The Tales of Three Asian Countries: How Indonesia, India and the Philippines Recruited Women for UN Peacekeeping Missions

Tulisan ini mengkaji perbedaan tiga negara dalam merekrut perempuan untuk berperan di bidang keamanan. Tulisan ini bertujuan untuk menjawab masalah umum dalam studi keamanan: Dimana perempuan? Khususnya, dimana perempuan dalam mendukung pasukan perdamaian Perserikatan Bangsa-Bangsa (PBB)? Walau jumlahnya setengah dari populasi dunia, namun kurang dari lima puluh persen perempuan berkerja di sektor swasta, lebih sedikit yang bekerja di sektor publik, dan sangat kurang yang berkutat di sektor keamanan. Jika keamanan benar-benar inklusif, maka perlu ada penelitian untuk menetapkan alasan di balik tidak hadirnya perempuan, dan untuk mencari alasan dibalik ketidakhadiran mereka. Dengan demikian, artikel ini berusaha untuk mengeksplorasi kontribusi beberapa negara anggota PBB dalam operasi perdamaian PBB, yaitu Indonesia, India dan Filipina. Artikel ini berfokus pada partisipasi perempuan dalam penjagaan perdamaian karena PBB saat ini sedang berusaha untuk meningkatkan jumlah perempuan dalam misi-nya. Studi kasus beberapa negara Asia ini untuk mengkaji bagaimana negara memposisikan perempuan sebagai aktor keamanan, apakah berada di tingkat yang sama dengan rekan-rekan pria mereka, atau apakah negara masih memposisikan mereka sebagai pihak yang selalu membutuhkan perlindungan.


Introduction
In running its peacekeeping missions, the UN does not have its own troops, but it relies greatly to member states' contribution of their professional defence and security personnel 'lend' to international mission. Therefore, it is important to understand how contributing countries deploy women peacekeepers to peace operations, because this understanding will assist the UN authorities to increase the numbers of women involved in peacekeeping missions, as well as making the presence of these women more meaningful. The strategy of increasing the numbers of women peacekeepers is part of a gender-balancing approach to foster diversity and equality of access. From its establishment until today, the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations (UNDPKO) is facing serious problems in increasing the proportion of women in total peacekeepers to meet the policy target of 20 per cent by 2014; hence, the target date was recently postponed to 2020. 1 Across 2009 and 2011, the number of policewomen grew by only 3 per cent and by just 0.3 per cent for military women. 2 Meanwhile, the strategy of making women peacekeepers' presence more meaningful is part of the UN gender mainstreaming approach to foster female leadership and involvement in decisionmaking, but is presently done through window dressing or tokenism, a facade for female inclusiveness. This study's academic contribution is positioned from the perspective of feminist internationalism, focusing on the emergent literature on gender in International Relations.

Feminist Internationalism
Different with the other type of feminism that works 'bottom-up' through focusing women issues and oppressions within the local context then argues specific solution, feminist internationalism elaborates transnational principles and standards to improve women's globally disadvantage situation. 3 The establishment of United Nations in 1945 is perceived by women groups as an avenue to solve problems of marginalisation through a 'top-down' strategy, persuading states to develop and adopt resolutions and treaties to improve women's welfare, such as allowing women to keep their nationality after marriage, standardising working condition and endorsing women to vote. Effort by feminist internationalism to provide an international standard of respecting women's rights has received its share of antipathy from states with differing perspectives spanning from 'liberal' to 'religious' state that would deny those rights because they challenge national culture, tradition and policies. 4 However, with international lobbies from women's groups and 'peer-pressure' from advanced democratic and developed states, more and more international treaties on women were signed. 5 This approach of feminism is not exclusive from the feminist thoughts previously elaborated but rather a wider expansion, bringing gender inequality from social issue to the level of state and international issue.
Notable contributors of feminism internationalism perspective are, amongst all, Jean Elshtain,Cynthia Enloe,Ann Tickner,Martha Nussbaum,Christine Sylvester and Laura Sjoberg. 6 Feminists internationalism has a rich and wide focus and, thus, they sometimes contradict each other and also perceived nonspecific, this is arguably because there are many issue they aim to counter and there is no one-size fits all solution. For this research in specific, the author examines the reality in the field using the work of Elshtain's dualism of women's 'beautiful soul ' and men's 'just warrior', Tickner's approach of questioning where are the women, what do they do, who are they represent, and Nussbaum's approach to focus on women abilities to overcome artificially enforced social hierarchy which will be explain in the following. Elshtain and Enloe have argued the masculine international relations realm, with men are doing all the action while women are watching or following of men's policy outcomes, hence giving women the voice to assert themselves is not only a necessity but an imperative. 7 The stereotyping of women as the weak and innocent was highlighted by Elshtain when she referred to the oversimplified 'binary' -of women as 'beautiful souls' and men as 'just warriors', contextualising the differences of masculine and feminine as a working framework. 8 Men are pushed to be brave warriors to protect the less strong women, who in turn are seen as procreators of children. Other types of action, different to the binary, will be considered as unnatural, even sometimes outlawed. Elshtain adopts her term from Hegel, who viewed women as beautiful souls protecting "the appearance of purity by cultivating innocence about the historical course of the world". 9 Other feminist internationalism, Tickner is inquiring where women are in international relations and began to raise feminism theory in international relations, asking the notion of security rather than only military strength. 10 Nussbaum was acknowledged for her exploration on how sex and sexuality have been enforced as source of artificial social hierarchy and how they are used to deny social justice to certain parts of the society, offering the focus on women's abilities and to value those abilities. 11 As the nation-state practice has been apathetic, the lack of women's involvement in the armed forces, obliges international organisations, like the UN, to call for increased female participation, constituting a strong push-factor for raising the importance of equal access and increased opportunity for women in the security sector. Although due to its male-dominance the peacekeeping operations may not be the successful example of UN push to increase female presence, the effort of endorsing women's agency and participation in peace-creation could be appreciated.

Where are the Women?
According to World Bank 2012 data, women accounted for fifty per cent of the global population, but only half have access to jobs, compared to 77 per cent of the male population. 12 Female participation is even lower in the governance sector, with only 21 per cent of women occupying positions as national parliamentarians, 13 and just 17 per cent as government ministers. 14 Yet, female participation in public roles is increasing compared to a decade ago, 15 except that, arguably, in defence and security sector (the sector includes institutions that manage and provide security for the state and its people, including the police and military forces) 16 remain a male domain. Data on women in the security forces worldwide are not yet available, and only a few countries care to calculate the presence of women in their forces, making it difficult to assess the rate of women participation as well as their welfare in terms of equal pay for equal employment, career track and retention.
Nira Yuval-Davis emphasised that women fulfilled vital roles in the defence and security sector, but often not contributing on equal basis to that of the men. 17 This is because the sexual division of labour in defence security is often more rigid and more focused on physical power than in the civil sector. History records that there have been women warriors since ancient times, and there are women currently serving in conflict, but men still outnumber women as armed forces personnel, and women are historically rendered suitable only as cooks, nurses and aides of war, those positioned as civilians, rather than fighters. There is a low advocacy to support women to obtain equal work in the defence and security sectors compared to support for women entering politics and economics. This likely reflects society's uneasiness about accepting women into the security environment, most often because women are stereotyped to fill domestic roles tied to housekeeping and child-rearing.
Female and male stereotypes reflect the differing roles, expectations and aspirations associated with the term gender; hence, it is a matter of situational culture. 18 Meanwhile the more universal biological difference between males and females is termed sex. 19 Gender is based on cultural perception, and thus changes over time, place and situation; while biological sex, by contrast, exhibits relatively more stable characteristics. Gender perception affects biological women and men during their daily lives, in pursuit of jobs and security. Women are often perceived to rule the domestic/household realms due to their perceived biological ability to give birth, rather than the gathering and hunting of food; hence, they are valued less in the business and security domains compared to males. This is reflected in the 16-30 per cent lower wages that women receive compared to men, an imbalance coined as a 'motherhood penalty '. 20 Such differentials can also be extended to the broader security context. More than 100 million women worldwide are held to be 'missing' due to inadequate care, particularly amongst girls, and sex-selective abortion; and, worryingly, this is occurring in times of peace, not war. 21 In the time of conflict, where rule of law is non-existence and legal enforcement could not be found, the security of women decline from bad to worse.

Women in Conflict and in Peace-Creation
Women and girls endure specific experiences in conflict linked to their 'secondary' status in societies. UN Beijing Platform for Action acknowledges that even though entire communities suffer consequences of armed conflict and terrorism, women and girls are particularly affected because their status in society and their sex. 22 It also recognises that women do not enjoy equal status in any society, and when the discrimination against them exists in peacetime, it will be exacerbated in conflict. Gender stereotypes are evidence that the combat forces are generally male-dominated, reinforced by the long-standing societal attitude that men are the warriors, and women are the protected. In the long term, this stereotype of weak-women categorises them as meek and vulnerable, deemed unsuitable to protect themselves along with the things they cherish, and thus dependent on male protection. In the face of continuing armed conflicts occurring in many parts of the world that are predominantly internal, the victims are disproportionately civilian, with no military training. 23 Countries in conflict generally deploy men to conduct military action, while women are normally positioned in supporting roles, such as caring for the sick, undertaking clerical administrative duties, and for the provisioning of male 'pleasure'. 24 Arguably, international norms perceived women as 'weak'. The Fourth Geneva Convention (1949) regulates the protection of civilian in times of war includes additional passage that stated "women shall be especially protected against any attack on their honour, in particular against rape, enforced prostitution or any form of indecent assault" (Art. 27, para 2, C. IV; Art. 75 and 76, P.I). This statement presented due to the experiences of World War II where women of all ages, as well as children, were subjected to inhumane acts including rape in occupied territories, brutal treatments, mutilations and enforced prostitution. Yet two decades afterwards the world's situation did not seem to have changed as the UN in 1974 adopted and enforced the Declaration on the Protection of Women and Children in Emergency and Armed Conflict. The Declaration proposed by UN Economic and Social Council stands on the ground that women and children are often became the victims of wars, civil unrest and other emergency situation that subjugate them "inhuman acts and consequently suffer serious harm." With international norms provide 'protection' especially for women, it is difficult for women, even the strong ones, to be seen as able to provide security and protection. This reality maintains countries to push men to enter defence and security roles, while women out of there. In effect, such international norms keep the number of women participating in security and defence sectors relatively small.
Women active participation in war began by helping behind the frontlines. They were canteen-keepers, nurses and comforters with humble acknowledgement. In times of conflict, states mobilise both men and women were equally, even women images were reconstructed as able to perform effectively in various combat positions to fill in demand of fighting positions. However, when the peace arrived, women contributions are forgotten as "cultural amnesia" had happened. 25 One example is Eritrea, where women were fighting together with men to separate their area with Ethiopia since the 1970s.
When the independence was gained in 1993, conscription was still kept for both male and female, however, the women joined military service for the compulsory 1.5 years were forced to fulfil senior officers' need rather than trained for combat. 26 Many other developing countries imposed different barrier, stopping women from entering the highrank military forces by limiting access to their defence academy, a prestigious institute that commonly male-only until recently. Example for this are Pakistan started to accept female cadets to its academy in 2003, 27 Serbia commenced in 2007, 28 Colombia in 2009, 29 India follow suits in 2010, 30 Nigeria in 2011, 31 Indonesia in 2013, 32

and even
Thailand not yet allowing women to enter its military academy until today. 33 The percentage of women trained in dealing with conflict situation in state militaries ranges from between 0.3 per cent (Bangladesh) to 24.3 per cent (Finland). 34 Similarly, female police forces range from 0.4 per cent (Italy) to 30 per cent (Rwanda). 35 This small number of women serving in the national forces compared to men, meaning that there is small number of women able to serve in the international peacekeeping missions, such as those organised by the UN. Moreover, despite the UN's multi-dimensional activities, peacekeeping is still military heavy, as evidenced by the fact that as per October 2015, some 85 per cent of UN peacekeepers were uniformed, and 73 per cent were military. 36

Lack of Women in UN Peacekeeping
The UN organisation main purpose has always been to maintain international peace and security using human rights value, including gender equality. However, the UN reason to recruit women peacekeepers is less pro-equality altruistic than it might seem. Arguably, the international organisation is trying to rebuild its reputation that has been undermined by peacekeepers misconduct. 37 The UN credibility has been tarnished after the report on sexual abuse perpetrated by peacekeepers was published in Mozambique in 1992 and soon after similar concerns were voiced in Cambodia, Somalia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. 38 39 The predominantly male profile of the UN secretariat and peacekeeping missions' has given challenges to the UN legitimacy, receiving complaints for mishandling sexual abuse and harassment cases by dismissing them unless they get caught by the media.
Due to the sexual exploitation cases often, if not almost always, perpetrated by men, the UN devised new strategies to remedy its credibility. To change its malemajority staffing, since mid 1990s the UN has been aggressively trying to recruit more women with the purpose of increasing the multi-national troop ability to provide assistance to the diverse local population, constitute of men, women, boys and girls. 40 In 2000, UN Security Council Resolution (UNSC) 1325 on Women, Peace and Security was adopted to call women active participation in peacekeeping and peacebuilding. In 2005, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan instituted mandatory training course for peacekeepers to address sexual exploitation and abuse in UN peacekeeping operations and also sending more women peacekeepers. 41 Women have been long involved in UN peacekeeping operations since 1957 but only after the case of sexual abuse perpetrated by male peacekeepers, their role finally recognised and considered important. In the first three decades of UN peacekeeping operations, only 20 out of 6,250 military peacekeepers were women. 42 In the 1980s, female UN peacekeepers amounted to just 1 per cent of total peacekeeping personnel, growing to 1.63 per cent one and half decades later. 43 The 2011 World Peacekeeping report written by Lee Katz, he mentioned the UN difficulties in seeking more women officers, from foot soldiers to high-ranking officers. 44 Up to the end of 2014, UN Gender Statistics indicated that peacekeeping operations comprise only 3.2 per cent military women and 9.5 per cent policewomen, making uniformed women participation of just 4 per cent of total UN forces. 45 The difficulties for increasing the number of women peacekeepers perhaps lies in the limited number of women working in the member states' security and defence forces. But even if the UN member states have the human resource, the question is whether they would be willing to deploy men and women equally. The UN International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (UN-INSTRAW) assigned Bertolazzi to investigate the reasons behind why there is very few female participation in peacekeeping operations. His research revealed that women peacekeepers faced sexual harassment, gender discrimination and biases in the UN missions. 46 Hence, it is no wonder that contributing countries are reluctant to deploy their women to UN missions, as the challenge is greater than deploying their male peacekeepers. The states' hesitancy to deploy women, in the same manner as men, would be examined in the three case study countries.

Reasoning Behind the Selection of Case Study Countries
The empirical case offered by this study focuses on the women peacekeepers from Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The reason why Indonesia is an interesting case study is because the country contributes the highest numbers of peacekeepers to the UN PKO amongst the Southeast Asian countries, ranking 18th in the world in April 2014, but deployed far fewer women peacekeepers in terms of numbers compared to the Philippines and India. 47 What is puzzling is that according to the Democratic Index assessment, Indonesia has a higher democracy level and higher GDP compared to the Philippines, despite it is lower than India. 48  The call to be UN peacekeepers are announced to every military and police district, to which, ideally, all personnel can apply. Yet, based on the field interviews to 18 personnel that were successfully became peacekeepers, they were appointed by their unit, rather than apply as individuals. 56  In terms of deployment, Indonesia sent women peacekeepers in both individual and contingent/unit deployments. Individual deployment is more challenging as the personnel is sent to work individually with multinational field unit and not allowed to bring arms, meanwhile in contingent/unit deployment the personnel is deployed in a group and allowed to bring their equipment, including protective armaments.
Nevertheless, based on UN Archive, Indonesia did not deploy women to all of its peacekeeping missions. 58 The missions that were deemed unsuitable for women peacekeepers were Liberia (UNMIL) and Nepal (UNMIN). When the sex-segregated data became available in late 2009, until December 2014, Indonesia consistently deployed over 1,500 peacekeepers and at times even reached 2,000 peacekeepers, yet the highest number of women peacekeepers deployed by the country was only 35 or less than two per cent. 59 The former IPTC's Chief I Gede Sumertha stated that the reason for women candidates failing peacekeeping recruitment test, besides not having husband consent is also because of their inadequate English skills. 60 He did not disclose any effort his institution made to solve the problem. This signify the relatively lacking political willingness in supporting women in the same way as men to become UN peacekeepers.

India
The country is one of the top five UN peacekeeping contributing countries for the last seven years, sending on average 8,000 uniformed personnel with only around 140, or less than two per cent, of them are female. 61 The reason why India sent relatively low percentage of women to peacekeeping missions is that, similar like Indonesia, the country imposes barrier for women to enter the security and defence forces. As per February 2016, there is only 2.5 per cent of over one million defence personnel are female. 62 The reason of such low number is because women only inducted to the military in 1992, allowed to enter the academy in 2010 and not yet allowed to apply for permanent jobs in the forces, except in nursing, dental and medical services. 63  Therefore, it is arguably more difficult for a female personnel to register herself to be a peacekeeper if not endorsed by her senior or the unit head.
The interview with Commander Dhundia revealed that India all-female contingent was able connect with the local women better than the previous mixedcontingent as they can talk more freely with women and girls about domestic violence, rape and abuse related with conflict. However, the approach is not always straightforward to talk about it, as she recalled: "As part of civil-military cooperation, we also provide yoga and meditation trainings to the local population. The training improved the interaction between local population and UN peacekeepers. After we gain their trust, the local women could confide with us with issues of domestic violence and rape. However, the number of local women police officers was low, so we encourage them to register as police member to help them solve their own problem." 69 The Singh and Narendra Modi are hoping for their country to secure a permanent seat in the UNSC. 72 As India is seeking membership of the UN Security Council, along with Brazil, Germany, and Japan (the G4 countries), the country has increased its UN peacekeeping contribution three-fold between 2004 and 2007. 73 This, arguably, is because higher force contributions in UN peacekeeping operations increase the member states' legitimacy to a seat in UNSC and India ability to deploy all-female unit is unmatched by other countries bidding for the permanent seat. However, India unwillingness to deploy its women peacekeepers to relatively dangerous UN missions of Abyei and Golan Heights amongst all, showed that the country not yet have the stomach to treat their women in the same way of their men.

The Philippines
The country is the only Asian country listed on "Best place for women to live" and it has managed to do so for seven consecutive years between 2009 and 2015. 74 Philippines ranked better than New Zealand and Switzerland in terms of women empowerment. According to the report compiled by the World Economic Forum, women in the Philippines have enjoyed greater economic participation, improved job opportunity, increased wages and led the region in terms of political empowerment. 75 The country has also shown similar achievement in its international involvement in sending uniformed women to join the UN peacekeeping missions. Compared to its Southeast Asian neighbours, including their most populated country in the region - are allowed to register themselves to undertake the exam and the result is decided by merit. This arguably allow the Philippines to recruit and deploy higher number of women peacekeepers than Indonesia and higher percentage than India.
Following the footsteps of India, the Philippines has trusted a woman leading peacekeeping unit, with Navy Captain Luzviminda Camacho commanding a contingent in Haiti. The difference is Commander Dhundia led 125 all-female unit, while Captain Camacho led 155 mix officers. 79 From the interview with Captain Camacho, she said that the Philippine's Peacekeeping Operation Centre conducted the training, and she, as well as the members of her contingent, were selected by the institution through a fair and rigorous process, as the country only sent its best personnel overseas. 80 Similarly, Philippines women selected as peacekeepers felt like they provide increase capacity and additional dimension to the UN mission. In the field interview in the Philippines, a female peacekeeper recalled her experience: "My commander told me that before, kids and women were afraid to approach our unit because the team members were all male. I think my presence, with my smile and long hair at the time, was making it easier for the population to accept us. My commander said that my 'hair diplomacy' worked better than his 'moustache diplomacy' (she laughed)". 81 Although the Philippines provided a greater chance for women to become peacekeepers, it still chooses which missions women can be deployed. Based on UN Archive, the Philippines did not deploy women to peacekeeping missions in the border between India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP), Abyei (UNISFA) and Western Sahara (MINURSO). 82 When the decision-makers were asked about the reason why they would not deploy women in these missions, it is because "it is not safe for them" and "they could get killed, leading to bad publicity". 83 These statements arguably show that even in the most equal country in Asia, the state would still prefer to protect its women.

Conclusion
The UN efforts to increase the number of women peacekeepers was intended to improve the local women situation in conflict and post-conflict area where the UN