UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality and enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men and the third gender as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. All human development and human rights issues involve gender dimensions. Globally, UN Women focuses on key priority areas that are fundamental to women’s equality, that can unlock progress across the board. The six priority areas include increasing women’s leadership and participation in political spaces, ending violence against women, enhancing women’s economic empowerment, engaging in all aspects of women peace and security processes, making gender equality central to national planning and budgeting through Gender Responsive Budgeting and advancing gender in intergovernmental processes. The UN Security Council Resolution 1325 recognizes that conflict affects women and girls differently when compared to men and boys, and that women must be part of conflict resolution and long-term peacebuilding processes. In this regard, UN Women has a universal mandate to assist countries and the UN system in progressing more effectively and efficiently towards achieving gender equality and the empowerment of women, as well as upholding women’s rights. UN Women plays a critical role in the development and strengthening of international norms and standards alongside their implementation through operational and coordination activities, while also informing the development of those norms and standards through experiences on the ground. It has also established strategic partnerships and networks with a wide range of stakeholders, including governments, women’s human rights advocates, and civil society organizations. Following the aftermath of the conflict in 2009, Sri Lanka has made several commitments to peacebuilding, reconciliation and good governance, and represents a historic opportunity to advance accountability and reconciliation as necessary steps towards long-term and sustainable peace. In this regard, the Sri Lanka Peacebuilding Priority Plan (PPP) was developed, in collaboration with the UN, to serve as the framework for a coordinated Government, UN and development partners’ response to peacebuilding in Sri Lanka. The PPP places particular emphasis on integrating gender perspectives within its framework. As such, it aims to ensure that peacebuilding initiatives in Sri Lanka include leveraging women’s capacities and contributions, and developing strategies for inclusion, which recognize their roles, and diverse experiences of conflict. Without women’s engagement at the stages of peace consolidation, the dangers of relapse are greatly heightened. Empirical evidence reveals a strong connection between the inclusion of women in peace processes and more durable and stable peace. Despite this however, the most challenging gap in terms of women’s inclusivity in decision-making, concerns the participation of women in peace processes and post-conflict political transitions. This is particularly relevant to the context of Sri Lanka, given that, when compared to other development indices, the political participation of women claims the widest gender gap in the country. In this context, with the generous support of the Multi Party Trust Fund (MPTF), UN Women is seeking the services of an assistant consultant to support implementation and provide administrative support for a series of dialogues and capacity building programmes for women community leaders on collective leadership and conflict resolution, as well as a series of village townhalls under the project: “Promoting Women’s Engagement in Waste Management to Prevent Conflict in Sri Lanka” The project will unfold in targeted local authorities and DS divisions within the districts of Puttalam and Mannar: 1. Puttalam District (04 local authorities and 4 DS divisions): - Puttalam Urban Council / Puttalam DS division
- Kalpitiya Pradeshiya Sabha / Kalpitiya DS division
- Chilaw Urban Council / Chilaw DS division
- Arachchikattuwa Pradeshiya Sabha / Arachchikattuwa DS division
2. Mannar District (01 local authority and 1 DS division) - Nanattan Pradeshiya Sabha / Mannar Town DS division
This MPTF funded project takes an innovative, integrated approach to peacebuilding, tackling ethno-religious tensions by bringing communities together to provide a sustainable solution for a shared environmental issue – Solid Waste Management (SWM) – with women at the forefront for conflict prevention. The nexus of Environmental Conflicts – Gender – Communal Tensions is unique, and a new area of peacebuilding not yet explored in Sri Lanka. The project focuses on women’s role within their communities to support conflict prevention Gendered division of household labour results in women being mostly responsible for waste management, hence they play critical roles in responding to environmental degradation at community level. Women’s community engagement results in greater responsiveness to citizens’ needs, often increasing cooperation and delivering more sustainable peace. Despite high involvement in communities, women remain under-represented in policy and decision-making; their experiences and skills are often overlooked. Thus, any solutions related to waste management, and communal tensions therein, require women’s meaningful participation. Women are uniquely positioned within families/communities to influence motivations that drive individuals to support intolerant ideologies or violence. Their gendered roles in shaping and informing families and communities allow women to support in countering intolerant narratives, mistrust and fear, which converge to exacerbate tensions and promote violence. The project will adopt an integrated approach to achieve its overall objective: building community resilience through women’s engagement in conflict resolution and their participation within community and local governance systems; strengthening community governance systems such as Praja Mandala to better lobby with local authorities; strengthening SWM systems within target divisions, including technical support to local authorities on better managing SWM systems; and supporting different communities to coalesce around the issue of SWM via Praja Mandala - with the goal of improving inter- and intra-community relations.
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