Women Waging War and Peace: Assessing the Gender Dimension of Conflict

Vijitha Mahadevan Eyango has been named Gender and Education Advisor for the Asia/Near East Bureau of the U.S. Agency for International Development. She is chair of the Institute for the Study of Gender in Africa (ISGA) at the UCLA James S. Coleman African Studies Center, and principal investigator and project director for the Gender, Science, and Technology in Africa Project. Synopsis: The gender dimension in conflict analysis has focused almost exclusively on women as victims of war with inadequate attention paid to women as participants in conflict or on their roles in conflict resolution. Women play an integral and multidimensional role in situations of armed conflict, both as perpetrators and victims, and as an effective force in mediation and post-war reconstruction. Using specific examples from South Asia, this presentation will assess women's roles in conflict, making the case for the global integration of gender considerations in conflict analysis. Part of Women's Week 2001