responsibility to protect, often referred to as RtoP. It demonstrates the Council’s readiness to address gross violations of human rights, as genocide and mass crimes against humanity may constitute threats to international peace and security.
feminine. Gender roles and expectations attributed to being male or female are learned. Gender is a broad social and political issue that determines men’s and women’s rights, participation, access to power, and social and political status.
The Three Pillars of the Responsibility to Protect 1. The State carries the primary responsibility for protecting populations from genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing, and their incitement; 2. The international community has a responsibility to encourage and assist States in fulfilling this responsibility; and 3. The international community has a responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian, and other means to protect populations from these crimes. If a State is manifestly failing to protect its populations, the international community must be prepared to take collective action to protect populations, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations. (stipulated in the Outcome Document of the 2005 United Nations World Summit)
1.4 Defining Gender and Important Related Concepts Before we can begin to understand the UN’s approach to WPS and the many obstacles and challenges it faces, it is important to define several key gender-related terms. Although often used interchangeably, the words sex and gender do not mean the same thing. They refer to two different, albeit interconnected, aspects of our world. Sex has an exclusively biological connotation, whereas gender refers to socially constructed notions about masculine and feminine roles that may or may not exactly coincide with notions of a person’s sex. More specifically, gender refers to the social attributes, roles, and responsibilities associated with being male or female and to the relationships between women and men and girls and boys, as well as the relationships between women and those between men. It also includes expectations about the characteristics, aptitudes, and likely or appropriate behaviours of both women and men, including what it means to be masculine or
The concept of gender is vital to examine systems of subordination and domination, as well as how such systems are socially constructed. Gender roles, responsibilities, norms, expectations, and stereotypes that are accorded to men and women in different ways directly affect power relationships in society, such as division of labour and decision-making structures. Gender is relational because it does not exclusively refer to women or to men but rather to relations between them. Gender defines certain roles that men and women play in society; socialization and stereotypes teach and reinforce these ideas and expectations. Gender roles are not fixed but can and do change over time.
Distinction between Sex and Gender A person’s sex is a biological category. A person’s gender is socially constructed, reflecting learned behaviours. It can change over time and within and between cultures.
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