The New School Graduate Program in International Affairs

GPIA Seminar Series presents

Sarah Taylor

Gender and Conflict Resolution:
Research Results from El Salvador and Guatemala

Over the last two decades, gender has increasingly been present in both the rhetoric and policy of security studies. Today, we are hard pressed to find an international actor that does not include gender issues in major policy recommendations. At present, these recommendations include calls for women to be included as high-level conflict negotiators, with the understanding that women in negotiations will lead to women's issues being included in the accords.

Based on comparative analysis of new qualitative fieldwork, this presentation reviews some of the realities of women at the peace table. For example, current literature tends to explain the lack of women's issues in the El Salvador accords as a result of the norms of the time, and to show Guatemala as a success of women at the table. However, the experiences of these women negotiators, their roles in the negotiations, and the substance of the final accords are the result of a complicated array of factors, such as the goals of the negotiations and the negotiators' personal histories.

Part of the Seminar Series.