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How Women Rescued Rwanda and Set a Global Example
The women of Rwanda are raising their voices. Rwandan Women Rising, a new book by Swanee Hunt, celebrates these women’s awe-inspiring achievements—and lets them explain in their own words how they changed their country and our world. These stories are ferocious yet ultimately courageous. The women do more than recall the horrors of the 1994 […]
Press
Talking Policy: Swanee Hunt on Inclusive Security
This article was originally published by World Policy Journal. In spring 1994, Rwanda was ripped apart by a genocide that left nearly a million dead. While news of the catastrophe reached all corners of the globe, the nation’s recovery and the key role of women are less often featured in the media. Swanee Hunt, former […]
Video
VIDEO: The Moment That Changed Her Life
Stella Sabiiti was a university student in 1976—newly married, with a baby on the way—when soldiers of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin kidnapped her from her dorm room. They tortured her for hours, accusing her of crimes she had not committed. She thought she was going to die. But instead, she looked the soldiers in the […]
Policy Brief, Research
Inclusive Ceasefires: Women, Gender, and a Sustainable End to Violence
Photo: Gregor Fischer/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images Download the Publication Traditional approaches to ending wars—where armed groups meet behind closed doors to hammer out a truce—are falling short in the face of 21st century conflicts. Belligerents increasingly target civilians, and global displacement from conflict, violence, and persecution has reached the highest level ever recorded. States that emerge from war […]
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The Role of Women in Countering Boko Haram
This article, by Women Waging Peace Network member Idayat Hassan, was originally published by Insight on Conflict. The Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP), popularly referred to as Boko Haram, has been waging a war against the Nigerian state for the past seven years. The insurgency has claimed over twenty thousand lives, displaced over […]
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Imagining A Day Without Women Peacebuilders
Picture this: It’s 2008 in Belfast. The Good Friday agreement was signed ten years ago, but—despite the months of thoughtful negotiation behind it—peace is falling apart. Catholics and Protestants still live in segregated neighborhoods. Young people go to school surrounded by students and teachers from the same backgrounds. Armed factions on both sides have refused […]
Video
VIDEO: In Kenya, Only Women Saw the Fire Coming
Fatuma Abdulkadir Adan grew up in volatile northern Kenya, the daughter of parents from two warring tribes. In 2005, sixty people, including dozens of children, were massacred in her hometown of Marsabit. In this video, she relates how government leaders ignored women’s warnings about impending violence.
Video
VIDEO: How Women Transformed the Peace Talks in Northern Ireland
During the Northern Ireland peace process, Monica McWilliams Williams co-founded the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition and was elected as a delegate to the Multi-Party Peace Negotiations. In this video, she reflects on how women transformed the peace talks by reaching out to marginalized groups and raising issues critical for long-term reconciliation.
Video
VIDEO: Muslim and Christian Women Band Together to End Killings in Nigeria
In response to a massacre of more than 500 women and children three miles from her home in central Nigeria, Pastor Esther Ibanga organized a march of Christian women for peace. The killing continued. So she reached out to a female Muslim leader, knowing that joint activity would be more powerful. In this video, she […]
Video
VIDEO: When Her Son Went Missing in Action, She Reached Out to the Enemy
After her second son—a Sri Lankan military officer—went missing in action, Visaka Dharmadasa founded the Association of War Affected Women and Parents of Servicemen Missing in Action. As she puts it: “The war was at my doorstep.” In this video, she tells the story of how she and other women went to rebel territory for […]
