Events

Countering Violence, Countering Extremism: The Women, Peace and Security Agenda in Service of Countering Violent Extremism

Hosted by the Centre for Women, Peace and Security

Wolfson Theatre, New Academic Building, LSE, United Kingdom

Speaker

Professor Laura J. Shepherd

Professor Laura J. Shepherd

Chair

Dr Paul Kirby

Dr Paul Kirby

#LSEWPS_CVE

The most recent resolution in the Women, Peace and Security architecture, UN Security Council Resolution 2242, raised the possibility of alignment with the Countering Violent Extremism agenda at the UN and beyond.

Three paragraphs are devoted to explaining how the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) and Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) agendas could align better. In response, various communities of scholars and practitioners have raised concerns about the instrumentalisation of both women and the WPS agenda in service of CVE. These debates also intersect with questions about whether there has already been a diminution of violence prevention as a core ‘pillar’ of the agenda, and whether the integration of WPS and CVE further narrows the scope of the kind of violence we are allowed to talk about preventing. 

In this event, Laura J. Shepherd will examine the articulation of prevention in the context of UN counter-terrorism efforts and the WPS agenda, in order to understand how the alignment of WPS and CVE agendas became possible. She will then explore the discourse of CVE intervention programmes in Australia, to explore the likely impact of alignment between CVE and the WPS agenda in this context and begin to draw tentative insight about this new policy development on the Women, Peace and Security agenda and on violence prevention initiatives more broadly.

Speaker

Professor Laura J. Shepherd is an Australian Research Council Future Fellow and Professor of International Relations in the Department of Government and International Relations at the University of Sydney, Australia. She is Visiting Senior Fellow in the Centre for Women, Peace and Security.

Dr Paul Kirby (chair) is Assistant Professorial Research Fellow in the Centre for Women, Peace and Security.