Sarah-Myriam Martin-Brûlé Reviews Cruz Report, Participates in Government-led Workshop on Women in Peace Operations

Dr. Sarah-Myriam Martin-Brûlé of the Department of Politics and International Studies is one of a handful of individuals across the world invited by the prestigious International Peace Institute’s Global Observatory to comment on the Cruz Report, a document authored by Lieutenant General (Retired) Carlos Alberto dos Santos Cruz that identifies challenges related to the security of peacekeeping personnel and puts forward solutions on how to address them in the mid/long-term. Read Dr. Martin-Brûlé’s review here. In it, she calls into question some of the report’s conclusions, adding important nuances and considerations, thus offering readers a multi-level understanding of key factors and issues to be considered in international peacekeeping missions.

On February 22 and 23 2018, Dr. Sarah-Myriam Martin-Brûlé also took part in the design workshop on Elsie Initiative on Women in Peace Operations. This initiative, that gathered representatives from various countries, from the UN as well as from civil society and academia, aimed to increase the number of women in peace operations. Matt DECourcey, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs and one of the keynote speakers in this workshop, states that “there is overwhelming evidence  that increasing the number of women in peace operations has a substantial impact on the success of those missions. Through the Elsie initiative, Canada is putting that research into practice.”

Dr. Martin-Brûlé will pursue her reflections on the role of women in international security in the context of an international conference entitled “Engendering International Security: The Role of Women in International Development, in NATO and at the United Nations”. This event, which will be attended by the Honourable Marie-Claude Bibeau, Minister of International Development and la Francophonie, representatives of the UN and of NATO as well by academics and key stakeholders, aims to discuss and assess the challenges of adopting and implementing a gendered approach towards international security. The conference will touch upon issues related to the empowerment of women in international development, to UN peacekeeping and to NATO missions. A policy report will summarize the day’s discussion and several scholarly articles stemming from this event will be published.