The Women, Peace and Security Agenda and the Continuum of Gender-Based Violence against Women

The purpose of this chapter is to analyse the resolutions of the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Agenda through the lens of provisions aimed at preventing and combating gender-based violence against women. Drawing on Liz Kelly’s concept of continuum of violence developed in Surviving Sexual Violence (1988), the chapter emphasises both the strengths and weaknesses of the WPS framework, stressing its predominant focus on repression and its recurrent portrayal of women primarily as victims. While acknowledging the impossibility of a new WPS resolution, due to a dangerous gender backlash on women’s rights in the world, the chapter advocates for a disruption of the traditional protection/participation binary. It calls for a systematic interpretation of the existing WPS resolutions in conjunction with the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and the Council of Europe Istanbul Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence. Such an approach, it argues, allow the WPS Agenda to reflect the multiple and intersectional experiences of women in conflict and post-conflict settings.