Pacific Women Building Peace: A Regional Perspective
Dr Nicole George - Department of International Relations, ANU

In this seminar I outline a new research project which examines how Pacific Island women have collaborated regionally to promote peace from the 1970s until the present day. In particular, I examine how women’s conceptual approaches to peace-building have shifted across time and how this has influenced the shape of collaborative peace advocacy strategies and the negotiation of regional relationships. In broad terms this research provides an important challenge to the bleak forecasts which often characterise international affairs analysis of the Pacific region by demonstrating the resources and capabilities existing within Pacific Island communities and how these have been mobilised to promote peace. This project also provides new insights into the nature of Pacific Islands regionalism which has conventionally been examined in ways which ignore the long history of Pacific women’s regional engagement. More broadly, this research will also further debates taking place within the fields of feminist international relations, and peace and conflict studies, on women’s political agency during periods of conflict by providing a deeply contextualised analysis of the varying ways women’s peace-building networks have functioned in a regional capacity.