Key messages
- Despite notable normative advances, after 25 years, the effectiveness of the Women, Peace and Security Agenda is threatened by a fragmented global panorama and faces significant challenges and setbacks.
- In the new context, the following stand out: (a) the increased frequency and complexity of armed conflicts; (b) the rise of ‘anti-gender’ movements and the erosion of women’s rights in many regions; (c) geopolitical divisions, which make it difficult to prioritise comprehensive solutions to conflicts; (d) the Agenda’s funding crisis; (e) the crisis of multilateralism; (f) the reduced representation of women as negotiators and mediators; and (g) the loss of policy coherence and its transformative potential due to the instrumentalisation of the Agenda, often used for geopolitical purposes.
- For the Agenda to remain relevant, it is crucial that it evolves and adapts to the new global situation and updates its principles with an understanding of the local contexts in which it must be applied.
- Suggestions to revitalise the Agenda in this new context include: (a) placing it at the centre of a 21st century vision of security that goes beyond defence; (b) a strengthened security role for countries particularly committed to the Agenda; (c) incorporating expanded and locally defined security needs and the protection of communities; (d) fostering inclusive mediation, recognising the diversity of traditions and actors; (e) protecting the integrity of the Agenda, avoiding its instrumentalisation for political purposes and promoting its coherent implementation; (f) investing in the creation of spaces and funds for women’s networks and grassroots organisations to influence peace agendas; (g) strengthening accountability, including civil society’s voice in monitoring national and international action plans; (h) re-politicising the Agenda, recognising and addressing power dynamics and considering women’s inclusion as a political demand; (i) recognising women’s political role, highlighting their leadership in resilience, conflict prevention, mediation and post-conflict governance; and (j) integrating the principles of the Agenda into strategic security and defence.
- These proposals seek to make the Women, Peace and Security Agenda a dynamic and effective framework for a more sustainable and inclusive peace. Recognising that the structural barriers of gender inequality are the main obstacle to progress on this Agenda, these measures also aim to close gaps and promote women’s rights and gender equality.
Analysis
1. Introduction
The 25th anniversary of United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 1325 and the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action mark significant dates in the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) global agenda. These commemorations call for a critical assessment of the progress made and the challenges that remain. Despite notable normative achievements –such as the strengthening of gender language in Security Council resolutions and the commitment to integrate the WPS Agenda into peace operations– the current international panorama is marked by contradictions. While gender equality frameworks have been strengthened globally, women’s rights are being eroded in many regions of the world. Moreover, armed conflicts are becoming more frequent and complex, and gender itself is becoming a field of political contention and instrumentalisation. These tensions raise a fundamental question: how can the WPS Agenda remain relevant and have an impact in changing power and conflict dynamics?
This analysis identifies two central dimensions that require further attention. First, it considers how transformations in the international order, in particular the shift towards multipolarity in a changing and fragmented geopolitical context, and the rise of anti-gender politics, are reshaping both the conceptual and practical underpinnings of the WPS Agenda.
Secondly, it examines how peace processes are evolving –becoming more fragmented, competitive and politically opaque– and what this implies for the inclusion of women and other traditionally excluded actors. In doing so, it advocates a more context-sensitive and politically informed understanding of the WPS Agenda as a normative framework and field of practice.
2. The global order in transition: implications for the WPS Agenda’s standards
The optimism of the post-Cold War era that underpinned the early years of the WPS Agenda has given way to a markedly different geopolitical environment. The emergence of a multipolar order has disrupted traditional alliances, while the weakening of the multilateral system has broken down the relatively coherent normative frameworks that characterised previous decades of global governance. Women’s rights, long considered signs of democratic progress, are now politicised and challenged. In several contexts, gender equality is no longer perceived as a universal aspiration, but as a fault line in ideological struggles. In this new scenario, the agenda with respect to gender equality, including the WPS Agenda, faces several challenges (some persistent) that overlap and reinforce each other: (a) the challenge of implementation (translation into practice has been poor and uneven); (b) the expansion and better articulation of ‘anti-gender’ movements; (c) the crisis of multilateralism; (d) a crisis of funding for the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (the WPS Agenda has suffered from a lack of adequate funding for 25 years); and (e) the crisis of the liberal order and a return to a realist vision of international relations in which geopolitical interest takes precedence over any other. In addition, as the language of WPS itself is appropriated for geopolitical purposes, the Agenda risks losing its normative coherence and transformative potential.
The tone and data of the UN Secretary-General’s latest report on women, peace and security (September 2024)[1] warns of the current state of the WPS Agenda: in a context of unprecedented levels of armed conflict and violence, and after several years of stagnation and regression in key indicators, ‘the progress achieved over the past 25 years is fading’. Among the factors undermining such progress, the report notes, are: (a) the growing backlash against women’s rights and gender equality (in a context where, as global data show, women continue to be under-represented in political, economic and social decision-making); (b) the reduced opportunities to advance the Agenda due to increasing geopolitical divisions, which make it difficult to prioritise comprehensive solutions to conflicts; increasingly, governments and non-state armed groups are resorting to military action and weapons proliferation, rather than diplomacy and mediation, including that sponsored by the UN and regional organisations; and (c) the fact that power and decision-making in peace and security matters remains overwhelmingly male-dominated and progress has been extremely slow in ending impunity for those who commit atrocities against women and girls.
The crisis of the liberal rules-based order, fragmentation and polarisation on the international scene have negative effects on gender equality agendas. These impacts, in turn, contribute to characterise this moment of transition in the global order, which is more resistant to agendas that seek to act on the roots of structural inequality (the social construction that constitutes gender and assigns certain roles and stereotypes to men and women), and not only the symptoms: the gap in political and economic leadership, the wage gap, or gender violence.
Women’s participation in peace processes has continuously declined in recent years. According to the Escola de Cultura de Pau in its 2024 report,[2] in 2022 women participated as negotiators or delegates of the parties in conflict in four of the five peace negotiations that were led by the United Nations. The representation percentage of women in negotiating delegations with women was 16%, down from 19% in 2021 and 23% in 2020. Involvement in peace processes in which the UN did not play a leading role was even lower. The UN Secretary-General’s 2024 report notes that, after analysing more than 50 processes in 2023, on average, women made up only 9.6% of negotiators, 13.7% of mediators and 26.6% of signatories to peace and ceasefire agreements. Moreover, in the case of agreement signatories, this proportion is reduced to 1.5% if Colombia’s agreements are excluded. There has also been a reduction in addressing gender equality issues in the Security Council. According to UN data, between 2015 and 2023 more than 65% of Security Council decisions explicitly included gender-related issues, up from 35% in the previous 15 years. However, the average has tended to decrease over the past two years and in 2023 it reached 58%, the lowest in seven years. Furthermore, the number of women from civil society invited to speak as experts on the WPS Agenda at the Security Council also declined from 56 in 2022 to 45 in 2023.
Although the normative and institutional architecture that has been consolidated over the last two and a half decades should contribute to gender mainstreaming in any peace and security initiative, it is clearly insufficient to advance the Agenda in the current context.
Regarding progress, it is worth highlighting, on the one hand, the group of countries that, in recent years, have adopted a feminist foreign policy, in the framework of which the WPS Agenda is –at least on paper– clearly central. However, if feminist foreign policies do not push, with specific and consistent commitments, for the implementation, effectiveness and impact of the Agenda, going beyond rhetoric, they could contribute to current narratives that question its relevance. The increase of mediator networks nationally, locally and regionally is also a significant development. The most recent is the Ibero-American Network, which joins the Nordic, Mediterranean, African, Commonwealth and Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) networks. The localisation of this Agenda is key to maintaining its relevance and impact in practice, particularly in the current context of conflict proliferation.
Changes in the global order are particularly visible in the reformulation of the concept of protection. In the liberal peace era, protection used to refer to safeguarding women from gender-based violence, especially sexual violence, in war, displacement and post-conflict contexts. However, contemporary conflicts, such as the war in Ukraine, have broadened this notion. Protection now includes collective defence of civilians against aerial bombardment, occupation and other forms of indiscriminate violence. Ukrainian civil society actors together with the authorities are redefining what protection entails on the ground, challenging previous assumptions and seeking new frameworks for understanding gender security in wartime. While facing the challenge of protecting civilians from indiscriminate drone and missile air strikes, as well as assisting refugees, the Ukrainian authorities and organisations have warned of an increase in human trafficking[3] at Ukraine’s borders and beyond, for the purposes of sexual exploitation, forced labour and illegal surrogacy. These protection efforts are further hampered in a context of political polarisation and the growing influence of anti-gender coalitions in the region. This is an area to which the standards and policies of the WPS Agenda have not yet provided adequate responses.
In parallel, the increasing presence of non-Western mediating actors in peace processes has diversified the ways in which gender is addressed. While the mediation led by the UN and regional organisations has adopted liberal feminist perspectives, other processes are embedded in state feminist traditions or employ alternative cultural, legal and political frameworks (Pratt, 2020; Ní Aoláin, 2016).[4] In certain contexts, the term ‘gender’ is explicitly rejected, while the concept of women’s rights is more acceptable and less controversial (True, 2013).[5] This diversity of approaches underlines the need for flexible approaches and an understanding of the social context in the application of the principles of the WPS Agenda –not as static norms, but as living practices shaped by specific social realities– especially in mediation settings characterised by a plurality of socio-political norms and values (Basu & Confortini, 2017).[6]
3. Evolving peace processes and the policies of inclusion
The architecture of peace processes has also undergone significant transformations. The theoretical linear model –comprising pre-negotiation, negotiation, agreement, implementation– rarely materialises in practice. Today’s mediation environments are more fragmented, often involving multiple parallel tracks, a proliferation of actors and competing policy objectives. These processes are further complicated by asymmetric power relations, regional interventions and strategic exclusions.
Within this fragmented terrain, inclusion no longer operates solely as a normative objective, but as an evaluated and contested political practice. The participation of women, on the one hand, and of traditionally discriminated groups, on the other, not only ‘adds’ value to peace processes, but transforms them. As demands for inclusion make themselves felt, especially from civil society and grassroots organisations, they often clash with the closed and confidential nature of high-level negotiations. These tensions reveal a wider conflict between elite-driven arrangements and so-called popular arrangements in terms of transparency and legitimacy. Mediation is no longer just about reaching alliances; it also involves managing the politics of visibility, representation and access to negotiations.
Moreover, the proliferation of mediating actors –including states, regional organisations and informal intermediaries– has given rise to new forms of ‘gatekeeping’. These actors can shape not only the agenda of the talks, but also determine who participates and what issues are considered negotiable. Consequently, inclusion becomes politicised and gender provisions can be sidelined or instrumentalised according to the strategic interests of mediators.
4. The WPS Agenda as an evolving policy field
In a quarter of a century, the WPS Agenda has matured into a multidimensional policy field, marked by adaptation and innovation as well as contradictions. While it has generated valuable normative and institutional commitments, it has also become a terrain of ideological struggle. Different actors within the WPS Agenda ecosystem promote divergent approaches: some emphasise feminist and demilitarised peace, while others promote the integration of women into existing military and security structures. This divergence reflects broader debates about the nature of peace and the meaning of gender justice.
The representation of women in the Agenda discourse adds complexity. Common narratives oscillate between portraying women as victims of sexual violence and as agents of peace and reconciliation. As feminist scholars such as Laura Shepherd[7] argue, this duality risks reproducing a problematic logic: women must first be ‘saved’ and then act as ‘saviours’. In many international forums, women’s trauma is presented as a demand for recognition and intervention, but their political agenda is often constrained by the very frameworks that seek to empower them. Victims are also survivors and survivors often emerge as political actors, leading movements, shaping discourse and demanding more just forms of peace.
Moreover, the geography of the implementation of the WPS Agenda reflects persistent global hierarchies. In many countries of the global North, National Action Plans are oriented towards external action –linking gender to foreign policy, development aids and assistance in security matters– while conflict regions are designated as the main spaces for implementation. However, the war in Ukraine has disrupted this dichotomy, making the WPS Agenda a direct concern of domestic and regional security policies in Europe.
In this context, Central and Eastern European feminists are redefining notions of security and protection, and highlighting that Ukrainian women are not simply passive recipients of protection: they are central actors shaping security debates and policy responses in the region. They are, among other issues, opening up the debate on defence as a notion of protection. They have warned that the WPS Agenda approaches are insufficient or fail to address the multiplicity of gender insecurities, both domestic and regional, related to Russian aggression. As O’Sullivan & Krulisova (2022, 2024)[8] argue, the approaches developed from the region, which actively question the liberal and Western assumptions (and leaderships) of the Agenda, and recontextualise them within the framework of the prevailing anti-gender politics of Central and Eastern Europe, constitute a challenge to the traditional North-South divide that has historically structured the Agenda discourse.
Conclusions: Ten recommendations for revitalising the WPS Agenda
To ensure that the WPS Agenda remains relevant and effective in this changing geopolitical landscape, the following 10 measures are proposed:
- Reconceptualise security in the 21st century, putting the WPS Agenda at the heart of a vision of security that goes beyond defence and prioritises and strengthens conflict prevention as the best investment in peace and stability, particularly at the local level. Localisation of the Agenda is essential to achieve an impact.
- Ensure, on the part of the states that most actively defend the Agenda, the fulfilment of the most relevant commitments, going beyond rhetoric and thus contributing to demonstrating its effectiveness and positive effect. It will be essential to lead by example and to set concrete, unwavering goals.
- Repoliticise the WPS Agenda by recognising and addressing the power dynamics present in peace processes. Inclusion must be seen as a political demand that defies closed, elite-driven negotiations rather than a purely technical exercise.
- Support contextual interpretations of protection, incorporating locally defined security needs, especially in situations of large-scale violence or occupation. Expand protection frameworks beyond individual-focused interventions to collective and civilian-targeted approaches.
- Promote flexible and pluralistic mediation strategies that recognise the diversity of actors and traditions involved in peace processes. Encourage mediators to engage with multiple understandings of gender, women’s rights and inclusion that transcend liberal frameworks.
- Protect the standards of the WPS Agenda from instrumentalisation, ensuring that gender equality and women’s participation are not applied selectively or as geopolitical tools. Promote coherence in the use of the principles of the Agenda across regions and actors, both in domestic and foreign policy.
- Invest in infrastructure for inclusive mediation, creating funds, training and political spaces for women’s networks, survivor groups and grassroots organisations to actively influence the peace agenda, not just as participants, but as defining actors.
- Strengthen accountability mechanisms in National Action Plans and international institutions. Overcome symbolic commitments through regular and independent reviews of the implementation of the Agenda, including voices from civil society, especially from conflict-affected communities.
- Reformulate women’s roles in peace and security to reflect both their vulnerabilities and their political role. Avoid reinforcing victim/saviour dichotomies in international discourse and instead highlight women’s leadership in resilience, conflict prevention, mediation and post-conflict governance.
- Mainstream the WPS Agenda into strategic security and defence policies, not confine them to development and aid frameworks. Particularly in Europe, with the war in Ukraine, the Agenda must document strategic-level responses related to security, resilience planning and defence reform.
These political actions are essential if the WPS Agenda is to be not only a normative achievement, but a dynamic and effective framework for inclusive and sustainable peace in the 21st century. Given that the main barrier to implementing the Agenda is the structural nature of gender inequality (particularly in the political and economic sphere) that persists in all countries of the world, the proposed measures can also act as levers for substantive progress in closing gender gaps, beyond its peace and security framework.
[1] ‘Women and peace and security. Report of the Secretary-General’, 24/IX/2024, United Nations Security Council, https://docs.un.org/en/S/2024/671.
[2] ‘Negociaciones de paz 2024. Análisis de tendencias y escenarios’, Escola de Cultura de Pau, Universidad de Barcelona, https://escolapau.uab.cat/ca/inicio/negociacions-de-pau-analisi-de-tendencies-i-escenaris/.
[3] UN Office on Drugs and Crime (2025), ‘Study on trafficking in persons and smuggling of migrants in the context of the displacement caused by the war against Ukraine’, February, https://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/tip/studies/2025/TIP_Study_2025_eng.pdf.
[4] N. Pratt (2020), ‘The gender logics of resistance to the Women, Peace and Security agenda’, International Affairs, vol. 96, nr 2, p. 521-538, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiaa001; F. Ní Aoláin (2016), ‘The ‘war on terror’ and extremism: assessing the relevance of the women, peace and security agenda’, International Affairs, vol. 92, nr 2, p. 275-291, https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2346.12504.
[5] J. True (2013), The Political Economy of Violence against Women, Oxford University Press.
[6] S. Basu & C.C. Confortini (2017), ‘Weakest “P” in the 1325 pod? Realizing conflict prevention through Security Council Resolution 1325’, International Studies Perspectives, vol. 18, nr 1, p. 43-63, https://doi.org/10.1093/isp/ekw001.
[7] Paul Kirby & Paula J. Shepherd (2024), Governing the Feminist Peace. The Vitality and Failure of the Women, Peace, and Security Agenda, Columbia University Press.
[8] M. O’Sullivan & K. Krulisova (2023), ‘Women, Peace and Security in Central Europe: in between the Western agenda and Russian imperialism’, International Affairs, vol. 99, nr 2, p. 625-643, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiad021; M. O’Sullivan & K. Krulisova (2022), ‘Feminist perspectives from Central and Eastern Europe: rethinking the Women, Peace and Security agenda’, European Journal of International Security, vol. 7, nr 1, p. 44-62, https://doi.org/10.1017/eis.2021.22.
