotiation tables to training peacekeepers on gender sensitivity — thereby launching what we now call the WPS agenda.
The pillars of WPS
The Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Agenda rests on four main pillars that provide a comprehensive blueprint for making peace processes and security policies more gender-responsive and inclusive:
- Participation: It means ensuring women’s equal presence at all decision-making levels — whether in peace talks, in leadership of peace operations, or in rebuilding governance within a country after war.
- Protection: It refers to safeguarding the human rights of women and girls, especially against sexual and gender-based violence in conflict zones, and ensuring their physical safety and dignity.
- Prevention: It involves preventing violence against women and girls (including conflict-related sexual violence) and preventing conflict itself by addressing gender inequality as a root cause of instability — a recognition that societies with less gender inequality are less likely to resort to war.
- Relief and Recovery: It means incorporating gender perspectives in humanitarian aid, refugee camps, and post-conflict reconstruction, so that women’s needs (from healthcare to economic security) are addressed and women are empowered in recovery efforts.
The implementation of WPS
The WPS agenda is implemented through a mix of international and national mechanisms. On the international level, the UN Security Council has passed further resolutions reinforcing and expanding the commitments of Resolution 1325. These resolutions have addressed issues like sexual violence in war as a tactic of terror (Resolution 1820 in 2008), improving women’s participation in post-conflict governance (Resolution 1889 in 2009), and linking WPS with counter-terrorism efforts (Resolution 2242 in 2015), among other topics. At the national level, over half of UN member countries have created National Action Plans (NAPs) to localize WPS commitments. These plans outline how each government — often in collaboration with civil society — will increase women’s roles in peace and security and protect women’s rights domestically. For instance, as of 2019, more than 80 countries had adopted NAPs, and by mid-2023 that number rose to over 100 countries. Many countries are now on their second or third-generation NAPs, what reflects their expanding ambition in putting the agenda into practice.
Thanks to UN and domestic actions, the WPS agenda has not remained confined to UN halls — it has led to real changes on the ground. For example, numerous peace negotiations in recent years have seen greater involvement of women mediators or delegates because of the normative pressure of UNSC Resolution 1325. Countries like the Philippines involved women at senior levels in negotiating a 2014 peace accord, widely seen as contributing to a more durable agreement. In Liberia, women’s peace activism was instrumental in ending the civil war in 2003 and was later bolstered by WPS frameworks that supported women’s participation in reconstruction. Even in ongoing conflict zones, the presence of women peacekeepers and police (though still a minority) has improved community relations and protection outcomes, aligning with WPS principles. The agenda has also spurred the creation of regional networks (such as the African Union’s women mediators network) and regular civil society advocacy at the Security Council’s annual WPS debates, holding global leaders accountable for progress.
The challenges related to the WPS Agenda
Despite promoting progress in feminine issues related to peace and security, the WPS Agenda has been the target of a few critics who point out inadequacies both in its principles and in its implementation.
According to postcolonial perspectives, the agenda often reflects Western liberal feminist ideas that may not fully resonate in non-Western contexts or may have little efficacy in them. Scholars point out that while Western nations champion WPS, they sometimes do so without properly consulting or empowering women in the Global South, whose experiences of conflict can differ greatly. In addition, there is concern that that powerful countries could use the WPS rhetoric to justify military interventions in the name of “saving” women — a dynamic some call the “liberal peace critique”. This critique warns against merely inserting women into existing military and peacekeeping structures without challenging those structures’ underlying militarism or power imbalances.
Another issue bemoaned by some specialists is the increasing trend of securitization of feminine issues. They argue that, instead of focusing on peace, WPS discussions often focus narrowly on security measures, like deploying female soldiers, intelligence officers or gender focal points. While the increased feminine participation in peace building efforts is beneficial, over-emphasizing this might undermine the holistic aspect of WPS. Accordingly, it should be stressed that the original intent of the agenda has been always about preventing and ending conflicts rather than merely making them safer for women and girls.
Furthermore, critics note that the WPS agenda sometimes treats women as a homogenous group, emphasizing women-as-victims or women-as-peaceful without accounting for diversity among women. An African woman in a rural conflict zone, a young woman from an indigenous minority, or an LGBTQ+ person in a war-torn society may have very different experiences and needs that a one-size-fits-all approach misses. Researchers have shown that WPS policies and NAPs rarely mention factors like race, sexual orientation, or disability, which means certain groups of women (or gender minorities) remain invisible and unserved. The push for intersectional WPS approaches is growing, to ensure no woman or girl affected by conflict is left behind due to the narrow framing of “women” in the agenda.
Even if those conceptual issues were dealt with, the implementation of the WPS Agenda also faces several challenges. One of them is that progress has been slow and uneven. While global commitments are lofty, women still remain under-represented in many peace processes and security institutions. As the UNSC itself noted in 2019, there are “persisting barriers” to the full implementation of the Women, Peace and Security Agenda — including women’s under-representation in peace processes and insufficient funding to carry out WPS initiatives.
Additionally, there is concern about “tokenism” in the agenda’s implementation. Some institutions might add a woman or a gender advisor to a team just to show adherence to the WPS Agenda, without truly empowering them or heeding their opinions. This superficial compliance with UNSC Resolution 1325 and the National Action Plans is prevalent in certain places, and it does little to shift entrenched male dominance in peace and security decision-making.
Finally, the lack of data about feminine involvement in peace efforts also poses challenges. Good data is critical for tracking progress in implementing the WPS agenda — for instance, knowing how many peace negotiators are women, or how many women access relief service. However, in the absence of such data, we may not see where women are excluded or what impact WPS initiatives are having. Because of this, civil society groups have frequently had to fill the void left by governments, by means of collecting evidence of women’s experiences during times of conflict and their roles in peace efforts.
Conclusion
The Women, Peace, and Security Agenda (WPS) is a landmark in international relations. It has connections to both the gender equality movement and the peace and security sector. It emerged from a recognition that sustainable peace is unattainable when half the population is excluded or victimized. Through its foundational pillars, the UN resolutions and the National Action Plans, the WPS framework strives to transform how the world approaches conflicts. Ultimately, its goal is to address the unique hardships women face in war and to make peace processes more inclusive, by tapping into women’s often overlooked contributions to conflict resolution. The agenda has achieved significant normative and practical impacts. At the same time, realizing its full promise remains a work in progress. Overcoming criticisms — whether about Western bias, securitization, or lack of inclusivity — will be crucial to strengthening WPS moving forward.
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