Page 26 - A Gender-Sensitive Indian Foreign Policy- Why? and How?

Indian Council
of World Affairs

knew all along. That is a very interesting take away from your very textured
comments on the subject and I hope we can discuss this further in the time
available to us after the speakers have finished making their presentations.
So I would like to now move to our next speaker Dr. Soumita Basu, she is the
Assistant Professor in International Relations at the South Asian University
in New Delhi. We were just talking of the South Asian provenance and I
think the South Asian University is a wonderful enterprise and endeavour to
essentially express that South Asia is an integer, and that we cannot separate
the one from the many in that context. So I will invite Soumita to make her
comments now. Thank you.

Dr. Soumita Basu Thank you, Ambassador Rao. Thank you also to ICWA, especially Dr. Ankita
(Assistant Professor, Dutta, for organizing this panel discussion. A very good afternoon to all.
Department of IR,
South Asian University, My fellow panelists have shared a number of valuable insights, and I am
New Delhi) happy to take this discussion forward. My brief is to focus on the Women,
Peace and Security agenda, and specifically India’s engagement with the UN
Security Council. I would like to begin with a few points that would set the
background to my remarks on the topic.

First, we are discussing gender-sensitive foreign policy in an international
context that is increasingly mindful that gender matters in international
affairs, in words if not always in deeds. This is certainly evident in the
UN Security Council, which has ten Resolutions on ‘women and peace
and security’ that are at the center of the WPS agenda; there are regular
open meetings on the theme; and, over the years, 86 Member States have
developed National Action Plans for the implementation of the WPS
Resolutions. It makes sense to talk gender in this scenario.

Second, I would like to note that one can be gender-sensitive without
necessarily being feminist. We see this in gender-related scholarship in IR:
scholars may recognize gender as a variable (and count women, men and
others in their research), but not be driven by the transformative dimension
of feminist thinking. So, as we discuss gender-sensitive foreign policy today,
it would be useful to reflect on what India can or hopes to get out of such a
foreign policy.

Third and finally, at any international forum, it is a matter of finding balance
between national interest and international norms. While we associate
the WPS agenda and women’s rights with international norms and legal
frameworks, evidence suggests that these are also in the interests of States.
Valerie Hudson et al have demonstrated the linkages between national

26 One can be gender-sensitive without necessarily being feminist.

Indian Council of World Affairs An ICWA Conversation