The D.C. Student Consortium on Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) launched on March 9th, 2021 with a series of parallel events on discussing four specific policy gap topics within the WPS agenda.
Watch each workshop here:
Opening Session
The opening session featured keynote speakers Dr. Alyssa Ayres (Dean of the Elliott School of International Affairs), Dr. Kathleen Kuehnast (Director, Gender Policy and Strategy at U.S. Institute of Peace), and Sanam Naraghi-Anderlini (Founder and Executive Director of ICAN). The speakers discussed the history of and relationship between gender and peacebuilding, where we stand with the implementation of the WPS Agenda, and what diverse communities of academics, practitioners, and activists can do to drive that implementation forward.
Feminist Foreign Policy Workshop
This 90-minute conversation with Jamille Bigio from Council on Foreign Relations, Gayatri Patel from CARE, and Belquis Ahmadi from USIP discussed the connection between feminist foreign policy and the WPS agenda and existing gaps in the space that are worth exploring.
Engaging Men and Boys in Gender Equality
Dr. Sandra Whitworth from York University, Dr. Gary Barker from Promundo, and Laxman Belbase from MenEngage discussed how men and boys could be engaged in the pursuit of gender equality in a way that is accountable to women and transcends rather than reifies gender norms.
LGBTQ+/Queer Perspectives and Understandings in Foreign Policy
Dr. Jamie Hagen from Queen’s University Belfast, Sahar Moazami from OutRight Action International, and former Swedish Minister for European Affairs and Democracy Birgitta Ohlsson from NDI talked about how WPS can expand from “women” to “gender” through the integration of the experiences and voices of queer communities into our global peace and security policy framework.
Intergenerational Gendered Trauma
Colette Rausch Research Professor, George Mason & Founder, Transform Trauma Solutions, Guglielmo Schinina, Head of Global Mental Health, Psychosocial Response and Intercultural Communication (MHPSS) section at IOM, Professor Rana Dajani of Biology and Biotechnology at the Hashemite University in Jordan, and Shambulia Gadsden Sams, Founder & Chair, WCAPS HBCU Connection, discussed the importance of addressing intergenerational gendered trauma in peace processes, post-conflict rebuilding, and domestically. Unfortunately, we lost the recording for this panel. If you are interested in the topic, we are happy to share event notes with you!
Closing Session
The closing plenary session featured keynote speakers Ambassador Melanne Verveer, Executive Director of the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security and Former U.S. Ambassador for Global Women’s Issues, and Dr. Chantal de Jonge Oudraat, President of Women in International Security. The speakers discussed where the U.S. stands with institutionalizing the WPS Agenda's central principles, what the path forward is for expanding the scope of WPS, and how the WPS paradigm can be shifted so that youth and academia can be drivers of the conversation.