Networking and network-building in Support of Women, Peace and Security: Experiences from the Western Balkans

This report captures experiences, lessons learned and examples of good practices from initiatives that supported networking and network-building during UN Women’s project on implementing UNSCR 1325 in the Western Balkans.

That project, Women Building Peace and Human Security in the Western Balkans Phase II 2008-2011, built on prior UN Women work in support of conflict resolution and peacebuilding in the region. Its two main components supported gender-sensitive security sector reform processes and the engagement of women and women’s organisations in peace processes at all political and social levels. These components were implemented at the regional, national and local levels, mainly in Kosovo, Bosnia Herzegovina (BiH) and Serbia.

This report assumes a basic understanding of issues related to women, peace and security, and therefore does not present a description of relevant theoretical concepts and tools. Instead, it illustrates how these concepts can be applied in practice, based on the experiences of UN Women and its partners in the Western Balkans.

The first chapter focuses on the various types of collaboration that can be developed with different stakeholders and presents some of the common approaches to networking in support of UNSCR 1325 implementation.

The second chapter describes, in the form of 10 case studies, specific network-building initiatives undertaken by local, national, regional and international partners with support from UN Women. While these are not all initiatives and activities taken by this project, the experiences presented here reflect the general themes and lessons learned arising from its implementation, and draw on other activities not presented in detail