Disrupting the Saviour Politics in the Women, Peace and Security Agenda in the Global South: Grassroots Women Creating Gender Norms in Nepal and Sri Lanka
| Author | Crystal Whetstone, Luna K. C. |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/23477970231152027 |
| Published date | 01 April 2023 |
| Date | 01 April 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Research Articles |
Research Article
Disrupting the Saviour
Politics in the Women,
Peace and Security
Agenda in the Global
South: Grassroots
Women Creating
Gender Norms in
Nepal and Sri Lanka
Crystal Whetstone1 and Luna K. C.2
Abstract
Saviour politics permeates some understandings of global gender norms by
those who construct the Global North as the origin of global gender norms,
and less attention is given to how saviour politics functions within the Global
South, wielded by some privileged women against grassroots women. We argue
that grassroots Global South women, despite their marginalisation, are global
gender norms actors and deserve greater decision-making power on the local
and international stages. We show how the United Nations Security Council
Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) and the broader WPS
agenda focus on global gender norms construction in Nepal and Sri Lanka. We
rely on qualitative methods. We highlight work done by grassroots women from
diverse castes, ethnicities, religious backgrounds, abilities, education and social
locations that construct global gender norms. This article adds to the WPS,
Global South-Global North relations and global gender norms building.
Keywords
Global gender norms, global north and global south, WPS, UNSCR 1325,
Nepal, Sri Lanka
Journal of Asian Security
and International Affairs
10(1) 95–121, 2023
© The Author(s) 2023
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DOI: 10.1177/23477970231152027
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1 Department of International Relations, Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey
2 Research Network on Women, Peace and Security, Center for International Peace and Security
Studies, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Corresponding author:
Luna K. C., Research Network on Women, Peace and Security, Center for International Peace and
Security Studies, McGill University, 845 Sherbrooke St W, Montreal, Quebec H3A 0G4, Canada.
E-mail: luna.kc@mcgill.ca
96 Journal of Asian Security and International Affairs 10(1)
Introduction
This article critiques the perception of global gender norms as deposited in
the Global South by Global North actors and enacted within the Global South
by privileged Global South women. We disrupt such saviour politics and argue
that grassroots Global South women, who are often marginalised, are global
gender norms actors, deserving of greater decision-making power within
local and international arenas. Specifically, we examine the implementation of
the United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 1325 (hereafter 1325) on
Women, Peace and Security (WPS), which launched the WPS agenda, an area
of scholarship and advocacy that enhances women’s equality and participation
in peace and security matters (Basu, 2016), in Nepal and Sri Lanka. This article
builds on previous studies suggesting that global gender norms creation provides
the opportunity for both the (re) production of power and resistance opportunities
(Cislaghi & Heise, 2020; Medie & Kang, 2018; Wilchins, 2019).
The UN encourages countries to implement 1325 and related WPS principles
by adopting WPS National Action Plans (NAPs). NAPs are national-level strategy
documents to help governments outline their priorities, aims and activities, as
well as coordinate the implementation of WPS policies, both at the domestic and
international levels. To date, 98 UN member states (51%) have adopted a WPS
NAP (Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom [WILPF], 2021).
There is a widespread perception that 1325 and WPS principles derive from the
Global North and must be deposited in the Global South. This construction
reproduces racial hierarchy by assuming that the Global South requires assistance
from the Global North through ‘a discourse…that perceives of individuals in the
Global South as merely recipients of norms’ (Hasstrup & Hagen, 2020; Parashar,
2019, p. 829). This view of 1325 localisation adheres to what we define as
saviour politics whereby some Global North feminists see themselves as ‘saving’
Global South women based on imperialist views that see the Global North as
‘civilised’ and the Global South as ‘backward’ (Cronin-Furman et al., 2017). Such
constructions both sideline and invisibilise the origins of 1325 and the WPS
agenda, as well as many global gender norms, which trace to Global South actors.
Basu (2016) has derided the association of the WPS agenda with the international
level and the Global North, drawing attention to the participation of Global South
governments––including Bangladesh, Namibia and Jamaica––and Global South
civil society organisations (CSOs) that played integral roles in the adoption
of 1325 in 2000. In the years since 1325’s launch, Global South actors have
continued to contribute to the development––and expansion of––the WPS agenda
(Basu, 2016).
While highlighting the saviour politics leveraged by some WPS actors in the
Global North against the Global South, we complicate this framing by pointing to
the saviour politics at play within the Global South. Privileged Global South
women frequently dominate local nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) where
they hold top positions, such as heads of organisations and board members. Such
privileged women are best positioned to access donor funds and to influence the
localisation of 1325 and the WPS agenda (Horst, 2017; Madsen, 2017). Some of
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