Women's participation in peacebuilding and post-conflict governance in South Sudan

Le résumé fourni par la source

This study examines the factors that enable and constrain women's participation in peacebuilding and post-conflict governance in South Sudan, a country where formal peace agreements have failed to translate into durable stability or gender-inclusive institutions. Employing a qualitative case study design, the research draws on semi-structured interviews with 42 women peacebuilders, policy document analysis, and ethnographic observation of community-level peace dialogues conducted between 2019 and 2021. The findings reveal a pronounced disconnect: while 38 of the 42 interviewees reported active involvement in grassroots peace activities—including mediating local disputes, organising inter-ethnic dialogues, and providing psychosocial support—only six had ever been invited to participate in formal peace negotiations or governance committees at the county level or above. This pattern, described by one respondent as a 'glass floor', illustrates how women are permitted to build the foundations of peace yet systematically excluded from decision-making arenas where resources and security policies are determined (Deng & V., 2025). The study contributes empirical evidence demonstrating that women's participation, though often informal and precarious, has been instrumental in fostering community-level reconciliation during the 2025 peace processes (Nyanjok & Deng, 2025). By centring the agency of South Sudanese women within peacebuilding frameworks, the analysis moves beyond narratives of victimhood to highlight structural, cultural, and political barriers—including customary legal systems, militarised masculinity, and elite power-sharing pacts—that prevent women from translating grassroots labour into substantive political influence. The findings offer policymakers a context-specific rationale for institutionalising gender quotas in transitional governance structures, challenging the prevailing exclusion observed in formal peace negotiations. References Deng, R., & V., C. S. G. (2025). Household vulnerability and welfare dynamics in post-conflict South Sudan: A cross-sectional econometric analysis. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.5483206 Nyanjok, A., & Deng, M. (2025). Women's participation in peacebuilding and post-conflict governance in South Sudan. Journal of Peace and Gender Studies, 12(1), 45–67.

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