Working Paper
The Ideal of Gender Justice and the UNSCR 1325

The paper examines why the efforts to promote gender justice by development aid have not succeeded in dealing with deeply-rooted structural injustices which prevent the realization of social justice and gender equality. The study analyses the implementation of the UNSCR 1325 ‘Women, Peace, and Security’ in Kenya and the Democratic Republic of Congo. The paper concludes that in current, transitional setting of international development co-operation, there is a need for deeper understanding of the complex social and political power structures and processes that integrate sub-national communal (religious, ethnic, or political) loyalties and pressures in a manner that efficiently prevents individual women/women as a group from enhancing women’s rights and gender equality as a priority.