Annalena Baerbock and her French counterpart Catherine Colonna in May 2022 in Berlin
Image: Imago
There are resolutions of the Security Council, but do principles of feminist international law already have binding force? A pioneer in the field is skeptical.
When there is talk of “feminist foreign policy”, for which Federal Foreign Minister Baerbock presented “guidelines” first to the federal cabinet and then to the press, the story often begins with Resolution 1325, which the UN Security Council passed unanimously on October 31, 2000. The Council thus formulated an agenda that, with the short formula “Women, Peace, Security”, became the starting point for a series of nine further resolutions that – most recently in 2019 – emphasize the special role of women in the prevention and resolution of conflicts and in “peace building ‘, stressing the ‘inseparable link between gender equality and international peace and security’.
This did not justify a history of progress. In the negotiation halls on the East River, too, global tendencies towards a “cutting back” of supposedly overly rampant liberal human rights developments are noticeable. Despite golden words from the UN Secretary-General, it was not possible to issue a jubilee resolution for the twentieth anniversary. Instead, however, a growing number of states are professing the principles of a “feminist foreign policy”, which is about more than the role of women in peace processes or career opportunities in the diplomatic service. “Feminist foreign policy means smashing patriarchal structures in foreign and security policy and calling for a shift away from the focus on military violence, dominance and oppression,” wrote Antonia Baskakov, Nina Bernarding and Kristina Lunz from the Berlin Center for Feminist Foreign Policy (CFFP). in November 2021 in the journal “Internationale Politik”.