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Security Sector Reform


Fragile, conflict and post-conflict situations affect women, girls, men and boys in different ways. SSR interventions should be analyzed from a gender perspective and tailored to meet the varying needs that arise from different experiences. Gender and SSR initiatives must be based on, and supported by institutional frameworks that rely on agreed standards for the rule of law and human rights, and the establishment of internal and external oversight mechanisms to enforce those standards.

Key steps and approaches to initiate and implement gender and SSR processes:

  1. Building national consensus and ownership on gender and SSR: Cohere at national level around a common vision for SSR in which gender is both central and mainstreamed; Include recipients and providers of security services; Conduct national needs assessment: ensure that gender expertise is part of the ToRs for the assessors, include an explicit focus or requirement on gender in all stages of the assessment process. The National Gender and SSR Needs Assessments should focus on Prevention, Protection and Participation.
  2. Facilitating and promoting equal opportunity and access:
    • The inclusion of women in the security sector should not be limited to placing women in uniform. Women need to be represented in security related decision-making and oversight structures;
    • Strategic interventions: i) Legal and policy frameworks, ii) Leadership. Operational intreventions: i) Establish a catalytic unit, ii) Implement sector wide consultations, iii) Develop institutional policies to facilitate gender and SSR implementation, iv) Recruitment and retention policies.
  3. Facilitating implementation and building capacity:
    • Create an enabling environment and build the required capacity;
    • Need for a supportive political environment, skills development and resource allocation. Budgets are a good indication of prioritisation and if gender is an integral part of SSR programs, this need to be demonstrated in the budget allocations.
  4. Prevention and protection
    • Zero tolerance on Sexual and Gender Based Violence within national security structures;
    • Initiate protection units;
    • Engage with men and boys;
    • Organize trainings (Standard operating procedures for dealing with SGBV survivors, investigative skills for police prosecutors, Forensic evidence collection, psycho-social support);
    • Initiate one-stop-centres;
    • Creating an enabling justice system;
    • Performance contract.
  5. Monitoring and assessment: Effective monitoring and evaluation of gender initiatives within SSR involves identifying the gender-based results aimed for at the beginning of an intervention, developing gender-sensitive indicators, and collecting and strategically using sex-disaggregated qualitative and quantitative data.

Steps to ensure that women’s interests and needs are included in national DDR programmes:
  • Establish quotas for women participating in peace negotiations and decision-making bodies on DDR, including in peace accords;
  • Support women to participate in these processes by providing training, education and the necessary resources;
  • Ensure that female participants in the DDR programme and a range of women’s views―e.g. leaders representing different social, political, geographical, and economic groups, including disadvantaged groups―are taken into consideration during DDR planning and implementation;
  • Hire gender experts to inform all stages of planning and implementation;
  • Ensure that the national DDR authority has an explicit mandate and legal framework governing DDR programming for women