Gender equality in peacebuilding

Andrea Thiis-Evensen talks to Dr Eleanor Gordon, who has worked with peace and security for 10 years, making a huge difference to the lives of hundreds of women. Her work has included building state security and justice institutions, working with demobilised guerrilla groups, addressing war crimes and human rights violations, promoting gender equality and inclusive approaches to peacebuilding, and addressing issues related to organised crime and terrorism.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

[Introduction audio]

Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Hey, my name is Andrea Thiis-Evensen. Welcome back to Peace and Gender. In this podcast I'm trying to highlight the issues around gendered inequalities by meeting the people who are actually seeking solutions. I'm trying to get to know not only their research, but also their personal story. In this episode I'm going to be talking to Eleanor Gordon, who worked for the UN with Peace and Security for 10 years.

Eleanor Gordon: A large group of women wanted to return to Srebrenica. They didn't have any homes. The homes had been completely destroyed. Their husbands and their children had been killed.

Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Eleanor is, in many ways, a living proof that you can make a difference if you just put your mind to it. Eleanor has worked with building state security and justice institutions. She's worked with demobilising guerrilla groups, addressing war crimes and human right violations, promoting gender equality and inclusive approaches to peacebuilding and she's addressed issues relating to organised crime and terrorism. This is Eleanor's story.

Eleanor Gordon: Whilst I was writing up my PhD I decided to do some voluntary work for a peacekeeping training centre because I felt that I had exposure to lots of aspects of what I was interested in and where I wanted to work. All bar the military and I felt that that was a gap in my knowledge and understanding so I decided to do some voluntary work. I was an intern at the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre in Canada for eight months and I completed my doctorate while I was there and it happened also to coincide with an opportunity with UNHCR. There was a UN volunteer's position within UNHCR in Bosnia that I found out about and I was recommended for it.

Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Eleanor was working for the UNHCR, which is the UN refugee agency. She was head of a small satellite office in eastern Republic Srpska, part of Bosnia and Herzegovina. One of her responsibilities was to facilitate the return of displaced people.

Eleanor Gordon: So basically Bosniaks returning to their pre-war homes who had been forcibly displaced. I was responsible for facilitating the first return, minority return to Srebrenica. Yeah that experience probably has - yeah, has framed the way I've seen my subsequent engagement.

Andrea Thiis-Evensen: When Eleanor was working in Bosnia she wasn't just sitting around in an office.

Eleanor Gordon: If you're right down at the municipal level you're generally working in the field and that's the most - for me, that's the most enjoyable work, when you're in direct contact with the people that you're ostensibly there to help. So yeah we would have an office but every day we would be out.

Andrea Thiis-Evensen: I wanted to know if there was a particular moment in Eleanor's career that still stays with her today. Eleanor was working for the UN in Srebrenica. In 1995 Serbian forces separated the Bosnian civilians at Srebrenica, putting women and girls on buses sending them to Bosnian-held territory. The men and boys who were left behind were murdered and it has been estimated that over 7000 Bosniaks were killed.

Eleanor Gordon: I was reflecting on this and I just couldn't get away from this particular event, so I found it really difficult to - because it, yeah it's quite a long time ago and my memory is failing.

So when I was head of the UNHCR satellite office covering Srebrenica, I was responsible for facilitating the first minority return to Srebrenica and as you probably know there was a genocide committed in Srebrenica during the war. Thousands of men and boys, particularly, were killed. So when I was working there with my colleagues in the international community and principally my colleague who was head of the Higher Representative satellite office in Srebrenica, we coordinated and facilitated their return. I guess it stays with me for many reasons, firstly, the amazing courage that people who have suffered such trauma, beyond what you can imagine.

When people are talking about conflict and war, often times we might reflect upon how you become desensitised to violence or how you can be very traum