OBJECTIVE 1B: Peace and security-building operations to be implemented with a gender perspective in order to increase their effectiveness. Women’s participation and representation in international operations forms an important part of resolution 1325. However, quantitative representation alone does not ensure that women and men are given the same opportunities. In addition to the inclusion of women, a conscious gender perspective must permeate the operations. Gender perspective is essential for a successful outreach to all persons and to ensure that women as well as men are safeguarded in the operations. In order to ensure this, implementing agencies needs to include the gender perspective as a clear and consistent tactic in the planning, implementation and evaluation of interventions. Operation 1325 therefore recommends that all responsible authorities have special staff responsible for ensuring that gender is integrated, that the integrated gender perspective is given ample space and resources for holistic implementation by all authorities. In this goal-setting, we see that the efficiency argument is prominent. Efficiency is one reason why the gender perspective is needed, but as discussed above, it is important to argue not only from the point of view of efficiency when it comes to gender equality, but also to apply a rights perspective. For the first time since the implementation of the Indicator Report all authorities now report that active competence upgrading on gender and 1325 is ongoing to a great extent in core business, although it cannot be regarded as standard. This is a general improvement, but to ensure that gender equality is not dependent on individual efforts, there is a need for continued work so that this perspective is standard and reflected in the relevant policy documents. There are shortcomings in terms of the presence of gender and 1325 in government policy documents; for example, the international unit of the Swedish Prison and Probation Service demanded more policy documents as these documents are important to ensure that 1325 and gender issues will be secured in the future. The Folke Bernadotte Academy reports that in 2015 they managed to include gender mainstreaming in the internal planning system more clearly than before, but there are still shortcomings in terms of gender equality in policy documents. In 2015, the government commission Gender integration in Government agencies (GI-commission/ JiM-uppdraget) expanded to include 60 agencies. Several authorities have stated, both in the indicator report and interviews that the Commission has been positive for their work with 1325 and gender equality. For example, the FBA noted that in its appropriation the GI-commission they were instructed to prepare an action plan for how the agency should develop gender mainstreaming in order to contribute to Sweden’s gender-equality policy objectives. This FBA plan includes both the work of 1325 and gender equality as a transversal perspective of sustainability in all its operations. The FBA also explicitly clarified that the unity and functional managers of the FBA are responsible for integrating a gender perspective into the business, something that is considered to create better conditions for gender mainstreaming in policy documents ahead. The government commission has given the authorities a strengthened capacity to work with gender issues and integration. For example, when the Armed Forces were in the pilot stage of the GI-commission (they now have extensive experience), they were able to hire two additional resource persons to work with gender mainstreaming, which made a big difference. Operation 1325 considers this to be an important government mission that needs to be taken seriously by all authorities in order to ensure that the gender-equality work done is not lost if committed individuals leave the authority.
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WOMEN COUNT 2.0