Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
‘When gender started’. United Nations gender
mainstreaming in Timor-Leste
Ms Sarah Smith, PhD Candidate
The Swinburne Institute of Social Research
Swinburne University of Technology
Refereed paper presented to the
Second Oceanic Conference on International Studies
University of Melbourne
9-11 July 2014
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
Abstract:
Drawing on interviews with East Timorese women’s activists, this paper focuses on
gender mainstreaming which has been part of successive UN peacebuilding
missions in Timor-Leste. The paper is based on the author’s doctoral research, which
examines how gender has been integrated into UN peacebuilding missions and the
operation of this in the particular context of Timor-Leste. This paper notes that the
sheer weight of UN gender mainstreaming in Timor-Leste has had some positive
impacts, especially in supporting formal equality gains for select women – women
being the key targets of gender programs. However, another consequence has been
that ‘gender’ needed to be translated into understanding, acceptance and ultimately
behaviour change, a task undertaken by East Timorese civil society organizations.
Consequently there is a disjuncture between the language of the existing women’s
movement and gender, which is seen as a process brought on by donors and
remains highly centralized in Timor-Leste’s urban capital. This highlights how
assumptions that UN gender mainstreaming will neatly capture and support women
and women’s movements in a given context may be over simplified.
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
Introduction
Drawing on interviews with East Timorese women’s activists, this paper looks at gender
mainstreaming in successive UN peacebuilding missions in Timor-Leste. Based on my
doctoral research, which examines how gender has been integrated into liberal peacebuilding,
of which the UN is central to, and the operation of this in the particular context of TimorLeste, this paper will look at some of the frictions related to translating international gender
mainstreaming rhetoric to a particular domestic context. ‘Liberal peacebuilding’ has come to
be used in the literature as peacebuilding has come to incorporate the cornerstones of a
modern liberal democratic state; that is, democratisation, rule of law, human rights and a free
and globalised market (Richmond and Franks 2009, 3). As gender mainstreaming and the
gender work incorporated into UN peacebuilding, or more broadly liberal peacebuilding,
focuses on women, the perspective presented here also focuses on women, rather than a
broader focus on gender being the socially prescribed roles that shape both men’s and
women’s lives. The sheer weight of UN gender mainstreaming in Timor-Leste has had some
positive impacts, especially in supporting formal equality gains for some women. A number
of individual women and women’s groups in Timor-Leste have successfully used the platform
provided by such policy to politicize their claims to women’s rights and make advances, even
small, in this regard. Good examples of this are the newly adopted Law Against Domestic
Violence and the high representation of women in Parliament, which has been largely
consistent since 2002. However the focus on formal equality has contributed to these frictions
as the benefits of gender work in Timor-Leste appear to be centralized in the urban centre,
Dili, and for those women that can access education. Another consequence is that ‘gender’ is
perceived to be conceptually attached to the international community and the UN framework
in particular that has arrived since Timor-Leste’s independence, rather than to the indigenous
women’s movement and the work they have been undertaken in regards to women’s
empowerment and conflict resolution since the mid-1970s. Rather than there being a
disjuncture between the language of the existing East Timorese women’s movement and the
rhetoric of gender equality so popular with international organizations, I think a more accurate
way of explaining this disjuncture is one that exists between the language used by the
women’s movement prior to 1999 and that which has more international currency and is now
quite prevalent in Timor-Leste. Yet this continues to shape women’s current activism in
Timor-Leste and it remains that ‘gender’ was often viewed throughout my research as
disconnected from and different to that prior activism, even where the goals remained the
same or similar.
What is also important in this discussion is that there is not a simple linear relationship or
diffusion of principles from the international space to the national sphere. Peggy Levitt and
Sally Merry (2009) have conceived of a process which they term ‘vernacularzation’ which
refers to the process of local adoption of globally generated ideas and strategies. They further
note that norms, such as women’s human rights ideas, ‘do not simply move from the global to
local places’, but rather ‘ideas and strategies developed in specific locales by earlier and
contemporary social movements migrate to other places and countries. Sometimes they
become the basis for international human rights principles and approaches’ (Levitt & Merry
2009, 442). This process of vernacularization is one in which international norms on women’s
equality are translated into local contexts, either using international rights based discourse or
different yet related discourses. As is the case in Timor-Leste, this process of
vernacularization or translation is generally undertaken by local civil society counterparts
who receive training, funding and support from UN agencies and international donors.
Historical context
First I would like to provide a brief historical background of Timor-Leste. The country was
colonized by Portugal in the 1500s, who came to the island as early as 1514, establishing the
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
first settlement there 50 years later (Dunn 2003, 13). During WWII, Allied and Japanese
troops battled for the territory, with East Timorese providing invaluable support to Allied
troops. The local population consequently suffered severe humanitarian consequences under a
harsh Japanese military occupation which survived until the territory was surrendered in
1945, subsequently returning to Portuguese colonialists (Dunn 2003, 19-24). Following the
Carnation Revolution in Portugal in 1974, Timor-Leste seemed poised to gain independence.
Sensing imminent Indonesian invasion and following a brief civil war between different East
Timorese political factions, the dominant political party Fretilin claimed independence on 28
November 1975. Just days after, on 7 December 1975, Indonesia launched an assault on Dili
and subsequently gained control of the territory, occupying Timor-Leste until 1999. Fretilin
was the political and military figurehead of the independence movement, and their chief
commander at the time of independence, Xanana Gusmão, became Timor-Leste’s first Prime
Minister in 2002. Fretilin by no means encapsulated either the entire resistance movement or
the entire political consciousness as at the time of Indonesia’s invasion there were a number
of nascent political groupings (see Hill 1976). All pro-independence factions formed a united
resistance front in 1998 under the National Council of Timorese Resistance (Conselho
Nacional de Resistência Timorense – CNRT). In 1999, following a referendum on
independence in which a majority of Timor-Leste’s population voted in favour, Indonesia
withdrew and the UN established an interim administration for two years, with Timor-Leste
finally gaining full independence in 2002. A UN peacebuilding mission was present in the
country from 1999 until December 2012.
East Timorese women’s movement
At this stage I would like to give a brief overview of the indigenous women’s movement in
Timor-Leste as it is important to document for the purposes of this paper. The development of
this movement is inextricably linked to the fight for independence and self-determination
from 1974 onwards. As the director of a national women’s NGO stated:
The women’s movement came from the clandestine [time], very strong. So that’s why we
continue. And we still feel it; we still feel the spirit of the hero, the women that have already
passed away. So we started from the clandestine and then we learn how to strategize (3
September 2013).
Part of the Fretilin vernacular that was shaping East Timorese politics from 1974 included the
language of equality and egalitarianism between women and men and socialist and Marxist,
as well as democratic theory, influences are evident. As one resistance member and women’s
activist recounts:
For politics we used... Aristotle, Marx, Mao Tse-Tung…we liked to use their theory. These
theories, they stress the importance of groups [collectives], these policies highlighted the
importance of the [ordinary] people…There were many theories but these are the ones I can
remember (Interview with Michael Leach, 24 March 2010, Dili).
Article 14 of the Constitution that was read out by the Fretilin Central Committee on 28
November 1975 guaranteed the ‘parity of rights to men and women’ (CAVR 2005, section 3.9
para 211). The first indigenous women’s organization was the Organização Popular da
Mulher Timorense (Popular Organization of Timorese Women – OPMT), the women’s wing
of Fretilin, established in 1975 prior to Indonesian occupation and continues today. The first
Secretary of OPMT was Rosa ‘Muki’ Bonaparte, who had returned from study in Portugal.
The OPMT was one of three popular mass organizations which formed the resistance base
along with the Popular Organization of Timorese Youth (OPJT) and the Popular Organization
of Timorese Workers (OPTT) (da Silva 2012, 147). At OPMTs establishment, Muki stated its
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
purpose as ‘firstly, to participate directly in the struggle against colonialism and second, to
fight in every way the violent discrimination that Timorese women…suffered in colonial
society’ (Bonaparte 1976). This statement also linked women’s emancipation with the
emancipation of Timor-Leste from colonialism, stating that the objective was not, strictly
speaking, to liberate ‘woman as woman, but the triumph of the revolution, and consequently
the liberation of woman as a social being who is the target of double exploitation…’
(Bonaparte 1976).
Upon Indonesian invasion and occupation of the territory, OPMT members were targeted
along with other key political figures. Muki and Isobel Lobato, who was another founder of
OPMT and wife of Fretilin leader Nicolau Lobato, were identified in the first days of the
invasion, taken to Dili’s port and assassinated. As explained by an OPMT member:
Muki Bonaparte was appointed secretary-general of OPMT; she was also a member of the
Central Committee. A woman had to be a member of the Central Committee so that women's
voice would be taken into account in decision making. So up until the 7th December, just over
a week or so of independence, [Indonesia] began to take control... the Indonesian troops had
taken over Dili... right at the start they killed the secretary-general of OPMT [at the
port]...Nicolau Lobato's wife she was killed [also]. Since they were both killed, OPMT... even
if the secretary-general and others were killed [OPMT] decided: ‘Never mind. We will choose
someone else and go to the mountains’. So, we went to the mountains, the war had already
begun (Interview with Michael Leach, 24 March 2010, Dili).
During the 24 years of guerrilla resistance against Indonesian occupation, women’s activities
were many and varied and reflected the organizational and logistical stages of the resistance
movement. OPMT was organized consistent with the administrative sectors of Fretilin and
provided support networks of women as well as spaces for them to work together, with the
opportunity to engage in active combat and clandestine activities (Alves, Abrantes, and Reis
2005; da Silva 2012, 152-159; Cristalis and Scott 2005). Women made up a majority of the
clandestine and civilian support base (Wigglesworth 2010). In the earlier years of occupation,
OPMT members worked in what was termed the ‘bases of resistance’ in which Fretilin had
organized the areas of Timor-Leste under its control into six administrative sectors (CAVR
2005, section 5.2; da Silva 2012). The invasion had caused mass internal displacement, and
Fretilin was left to provide for the large number of refugees in these areas, a task which
OPMTs activities were central to. Within OPMT, commissions were established which dealt
with logistics, education, health and hygiene and crèches (Alves, Abrantes, and Reis 2005,
17-18). The ‘bases of resistance’ era ended in 1978 and, following commands from the
Fretilin Central Committee, many people came down from the mountains. OPMT members
also adjusted to the changing situation, some members remaining in the jungle, others
organizing from surrendered areas. Through the structure of OPMT, East Timorese women
‘bore arms alongside men, provided logistical support, carried out a broad range of
clandestine political…activities, as well as taking primary responsibility for the well-being of
family and community development often in the absence of men’ (de Fatima 2002).
The language of women’s rights and equality in this period was that of women’s
emancipation. During the resistance, Fretilin provided education in literacy and politics and
the emancipation of women was part of this socio-political program (CAVR 2005, section
5.2, para 39, 43). Upon independence, the Commission for Reception, Truth and
Reconciliation was established (CAVR) which documented the oppressive occupation period.
The final CAVR report describes women’s emancipation programs and provides insight into
the ways in which gendered roles were utilized in support of the resistance struggle:
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
Women were encouraged to get involved in education, health, agricultural production and the
production of items to be used by the military such as baskets…and bags. Men and women
took turns in looking after the children in crèches…In some areas, courses were run to prepare
women for marriage. For example, OPMT ran a course in the [central north] sector. The aim
was to create nationalist families with respect for men’s and women’s rights…Through these
courses future brides also learned to challenge colonial and feudal attitudes and
preconceptions about women, and to defend the dignity of both women and men (CAVR
2005, section 5.2, para 43-44).
Far from simply being on the receiving end of an egalitarian ideology, East Timorese women
defined their own needs and demanded their own rights, articulated both as part of the
resistance and as their experiences of occupation and colonialism. Despite the emergence of a
language of equality during this period, women were not equal within Fretilin with only three
women sitting on Fretilin’s Central Committee (Cristalis and Scott 2005, 27; da Silva 2012,
148). One member of OPMT recounts ‘there was a vision of equality…but the Fretilin
commanders did not really practice what they preached…the OPMT gave women the
opportunity to organize, both for resistance and to fight discrimination against women.’
(quoted in Cristalis and Scott 2005, 33). OPMT spoke out against polygamy and the
traditional marriage practice of barlake – most commonly translated as dowry or bride price1
– both of which were outlawed within Fretilin for being exploitative (Cristalis and Scott 2005,
29; Pinto and Jardine 1997, 47) and indeed OPMTs manifesto identifies the causes of
women’s oppression as both cultural and structural (da Silva 2012, 149). In particular is the
singling out of balrlake which is described in the manifesto as ‘no longer about the alliance of
families [but] instead had become a social philosophy and practice depriving women of their
dignity’ (da Silva 2012, 149). Barlake continues to be the source of much contention. During
the UNs interim administration a constitutional consultation was carried out in each of TimorLeste’s 13 districts to assess those issues that were considered most pertinent to the
population and which they wanted to be covered in the new constitution. Barlake featured in
much of this discussion, some districts wanting regulation of the marriage system to prevent
exploitation whilst others were more inclined towards abolishment (Constitutional
Commission 2001). Regardless, it highlights the ongoing discussion relating to internal
dimensions which may impact on women’s full enjoyment of equal rights.
During the 1990s, as demonstrations against Indonesian occupation began to occur more
publicly women also took this opportunity to establish civil society organizations that focused
mostly on the kinds of violence women were experiencing under Indonesian occupation
(Cristalis and Scott 2005, 48). Perhaps the most well-known of these is FOKUPERS (Forum
Komunikasi Untuk Perempuan Lorosae – East Timorese Women’s Communications Forum)
which was established in 1997. FOKUPERS was a grass roots women’s advocacy
organization and was ‘one of only a handful of pre-referendum non-church NGOs trying to
operate in a hostile environment’ (Conway 2010, xviii). OPMTs sister organization for youth
was established in 1998, the East Timor Young Women’s Group (Grupo Feto Foinsa’e Timor
Lorosa’e – GFFTL) and also continues its activities today. When the CNRT was established
in 1998, the Organization of Timorese Women (Organização da Mulher Timorense – OMT)
was also established which, as the women’s wing of CNRT, welcomed women from all
political parties and none (de Fatima 2002). OPMT had been part of the lobbying for the
inclusion of all political parties under one umbrella and thus the resultant CNRT. The
establishment of OMT meant the transformation and broadening of OPMTs organization and
activities, and the OMT has built on the original structure of OPMT. In 2002, OMT had
1
However, as Sara Niner (2012) points out this is an incorrect translation as barlake is a form of reciprocal
exchange. For a more in depth account of barlake and its centrality to indigenous marriage practices see Niner
(2012) and Hicks (2012).
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
approximately 70,000 women members organized into over 3000 secretariats in each hamlet
(de Fatima 2002).
Post-occupation, the numbers of women’s organizations began to grow. In 2000, Rede Feto,
an umbrella women’s secretariat which included 16 women’s organizations was established to
improve coordination between these organizations. During the same year, the First National
Women’s Congress was held which canvassed women’s concerns from each of the 13
districts in Timor-Leste and from which a Platform for Action was produced. Since then,
every four years, a National Women’s Congress is held which produces a Platform for Action
outlining key areas for advocacy over the coming four years.
Gender mainstreaming
Following the discussion of the East Timorese women’s movement, it is important to outline
what is meant by UN gender mainstreaming and their approach to ‘gender’ more broadly.
Gender mainstreaming was defined as a ‘global strategy’ in the Beijing Platform for Action in
1995 and as a strategy fundamental to peace and security operations in Security Council
Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security. For UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding it
gained further currency in the ‘Namibia Plan of Action on Mainstreaming a Gender
Perspective in Multidimensional Peace Support Operations’ (see S/RES/693, 2000). A
commonly agreed upon institutional definition of gender mainstreaming can be found in the
ECOSOC ‘Agreed Conclusions’ which states it is a
…process of assessing the implications for women and men of any planned action, including
legislation, policies or programmes, in all areas and at all levels. It is a strategy for making
women’s as well as men’s concerns and experiences an integral dimension of the design,
implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies and programmes in all political,
economic and societal spheres so that women and men benefit equally and inequality is not
perpetuated. The ultimate goal is to achieve gender equality (UN Office of the Special Adviser
on Gender Issues and Advancement of Women 2002, v).
The adoption of Resolution 1325 was a watershed moment as it was the first time that the
Security Council had devoted an entire session to debating women’s experiences in conflict
and post-conflict zones (Cohn, Kinsella and Gibbings 2004, 10). It formally links the
promotion of women’s rights with international peace and security and has become part of the
UN formal discourse on peace and security (see Tryggestad 2009). It is evident that the
fundamental principles of mainstreaming a gender perspective throughout UN peace
operations focus on women; in particular the intertwining goals of women’s empowerment
and women’s protection or security. This is instead of broader attention to ‘gender’ which
would suggest an assessment of differential impacts of policy and practice on both men and
women, how differential impacts could be related to socially prescribed roles for men and
women and how these may shape and be shaped by peace and security operations.
Since its emergence, gender mainstreaming has been criticized for a variety of reasons.
Gender mainstreaming embodies a characteristically liberal approach of simply adding
women to more visible organizational spheres, whilst some argue failing to adequately deal
with the often structural nature of women’s inequality. Essentially it aims to add ‘the gender
element’ to existing conflict resolution and peacebuilding practices without thinking critically
about the structures that have perpetuated the invisibility of women or gender to begin with
(Väyrynen 2004, 138). Some of the key criticisms put forward by feminist international
relations and security studies scholars are that gender mainstreaming constructs women as a
singular homogenous collective with similar experiences, needs and interests; that women,
peace and security discourse constructs women predominantly as victims rather than agents or
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
actors; and that whilst gender mainstreaming and Resolution 1325 represent important
rhetorical commitments the implementation of such has been ad hoc with limited successes
(for example see Hudson 2013; Puechguirbal 2010; Whitworth 2004, 120).
UN and gender in Timor-Leste
These concerns highlight both practical and conceptual challenges underlying the women,
peace and security agenda. Gender as a policy and practice is well-entrenched in Timor-Leste,
in both the now closed UN peacebuilding missions and the broader community of national
and international NGOs. With the end of Indonesian occupation in 1999, the UN established
an interim administration (UN Transitional Administration in East Timor – UNTAET) which
held legislative and executive authority over the territory until 2002, when Timor-Leste
gained independence. UNTAET, even though established before Security Council adoption of
Resolution 1325, was the first UN peacebuilding mission to include a Gender Affairs Unit
(GAU). The GAU of UNTAET had a good working relationship with East Timorese women’s
organizations, and, according to a UN gender adviser, took as its mandate the Platform for
Action produced at the First National Women’s Congress in 2000 (27 February 2014). Given
UNTAETs broad mandate as executive authority, the GAU struggled to ensure that the
women’s movement in Timor-Leste was included in the development of the new state and to
ensure mechanisms were put in place to make sure this involvement was sustained after
independence. Moreover, the GAUs role in Timor-Leste was also to provide legitimacy to the
continuance of such programs in future peacebuilding missions (Interview 27 February 2014).
During UNTAET the GAUs role was equally focused on lobbying both UNTAET and the UN
in New York for adequate support in achieving the directives outlined in the Platform for
Action. The GAUs existence was therefore not unproblematic but it did manage to spearhead
some key campaigns in support of the national women’s movement and carve out a small
space for their voices to be heard by both UNTAET and East Timorese political elite. At its
close, the structure of the governance pillar of UNTAET was devolved into the first
independent government of Timor-Leste, following Presidential elections and the prior
election of a Constituent Assembly (which was transformed into the first independent
government). The GAU was transformed into the national women’s machinery, the Office for
the Promotion of Equality (OPE), which has since become the Secretary of State for the
Promotion of Equality (SEPI).
Subsequent missions seem to have been less successful in regards to gender mainstreaming.
The follow on mission at independence, the UN Mission of Support in East Timor
(UNMISET, 2002-2004), severely slimmed down the gender unit to one adviser, whilst
maintaining a military and police security focus. During UNMISET there was a six month
period where no gender adviser was present and upon the role being fulfilled again it was
found by a Department of Peacekeeping Operations review that awareness needed to be raised
amongst mission civilian and military staff. A commission was established to investigate
reports of sexual misconduct as was a module on UN policy regarding sexual exploitation and
abuse (Koyama and Myrttinen 2007; Ospina 2006). At the outbreak of violence in 2006, the
UN presence was increased again after being scaled down to a small political mission. The
UN Integrated Mission in Timor-Leste (UNMIT, 2006-2012) included a gender affairs unit
and its key gender mainstreaming policies were aligned with the overall mission mandate;
being a police mission, this meant increasing women’s representation in security sectors and
improve the police and judiciary responses to cases of sexual and gender based violence.
At a national level, the organized East Timorese women’s movement is actually very good at
adopting internationally recognizable language of gender equality. Indeed East Timorese
women stayed connected to transnational women’s activism during occupation years,
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
especially highlighting the injustices they suffered under occupation and calling for support in
both their emancipation and Timor-Leste’s independence. East Timorese women were present
at both the Nairobi NGO Forum held prior to the official UN conference and at the Beijing
Conference (Hill 2012, 218). With the commencement of UN peacebuilding operations, the
East Timorese women’s movement was to find itself the focus UN gender policies. Although
the elite women’s movement or women who had studied abroad and were part of the diaspora
were familiar with the term ‘gender’, others involved in broad based resistance era
organizations such as OPMT were less so as women’s activism was more commonly framed
in terms of ‘women’s emancipation’. As one activist and researcher stated, the
commencement of gender work post-occupation led many people to ask ‘what happened to
emancipation?’ (29 July 2013). Throughout my research in discussions of gender
mainstreaming, challenges to this work were often characterized as associated with the
‘newness’ of gender theory and language. ‘Gender’ was viewed as categorically different to
the work undertaken by OPMT and OMT during the resistance, despite the fact they enjoyed,
and continue to enjoy, broad based support and well-functioning organizational structures that
filtered down to village levels. Essentially, gender mainstreaming was not well connected to
the historical foundations of the East Timorese women’s movement.
One obvious difference is the change in context between occupation, resistance and
independence. Timor-Leste had been through centuries of colonialism and decades of
repressive occupation, both of which marginalized the role that East Timorese could play in
the economic and political life of their country. The end of the occupation period meant that
the ability to advocate and agitate completely changed. According to the head of one national
NGO, the most significant change was shifting to an environment where people could talk
about human rights and women’s rights, whereas previously she stated that ‘no one cared
about it, we could not do anything about it because we were under occupation’ (31 July
2013). This means that rather than ideas on gender and women’s empowerment being absent,
it was rather that advocacy around these issues, and human rights more broadly, was severely
proscribed under occupation. Despite this however OPMT in particular enjoyed wide support,
and as mentioned previously, a small number of women’s advocacy organizations besides
OPMT managed to operate in this hostile environment.
Those who worked in gender in Timor-Leste, both in national and international NGOs and in
the UN missions stated that some gender equality work was countered by claims that it
represented an attempt to undermine or subvert East Timorese culture; ‘gender’ was seen as a
process brought on by donors. For example, someone who had worked for UNFPA for many
years delivering programs on sexual and gender based violence in Timor-Leste, stated that
using gender theory was ‘not effective’ and that ‘the theory and associated language tended to
alienate participants’ (4 September 2012). In the context of highly centralized peacebuilding
missions – especially the transitional administration – which were criticized for alienating
much of the East Timorese population, gender has been politicized and attached to the
international community. National women’s organizations devoted much energy to processes
of translation and negotiation around the principles of international gender theory and much
of this was on explaining it was not an imported or foreign concept and that it was in fact
consistent with women’s prior activism, the principles of the resistance movement and
consistent with East Timorese culture. These negotiations are essentially about trying to find a
synergy between the existing women’s movement and gender mainstreaming language. For
example, the head of one national women’s organization with a long history of advocating for
women’s rights in Timor-Leste said about the organizations work that ‘this is not gender from
outside, we already struggled for that…we cannot use the gender terminology but we use
another way’ (10 September 2013).
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Consistent with above mentioned criticisms of gender mainstreaming is that, like elsewhere,
Timor-Leste is not a homogenized space of equally placed women and men. A distinct
difference is that between the urban centre, Dili, and Timor-Leste’s rural areas and socioeconomic division’s existent in both urban and rural settings. Much of the formal gender
mainstreaming benefits have remained centralized in Dili, which is also true of other peace
dividends such as access to jobs, education, health care and so on, although generally
development indicators in Timor-Leste remain poor. In 2011, the UN Special Rapporteur on
extreme poverty stated that poverty – defined broadly to incorporate social, cultural and
political exclusion – was ‘pervasive and widespread’ and that the majority of the population
living in rural areas were trapped in intergenerational cycles of poverty (UN News Centre
2011). Given their presence for 12 years, subsequent UN peacebuilding missions have also
been part of this political and social landscape. In terms of gender mainstreaming, centralized
peacebuilding has meant that large numbers of the population are abstracted from the
benefits.2 Despite commendable formal gender equality gains, substantive equality remains
elusive. As one local NGO worker explained to me:
A lot of people complain that all of the focus on gender empowerment is in Dili, and for the
elite, and for the Lucia Lobato3 and…of course they can be in the parliament, but it doesn’t
mean that me and my [village], that I have any voice (31 July 2012).
In this regard, women’s organizations found that this rural-urban difference, partly fomented
by the presence of highly centralized peacebuilding missions (in conjunction with UN
agencies), presented challenges to their work. This is best summarized as mistrust. A
prominent figure in the national women’s movement explained this relationship between
working at the national level and the presence of the UN missions to me as follows:
All the UN bodies were concentrated at [the] national level. So the activities of women were
also concentrated at the national level, all the information that we got, the leadership or
training that we got. So in the rural areas they cannot reach this information, no radio, no
communications. So this is a gap. And they say ‘you are from the national [level], gender is
from the outside’. You know this is a big gap among the urban and the rural information. And
then because everything is concentrated at the [national level]…they thought that we are
influenced by the [foreigners] to deliver this information…Not just suspicious of [foreigners],
but us too, me too. Because we’re from the urban areas, they say ‘you are influenced by
[foreigners] to deliver these things to us’ (10 September 2013).
This is consistent with Levitt and Merry’s (2009, 449) theory that processes vernacularization
leads to suspicion of those who are engaged in translating, in this case women’s NGOs, as
they act as a medium between international actors and domestic populations. Civil society
plays an important role in peacebuilding and in Timor-Leste women’s organizations were the
vehicle to deliver gender mainstreaming programmes in partnership with the UN mission, UN
agencies and international NGOs to rural areas. A well-functioning civil society, fundamental
to what is termed ‘liberal peacebuilding’ in the literature, acts as a ‘crucial validation of
liberal peacebuilding strategies and objectives’ as it is expected that civil society actors will
support and legitimize peacebuilding activities on the ground (Richmond 2009a, 150). While
having UN support has been hugely beneficial for some organizations, it has presented its
own challenges. For example, the UNs primary operating language in Timor-Leste has been
English which has meant that those who could access UN jobs were also required to speak
English and this was true for those jobs in gender mainstreaming. Experience in gender or in
2
UNTAET did however establish gender advisers for their district counterparts and this system seems to have
worked quite successfully. Despite the transformation of the GAU into OPE and subsequently SEPI, TimorLeste’s government has not sustained an adequate district gender representation.
3
Former Justice Minister for Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste currently in jail for corruption.
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
advocating for women’s rights was obviously held in high regard, but those women who were
considered educated and who also spoke English were privileged in the job market created by
the UN missions:
Some women actually had very good experience in gender issues and gender mainstreaming,
but because they did not know English everything is just closed to them. And there were some
people who know English but have less experience in gender, so the job will go to them
(Director national NGO, 31 July 2013).
This is in contrast to a largely unified resistance which relied on a base of literate and
illiterate, educated and uneducated individuals.
In addition resistance era organizations like OPMT have been less well recognized then other
women’s organizations, considered to be non- or apolitical, which have emerged pre- and
post-independence, such as FOKUPERS and Rede Feto. OPMT, in particular through its
association with Fretilin, which was sidelined in favour of UN association with key political
figures, did not fit the UN model of what an NGO should look like. According to one activist,
NGO formation was a key way to be able to engage with UN peacebuilding efforts, which
had sidelined most but an elite core, but in order to engage NGOs had to be apolitical (29 July
2013). Those who were illiterate, could not speak English, and had limited resources were
also further marginalized in this regard.
Conclusion
My discussion here has analysed how gender mainstreaming in liberal peacebuilding can
support or limit nascent or existing women’s movements and women’s organizations.
Feminist security and international relations scholars have questioned whether ‘liberal
internationalism’ (Whitworth 2004) or liberal peacebuilding, with a tendency towards
uniform approaches, can provide adequately for women’s empowerment and security in
diverse settings. Gender mainstreaming is certainly a necessary attachment to liberal
peacebuilding, despite its limitations, and incremental gains have been made in regards to
women having access to peace processes, funding associated with peacebuilding missions,
and women’s particular security concerns gaining traction in the international sphere. In
Timor-Leste there are some positive examples of changing attitudes, as the head of one
national women’s organization explained:
Since 1999 until now, [people say] ‘ah, gender, gender’. I admire the people in the rural areas,
the isolated areas. In the discussion or the workshops, when a man raises their hand and they
talk and later another man raises it up again, they say ‘gender please, [it’s a woman’s turn]
now’. So you see it’s a long process of raising awareness… (10 September 2013).
The case of Timor-Leste highlights however that while some formal equality gains are
possible, the presence of gender mainstreaming programs cannot always mitigate the other
consequences on gender conceptions and gender relations brought about by the presence of
UN peacebuilding missions. The predominant mode of operating both within and outside
gender programs shapes the way women’s organizations can advocate if they want to do so in
partnership with peacebuilding missions and UN agencies. The bureaucracy of the UN
missions such as language requirements and particularities relating to UN-NGO working
relationships, whether intentionally or not, has meant that women’s organizations must take a
particular form in order to establish this working relationship, essentially undermining the
broad-based resistance support. Although other factors are present such as domestic norms
and attitudes, this case study demonstrates how UN peacebuilding missions do shape in
intricate ways the environments into which they intervene.
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Sarah Smith. ‘When Gender Started’: UN Gender Mainstreaming in Timor-Leste.
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