On a Tuesday evening in mid-July, the Embassy of Sri Lanka in Washington, DC opened its doors to celebrate 51 female leaders from the Wilson Center’s Women in Public Service Project Institute at Bryn Mawr College, a program co-sponsored by the U.S. Department of State to advance the leadership capacities of women in post-conflict countries. Among the women in attendance were journalists, high court judges, social workers, mentors, civil society activists, and members of parliament who were accepted to the Institute as a result of their work to further facilitate the process of peace in their communities.
Earlier in the day, the delegates attended a two-part panel in their honor at the Wilson Center for International Scholars moderated by Dr. Rangita De Silva de Alwis, director of the Women in Public Service Project. Among the panelists were Dr. Elaine Kamarck of the Brookings Institution and author of the panel’s namesake, How Change Happens: Politics and Policy in America; former Ambassador to Cambodia, Carole Rodley; Afghanistan’s first and only female mayor, Azra Jafari; State Department Deputy Assistant Secretary for Partnerships and Learning, Jerry White; Kathleen Kuehnast of the U.S. Institute of Peace; Tamara Wittes of the Brookings Institution; South Sudan’s Deputy Minister of Housing and Physical Planning, Mary Nyalung Ret; and Adviser to the President of Serbia, Snezara Kresoja.
The panelists’ remarks focused on the theme of women “outside the power structure acting as agents of change” in their communities. Ambassador Rodley shared her experience working in Cambodia, touching on the importance in post-conflict countries of dropping what so often becomes a “backward-looking narrative” in favor of her strategy of “changing attitudes, changing behavior, and changing the rules” in order to move forward in peacebuilding and development. Rather than forcing foreign perspectives and notions of development, Rodley asked “who is better to know what needs to be done” in a post-conflict society “than the people who live there?” She expressed the importance of “training...survivors to tell their own stories” as a mechanism of empowerment for domestic ownership of a nation’s history. She spoke of the issue of sex slavery in Cambodia and how important it is that the women involved saw themselves as survivors rather than victims, allowing them to help other women out of the trade by sharing their experiences to empower and educate in the fight against sex slavery. She encouraged the delegates from the Institute in the audience to “have a vision, make it a big vision...[and to] find a way to tell the story.”
Azra Jafari spoke of her experience as Afghanistan’s first female mayor, several times eliciting swelling applause for her bravery and strength in the position in such a volatile environment. She provided a picture of the situation for many women in Afghanistan, detailing the tribulations of her journeys to Kabul for mayoral duties. Because “security is the main problem in Afghanistan for women in rural areas” and Jafari must travel from the central Daykundi province over 270 miles to Kabul, she must switch vehicles several times and cover her face completely so as not to be recognized by the Taliban. Given these challenges, it was quite hard to believe when Jafari then explained that the Afghan government is in talks to form a peace agreement with the Taliban. This proposal, Jafari explained, is as alarming to many women in Afghanistan as it was to the audience.
In such post-conflict societies it is imperative that we “don’t wait for the revolution to be over to claim women’s rights.” For Afghanistan, this means not succumbing to what Tamara Wittes described as a tendency of leaders in post-conflict societies to set women’s issues aside as a luxury. Engaging in peace talks with an organization that would assassinate Jafari if they could is not the way to do this. Wittes explained that there are consequences of “that silence” that can shroud women’s issues in post-conflict negotiations—that “gender issues are not only relevant, [but] they’re essential” to an inclusive and humane society. She encouraged the delegates to “organize [their] collective voice and constantly bring it forward”, to provide social accountability to documented human rights norms to which their countries may be signatory but not necessarily practitioners of. This means bringing women into the official negotiation process so that they are present at the peace-making table. Wittes encouraged the delegates to incentivize their inclusion in these talks by representing themselves as a constituency that their governments need, to “demonstrate that there is a critical mass in society that cares” about the fate of women.
Taking these words of advice, the 51 delegates later joined guests from all over the city at the Sri Lankan Embassy for an elegant evening of storytelling, networking, dance, and exquisite cuisine. In celebration of their completion of the two-week institute, the delegates enjoyed the opportunity to extend their experiences to those outside of the Wilson Center and Bryn Mawr college, discussing the circumstances in their countries with actors in the non-profit and private sectors around Washington, DC. While the Ambassador himself was unable to attend, the party enjoyed his country’s hospitality—mingling in an enclosed terrace decorated with figures of the Buddha, enjoying a traditional Sri Lankan dance performance, and feasting on an extensive buffet including cashew white curry, brinjal moju, papadam, chicken curry, yellow rice, soya meat curry, fruit salad, and cake.
Most of the delegates I spoke with were heading back to their home countries after they returned to Bryn Mawr College that night. Although their experiences in the program and around DC over the two weeks contrast highly with the work they will return home to do, they are now equipped with the strength and support of each others’ stories, and the vision that activism and social justice are more than buzzwords, but actually the key pieces of an emergent global approach to realizing change.
This article was originally published in the Diplomatic Courier's September/October 2013 print edition.
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Women Leading in Post-Conflict Nations: Peacebuilding & Development at the Embassy of Sri Lanka
October 4, 2013
On a Tuesday evening in mid-July, the Embassy of Sri Lanka in Washington, DC opened its doors to celebrate 51 female leaders from the Wilson Center’s Women in Public Service Project Institute at Bryn Mawr College, a program co-sponsored by the U.S. Department of State to advance the leadership capacities of women in post-conflict countries. Among the women in attendance were journalists, high court judges, social workers, mentors, civil society activists, and members of parliament who were accepted to the Institute as a result of their work to further facilitate the process of peace in their communities.
Earlier in the day, the delegates attended a two-part panel in their honor at the Wilson Center for International Scholars moderated by Dr. Rangita De Silva de Alwis, director of the Women in Public Service Project. Among the panelists were Dr. Elaine Kamarck of the Brookings Institution and author of the panel’s namesake, How Change Happens: Politics and Policy in America; former Ambassador to Cambodia, Carole Rodley; Afghanistan’s first and only female mayor, Azra Jafari; State Department Deputy Assistant Secretary for Partnerships and Learning, Jerry White; Kathleen Kuehnast of the U.S. Institute of Peace; Tamara Wittes of the Brookings Institution; South Sudan’s Deputy Minister of Housing and Physical Planning, Mary Nyalung Ret; and Adviser to the President of Serbia, Snezara Kresoja.
The panelists’ remarks focused on the theme of women “outside the power structure acting as agents of change” in their communities. Ambassador Rodley shared her experience working in Cambodia, touching on the importance in post-conflict countries of dropping what so often becomes a “backward-looking narrative” in favor of her strategy of “changing attitudes, changing behavior, and changing the rules” in order to move forward in peacebuilding and development. Rather than forcing foreign perspectives and notions of development, Rodley asked “who is better to know what needs to be done” in a post-conflict society “than the people who live there?” She expressed the importance of “training...survivors to tell their own stories” as a mechanism of empowerment for domestic ownership of a nation’s history. She spoke of the issue of sex slavery in Cambodia and how important it is that the women involved saw themselves as survivors rather than victims, allowing them to help other women out of the trade by sharing their experiences to empower and educate in the fight against sex slavery. She encouraged the delegates from the Institute in the audience to “have a vision, make it a big vision...[and to] find a way to tell the story.”
Azra Jafari spoke of her experience as Afghanistan’s first female mayor, several times eliciting swelling applause for her bravery and strength in the position in such a volatile environment. She provided a picture of the situation for many women in Afghanistan, detailing the tribulations of her journeys to Kabul for mayoral duties. Because “security is the main problem in Afghanistan for women in rural areas” and Jafari must travel from the central Daykundi province over 270 miles to Kabul, she must switch vehicles several times and cover her face completely so as not to be recognized by the Taliban. Given these challenges, it was quite hard to believe when Jafari then explained that the Afghan government is in talks to form a peace agreement with the Taliban. This proposal, Jafari explained, is as alarming to many women in Afghanistan as it was to the audience.
In such post-conflict societies it is imperative that we “don’t wait for the revolution to be over to claim women’s rights.” For Afghanistan, this means not succumbing to what Tamara Wittes described as a tendency of leaders in post-conflict societies to set women’s issues aside as a luxury. Engaging in peace talks with an organization that would assassinate Jafari if they could is not the way to do this. Wittes explained that there are consequences of “that silence” that can shroud women’s issues in post-conflict negotiations—that “gender issues are not only relevant, [but] they’re essential” to an inclusive and humane society. She encouraged the delegates to “organize [their] collective voice and constantly bring it forward”, to provide social accountability to documented human rights norms to which their countries may be signatory but not necessarily practitioners of. This means bringing women into the official negotiation process so that they are present at the peace-making table. Wittes encouraged the delegates to incentivize their inclusion in these talks by representing themselves as a constituency that their governments need, to “demonstrate that there is a critical mass in society that cares” about the fate of women.
Taking these words of advice, the 51 delegates later joined guests from all over the city at the Sri Lankan Embassy for an elegant evening of storytelling, networking, dance, and exquisite cuisine. In celebration of their completion of the two-week institute, the delegates enjoyed the opportunity to extend their experiences to those outside of the Wilson Center and Bryn Mawr college, discussing the circumstances in their countries with actors in the non-profit and private sectors around Washington, DC. While the Ambassador himself was unable to attend, the party enjoyed his country’s hospitality—mingling in an enclosed terrace decorated with figures of the Buddha, enjoying a traditional Sri Lankan dance performance, and feasting on an extensive buffet including cashew white curry, brinjal moju, papadam, chicken curry, yellow rice, soya meat curry, fruit salad, and cake.
Most of the delegates I spoke with were heading back to their home countries after they returned to Bryn Mawr College that night. Although their experiences in the program and around DC over the two weeks contrast highly with the work they will return home to do, they are now equipped with the strength and support of each others’ stories, and the vision that activism and social justice are more than buzzwords, but actually the key pieces of an emergent global approach to realizing change.
This article was originally published in the Diplomatic Courier's September/October 2013 print edition.
