(Des)masculinizando as operações de paz: uma análise do gender balancing aplicado ao caso da MONUSCO

Abstract

Ever since the year 2000, when the Women, Peace and Security Agenda (WPS) was created by Resolution 1325 issued by the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), the institution has started to include measures aimed at gender equality in conflict and post-conflict environments through its peacekeeping operations. Such measures originate from gender-oriented instruments, called gender mainstreaming and gender balancing. The first one, despite being inaugurated within the scope of peace operations based on the WPS Agenda, has had international incentives since the IV World Conference on Women in Beijing, in 1995, and functions in such a way as to involve institutional considerations about the different needs men and women have. The second proposes achieving quantitative equality between men and women within institutions, in order to reduce or extinguish percentage inequalities and increase representativeness. When applied to UN’s peacekeeping operations, gender balancing acts in order to seek a reduction of asymmetries between men and women in the peacekeeping process, including through the increase in the number of women peacekeepers. This research proposes the following question: Based on the analysis of the MONUSCO case, what is the role of increasing the female military contingent in peace operations in the process of destabilizing the gender patterns that structure such militarized environments? The United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO), chosen as a case study for this dissertation, is considered to be one of the most dangerous current peace operations. This study argues that even with the quantitative increase in women peacekeepers promoted through gender balancing policies, there is no significant change in gender expectations and standards, since militarization is fundamentally structured under a patriarchal system and practices. The case study was developed from a content and discourse analysis on the main documents that involve gender and this peacekeeping mission, and it goes through the establishment as MONUC until after its replacement by MONUSCO. For this, this dissertation is segmented into 3 (three) chapters that have as a theoretical basis the critical feminism of security studies, proposing questions and an analysis mostly from an exploratory and qualitative nature. The first chapter develops a critical feminist theoretical foundation and promotes reflections on militarism; the second one addresses gender mainstreaming and gender balancing in UN peacekeeping operations, focusing on the MPS Agenda; and the third and last proposes a greater depth on the case study, in order to discuss possible changes in gender dynamics from the inclusion of gender balancing measures to increase the number of military women in the operation.