January 2008: 9th Annual Colloquium and Policy Forum
Security Sector
January 22, 2008
Recognizing that men and women have differing views of security, ensuring women hold positions in a country’s security sector remains critical to achieving a sustainable peace. Yet, few women hold high level posts in the security sector worldwide. The Initiative for Inclusive Security, a program of Hunt Alternatives Fund, is committed to increasing women’s participation in the security sector.
This commitment has made security sector reform the focal point of Inclusive Security's Ninth Annual Colloquium and Policy Forum. Women leaders from some of the most volatile and politically significant parts of the world, such as Afghanistan, Colombia, Haiti, Israel, Liberia, and Palestine, gathered in Cambridge, Mass., and Washington, DC, from Jan. 12-25, 2008 for these events. These 25 women joined experts with backgrounds in security sector reform to explore advancing women’s participation in the security sector and to serve as a model of the cooperation needed to enhance the effectiveness of the security sector. According to the U.S. Department of State, women make profound contributions to stability, prosperity, and peace throughout the world. Yet, only five percent of police and military forces worldwide are female. The presence of women police and military officers can strengthen and rebuild confidence in reformed security forces, while collaboration by security officials with women in civil society and government broadens the sector’s constituency and boosts its legitimacy and effectiveness.
Inclusive Security’s Colloquium is led by Ambassador Swanee Hunt, who co-founded and directs the Women and Public Policy Program at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. Colloquium participants include high-ranking parliamentarians with influence over defense policy and spending, senior ministry officials, government ministers, uniformed military and police officers, and heads of development and advocacy organizations. The women leaders then travelled to Washington for Policy Forum, where they advocated for their inclusion in the security sector to more than 400 key decision makers from the U.S. government, military and police organizations, foreign governments, private security contractors, regional security organizations, and non-governmental organizations. Participants also met with senior officials at the departments of Defense and State, members of Congress, and other key players in the security sector.
List of Colloquium 2008 Delegates
Biographies of Colloquium 2008 Delegates
Watch the JFK Forum with Israeli, Palestinian, Colombian and Afghan Women at Harvard
Country Recommendations Developed During Colloquium 2008
Colloquium 2008 Press Coverage
The Initiative's Work in Security Sector Reform
Participants from Afghanistan, Israel, and Palestine also took part in two public events in Washington, DC on Thursday, January 24.
