Promise: to promote more women in peacekeeping. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said at the 2017 Vancouver Peacekeeping Ministerial: “We are equally committed to increasing the number of women that we deploy as part of UN peace operations.” (“Canada to deploy more women to peacekeeping missions, says Trudeau” Youtube, 1:13). A specific programme was also announced “titled Women in Peace Operations Pilot – ‘The Elsie initiative.'”
Table 2. Number of Canadian uniformed women in peacekeeping (benchmark data and the recent figures)
| Date | Military Women |
Police Women |
Total |
Source |
Comment |
| 2015 Oct 31 | 1 | 20 | 21 | UN, 2015 (pdf) | Conservative gov, last official figures |
| 2016 Aug 31 | 2 | 13 | 15 | UN, 2016 (pdf) | At time of London ministerial, last official figures before meeting |
| 2017 Oct 31 | 2 | 6 | 8 | UN, 2017 (pdf) | At time of Vancouver Ministerial, last official figures before meeting |
|
2021 Apr 30 |
5 |
9 | 14 | UN, 2021 |
5 women of 28 military personnel (18%) |
Recent stats:
At the end of April 2021, the Trudeau government iproviding only 14 women uniformed personnel. The total is significantly fewer than the 21 women that the Harper government provided at the end of its term.
During the time of the Mali deployment (2018-19), if the National Support Element is included, the number of Canadian women increased substantially. The percentage of Canadian uniformed women on peacekeeping became especially high (25%) compared to other countries, with the UN average being (approx) 5% for military personnel, and 10% for police. Although the UN has no target for troops, it has set a target of 16% for SOs and MILOBs in 2019 (starting 2018 at 15% and increasing 1% each year thereafter to 2028; UN Security Council resolution 2242 (2015) called for a doubling number of women by 2020).
Canada almost lost a military position in the UNMISS mission in March 2019 when it was unable to meet the UN quota for women in peacekeeping. After Canada pledged to increase its number of deployed women, the UN allowed Canada to retain the position.
The government’s 2017/18 Progress Report on the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) Agenda states: “Dedicated efforts were made to recruit women for the Canadian deployment to the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA), resulting in women making up 14% of the Canadian contingent, including the task force deputy commander, and to ensure gender responsive action through the deployment of a gender advisor.”
The 2017/18 Progress Report also states: “Of the 45 Canadian police newly deployed to international peace operations during the fiscal year [2017/18], women made up 18%, as compared to 14% the previous year.18” [footnote 18: “Of the total 70 police in deployment during the fiscal year, women represented on average 19% in fiscal year 2017–2018 and 18% in 2016–2017. The target is 20%, which equals the UN goal.”] It seems there has been some backsliding in 2018/19.
Observations:
In 2020, Canada had dropped to near record lows in its contributions of women to peacekeeping, i.e., single digits. In 2021, it is only slightly above that.
In 2019, Canada finally temporarily set a good example percentage-wise, with 19% of its UN military personnel being women, well above the UN average. For Staff Officer/MilObs deployed, Canada had 7 out of 23 or 30%, well exceeding the UN goal of 16% for 2019.
In 2017, Canada’s Vancouver pledge, especially the financial incentives, held promise to increase the number of women military personnel provided by other countries.
Unfortunately, slow to no progress on the pledges on women, peace and security or WPS is being made:
– Elsie initiative: Announced at the 2017 Vancouver ministerial, the Global Elsie Fund was launched at the UN on 28 March 2019, co-organized with UN Women. The disembursements have been very slow. Nothing had been distributed to ransferred to Participating Organizations by end of 2020. Most has gone to administration. The programme is planned to end March 2022.
– Training assistance: two countries were designated to serve in a pilot project: Ghana and Zambia — see Freeland, Sept 2018, neither being Francophone — but actual training and mentoring activities have not commenced in the three year period since initiative was announced.
– A pledge of C$ 21 m was made in Vancouver for WPS in UN peace operations. This includes contributions to the UN’s trust fund for victims of sexual exploitation and abuse or SEA. Whether the funds were actually dispersed is not known.
– More broadly, “A new WPS Chiefs of Defence Network was launched by Canada, the United Kingdom and Bangladesh to share best practices and compare progress in addressing barriers and challenges to integrating WPS in national militaries.” Canada succeed the United Kingdom as network chair in July 2019. — see WPS CHODS website. But a planned tour of nations for WPS consultations by General Jon Vance did not take place as planned.
– Canadian Gender Advisors (GENADs) were deployed with Op PRESENCE and UNMISS (South Sudan).
– Graphs of CAF women deployed by year 2011-21 is shown in Annex Figure A1.5, giving the number that went on deployment that year and the percentage women of the total deployed (men and women combined).
– Percentage by women by occupation in CAF and percentage deployed on peace ops by occupation (Annex Figure A.6) shows that women are less likely to be deployed than men in all occupations, except engineering officers.
Conclusion:
The total number of Canadian women contributing to peacekeeping has fallen drastically with the end of the Mali mission. It was only with that mission that Canada finally made an impact by example in the percentage of women deployed, at 25%, after years of slow or no progress. The percentages have since fallen, as have the number of women deployed. Some long-promised programmes may eventually be implemented, especially the Elsie initiative, which has not started dispersing funds more than three years after it was announced. The long-term effects of the Fund are yet to be determined.
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