Experiences of (in)security: An analysis of the Women, Peace and Security agenda

Abstract: The Women, Peace and Security agenda (WPS) argues for women’s rights and recognition of women’s situations in all stages of a conflict. Previous research has shown how refugee women seem to be overlooked in international legislation. Existing research considering the WPS agenda has mainly focused on issues of implementation and discourses. This study aims to explore how conceptualizations of security within the international WPS agenda and the Swedish national action plan for its implementation (NAP) can compare to women’s refugee experiences of (in)security. The security concept is explored with several frames; traditional state security, human security, and feminist security studies as focusing on security as narrative. This is complemented by a theoretical discussion of conflict and war as experiences. Feminist research methodology is applied as guidelines for the research project. The material for analysis is first, the resolutions of the WPS agenda and the Swedish NAP, and second, interviews of women with refugee experiences. The documents are analysed by using a qualitative content analysis, and thematic analysis is used for the interview material. Furthermore, the two analyses are combined in a comparative discussion. The main conclusions reveal that conceptualizations of security within the regulatory documents do not cover (in)securities described in the interviews. There is a lack of recognition of the importance of women’s experiences of conflict and security.