We engage in policy impact in different ways:
Through our unique partnership with UN Women’s Elsie Initiative Fund, the Lab collaborates with military/police leaders in countries to identify barriers to women’s participation, wellbeing, and retention. Our process has facilitated conversation about institutional changes related to parental leave, mental health, contraception, and childcare provision in all these countries. Notable outcomes include establishing a childcare facility for the Senegalese Gendarmerie, improved mental health support for the Liberian Armed Forces, and breast cancer screening for women in the Sierra Leonean military.
We conduct original research on issues related to women’s participation challenges and workplace culture (e.g. sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment), which we have translated into original policy reports and webinars that have been disseminated widely.
We are frequently consulted by different UN agencies and think-tanks to advise and train on various issues related to women’s participation in the security forces, the creation of gender responsive security institutions, and on policies related to sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment.
Our Current Policy Outputs
Abstract: Women’s participation is essential for effective peacekeeping. Despite commitments under the UN Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Agenda, women remain underrepresented in UN peace operations, particularly in leadership and operational roles. The Measuring Opportunities for Women in Peace Operations (MOWIP) assessment has been completed in 20 Troop and Police Contributing Countries (TPCCs) to understand barriers to women’s meaningful participation. This Meta Analysis reveals four persistent key barriers and offers recommendations to overcome them. These key findings are then applied to the Future of Peacekeeping Report We then provide recommendations for TPCCs and the UN to mitigate barriers across mission models.
Policy Brief #4: Training on Sexual Exploitation and Abuse for Uniformed Peacekeepers: Effectiveness and Limitations
Authors: Phoebe Donnelly, Sabrina Karim, DeAnne Roark, and Muhibbur Rahman
With Additional Support From: Sky Kunkel and Emily Jackson
Abstract: Sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) by UN peacekeepers continues to under mine the organization’s legitimacy and effectiveness. While training on SEA is required for all UN personnel deploying to UN peace operations, there is little data available on how effective these trainings are. This paper presents the first quantitative analysis of SEA training’s effectiveness, using original survey data from more than 4,000 uniformed personnel in ten countries. The analysis reveals that SEA training has a significant positive impact on attitudes and knowledge about SEA. Personnel who completed pre-deploy ment SEA training were substantially more likely to recognize that SEA would violate their national policy (85 percent versus 67 percent among untrained personnel), to consider SEA to be serious (85 versus 68 percent), and to express willingness to report SEA (80 versus 57 percent). The analysis also found that UN deployment increases the likelihood that personnel will receive various gender-related trainings beyond SEA. This professional development could contribute to broader institutional norm changes within military and police organizations. However, despite pre deployment SEA training being mandatory, a significant proportion of deployed peacekeepers reported never receiving this training, with mid ranking personnel least likely to receive instruction on SEA. Although the quantitative analysis shows positive links between SEA training and views on SEA and reporting, there are limits to how much SEA training can result in behavioral change. Interviews and workshops with training experts revealed limitations in current approaches. The compliance-focused framework often reduces training to a “box-checking exercise,” while the short duration and broad scope of training can limit retention. Trainers may also lack expertise in SEA or other gender-related topics. Training experts emphasized the need for SEA trainings to contextualize and apply the material rather than focus on prescriptive instruction. SEA training also needs to focus on behavioral and cultural change rather than mere policy compli ance, addressing SEA as a collective unit responsibility rather than an individual obligation. Several regional training centers are already pioneering such approaches, including scenario-based learning, small-group discussions using local examples, and leadership modeling. Ultimately, while current SEA training shows measurable positive effects on attitudes and knowledge, improvements in delivery methods and enforcement of training requirements are necessary to maximize this training’s effectiveness and create lasting institutional change.
Policy Brief #3: The Future of Peacekeeping Needs Everyone: A Path Forward for Women’s Meaningful Participation in Peace Operations
Authors: Sabrina Karim, Sarah Rowse, Inka Lilja, Zinab Attai, Kathleen Fallon.
Abstract: In recent years, global shifts in peacekeeping contributions have led to African countries being some of the largest contributors of peacekeeping. Yet, many of the countries lack resources and have limited funding for their state security forces. On one hand, deployment to peacekeeping missions helps provide the country’s security forces with training, new experience, and funds. On the other hand, there is less information about the challenges that these peacekeepers face upon return. This policy brief explores four potential challenges for African peacekeepers after they return from operations: relationship, psycho-social, economic, and career challenges. The report finds that the main challenges for returned peacekeepers upon their return appear to be relationship and financial. Women were more likely to experience financial challenges and social stigma whereas men had more physical and mental health problems. Psycho social, mental health, and physical problems were more prevalent in the military than the police. The report ends with a series of policy recommendations.
Policy Brief #2: The Transition Home: Key Challenges for African UN Peacekeepers Upon Return
Authors: Sabrina Karim, Maggie Dwyer, T. Debey Sayndee, Clair MacDougall, Sky Kunkel, Addison Barton, and Mike Kriner
Policy Brief #1: Moving Beyond Zero Tolerance: Preventing Sexual Exploitation, Abuse, and Harassment in UN Peace Operations
Authors: Sabrina Karim, Sky Kunkel, DeAnne Roark, Angie Torres-Beltran, Cameron Mailhot, Sumin Lee, Radwa Saad, Priscilla Torres, Emily Jackson
Abstract: The inaugural Gender and Security Sector Lab policy memo, “Moving Beyond Zero Tolerance: Preventing Sexual Exploitation, Abuse, and Harassment in UN Peace Operations,” brings together decades of academic research as well as utilizes the GSS’s lab’s survey data and interviews with uniformed personnel from ten countries to describe several problems with the current zero tolerance framework for preventing SEAH (sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment). It suggests different approaches to developing a policy framework to prevent SEAH. Then the brief evaluates three possible avenues through which SEAH can be prevented: punitive, professionalization, and victim-centered/health approaches. The policy brief is meant to provide policymakers and practitioners with evidence to make changes that move beyond the UN zero tolerance policy toward a more comprehensive, holistic approach to prevention.
Policy Outputs with DCAF and GAC Funding
The Gender and Security Sector Lab is funded by Global Affairs Canada. It was previously funded by DCAF The Geneva Centre for Security Governance. Both grants are a part of the larger Elsie Initiative. The grants have allowed for the lab to create a rigorous methodology and set of tools for different countries to measure the barriers to women’s meaningful participation in United Nations Peacekeeping Operations. For more information about DCAF and the Elsie Initiative, click on the button below.
The Measuring Opportunities for Women in Peace Operations (MOWIP) Methodology is a rigorous and innovative tool to measure the degree to which women can meaningfully participate in peace operations from the perspectives of the troop- and police-contributing countries (TPCCs). It develops ten issue areas and measures the degree to which the issue areas constitute a barrier or create opportunities for women’s meaningful participation in UN peace operations.
You can learn more on DCAF’s involvement in the Elsie Initiative on DCAF Elsie Initiative webpage. The MOWIP Methodology is the “gold standard” methodology for assessments required for applications to the Elsie Initiative Fund.
The Measuring Opportunities for Women In Peace Operations (MOWIP) Toolbox provides all data collection tools, templates and Explainers necessary for conducting a MOWIP Assessment, using the MOWIP Methodology. All data collection tools, templates and Explainers referred to in the MOWIP Methodology are downloadable on this webpage.
The Gender and Security Sector Lab has helped to write and publish MOWIP reports for over ten countries. They can be found here.
The GSS Lab has also contributed to the Global MOWIP report. Produced under the umbrella of the Elsie Initiative, the Global MOWIP presents consolidated data using the MOWIP methodology from 4 Troop- and Police- Contributing Countries (TPCCs) with a focus on actionable recommendations for international peacekeeping policy and practice.
This policy brief series addresses salient issue areas in MOWIP assessments that emerge as barriers, or opportunities (or both), to women in peacekeeping. It aims to debunk policy myths that have failed to generate systemic change in peacekeeping and to introduce new narratives, based on fresh evidence and research findings across MOWIP data, that identify clear ways forward for key policy actors.
Overall, the series aims to promote a shift in policy frameworks and its corresponding policy actions, from “increasing participation” (in numbers) to “increasing meaningful participation” (via the transformation of structures, practices, and attitudes).
Contact us.
If you are an undergraduate who would like to work for the lab or if you would like to find out more about GSS lab events, please email gsslab@cornell.edu
Undergraduates who want to be a research assistant can fill out an application here.