Peace and Gender

Peace and Gender is a podcast where we meet the people who dedicate their lives to help others, through action and research, in the field of gender, peace and security. Dr Sara Niner is an expert in the field of gender and development and has spent her life working on issues in the post-conflict environment of Timor-Leste, and has provided specialist in-country advice on gender issues, for international agencies. Dr Sara Niner will tell us about how she became interested in Timor-Leste as she travelled through the country as a backpacker, she tells us about the tragic massacre that took place without her even knowing, and about her work, trying to help the women who were rendered invisible during the conflict. Edited and Produced by Andrea Thiis-Evensen Pictures: Sara NinerGraphic Design: Shayla Rance See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The podcast Peace and Gender is back for another semester. In this week's episode we are joined by Historian of gender, sexuality and empire, Jessica Hinchy, who will be talking about her book Governing Gender and Sexuality in Colonial India: The Hijra, C. 1850-1900. Jessica takes us on a journey in discovering the stories behind these eunuch and transgender people who played a significant role in their communities and we look at how they went from surviving complete eradication to speaking into the global transgender debates today. Produced and researched by: Andrea Thiis-Evensen and David Bonaddio Edited by: David Bonaddio See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Peace and Gender podcast is back, kicking off the new season with Miki Jacevic. Miki is a veteran peacebuilder and activist for women's inclusion in peace and security, who has worked with governments all around the world. In this weeks episode, Miki tells us about why women should be included in the peace process in post-war countries and conflict areas, through some first-hand experiences he has had with women changing the course of their countries. Produced by: Andrea Thiis-Evensen Edited by: David Bonaddio Research by: Hien Trang Lee See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode of Peace and Gender, Andrea Thiis-Evensen meets up with PhD student Sarah Hewitt, who is working on a project looking at what actually happens to women, after peace provisions are put in place, in post-conflict areas. How do women experience the gender provisions, and do they actually work? TRANSCRIPT [Opening theme] Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Hey. My name is Andrea Thiis-Evensen and welcome back to Peace and Gender. In this podcast, I'm trying to look at different gendered inequalities, meeting the people who are actually seeking solutions and making change, and getting to know both their research and their personal story. Sarah Hewitt: We've got women's participation in peace processes. We've got these gender provisions being really important to be included in peace agreements. What happens afterwards? What actually happens to women's participation? How are these provisions being implemented? Andrea Thiis-Evensen: That is Sarah Hewitt. Sarah is a PhD student at Monash University. She focuses on how women's participation in peace processes influences the incorporation of gender provisions in peace agreements. Sarah Hewitt: You know, if women in the peace process did participate, what happens to their participation after an agreement has been signed? What happens to the networking or the civil society organisations that are included or that are mobilised, informally, around these peace processes? Andrea Thiis-Evensen: What does really happen after gender provisions are implemented? Sarah Hewitt: It's important to say, okay, there's been all this attention on why women need to be present and why women need to participate in these forums that are creating these documents. It's also important to say, okay, these documents have been created but what happens to them? How are women interacting with them? How are they deploying these rights? How are they using them? How are they utilising to advance women's rights, to advance their own participation, to advance their own bodily autonomy? Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Sarah is part of a long-term project, which is mapping gender provisions of peace agreements. Sarah is in charge of two countries: Kenya and Nepal. There is a reason why she made this choice. Sarah Hewitt: The reasons I look at these two countries was because they had a peace process after 2000. They both had peace processes that resulted in really gender-sensitive constitutions. They had these agreements and then they had this constitutional process. Gender provisions, within these constitutions, it brought about increases in women's parliamentary representation, for instance. It kind of made it constitutional that women have equal access to inheritance and equal access to property, which is so important for their economic autonomy, right? For them to be able to decide over their livelihoods. For Nepal, it's the first country in Asia and the Pacific to have a constitutional gender provision protecting sexual minorities. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Before learning more about her project, I wanted to know more about why Sarah started getting involved with international relations and why she's so interested in peace and women's experiences of peace. Sarah Hewitt: I was born in South Africa and my mum was a journalist in South Africa during the Apartheid era. When she had my older brother, she had to quit her job, because my dad was training to be a surgeon. She had to be - go into that caring role of motherhood. She never got back into journalism, because we moved around a lot for my father's job and we ended up in Tasmania. I think, because of my mum, right? She had been there during that time, where she saw racial and sexual marginalisation at a huge and horrific scale. She would talk about it and they'd have great dinner parties where they'd discuss politics and things like race and gender. From an early age, I was exposed to those kind of social justice ideas, which led me to leave Tasmania and go to...

In this episode, Andrea Thiis-Evensen talks with Betty Barkha, a PhD student at Monash who grew up in Fiji, with cyclones raging outside her window, watching whole villages disappear under the water. Betty has now worked with development for eight years, focusing on the effect climate change has on women. EPISODE TRANSCRIPT Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Hey. My name is Andrea Thiis-Evensen and welcome back to Peace and Gender. In this podcast, I'm trying to highlight the issues around gendered inequalities, by meeting the people who are actually seeking solutions, getting to know both the research and their personal story. Betty Barkha: I think, just the constant fear every single time we have a cyclone warning and the fear of not knowing how devastating it will be is scary. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: That is Betty Barkha. Betty is a PhD student at Monash. She grew up in Fiji. She has a pretty clear area of interest, an issue that she has decided to dedicate her life to try and improve. Betty Barkha: Essentially - and not just because I'm from the Pacific - it's climate change. It's because it's not a reality just for the Pacific Islanders or people facing typhoons or hurricanes. It's a reality for all of us. Things are changing. The environment is changing and we need to get onto it. We need all hands on deck, taking action. That's exactly why I'm studying climate change and its risks and how we can fast-track this process and make sure that we do no harm in the process and that voices are heard. Nothing gets left behind. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: What started Betty's burning interest in climate change? Betty Barkha: During my first year in university, there was a bunch of young leaders across the Pacific who had come into Fiji for a Pacific climate leadership workshop organised by 350.org. Towards the conclusion of that, there was this incredible man, Ben, from the Marshall Islands. He stood up in front of us with tears in his eyes and said, when I stand in the middle of the largest island, and I throw a stone this side, it reaches the ocean. When I throw a stone that side, it reaches the ocean. He stood there in a room full of about 80 people and begged for us to send him sand to save his island home and we couldn't. We just couldn't send him sand to save his island home. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: That was the start of Betty's journey to advocate for climate change. This was a decade ago, when she was first-year undergrad in Fiji. What she experienced that day had a ripple effect. Betty Barkha: It definitely led to a movement in the Pacific for young leaders. There's been a few pockets of movements. There's Pacific Island Represent, there's Pacific Climate Warriors, there's National Climate Warriors that do a lot of climate action within their countries. Essentially, what it led to was the rise of a youth climate movement in the Pacific. That climate movement has been brilliant. It's been on the frontlines of advocating for divestment in Australia - in Australian banks. It's also been taking into UN spaces and taken space and spoken on what's definitely impacting them, why they're on the frontline, why things need to change. It led to the rise of a movement in the Pacific that definitely connects to the larger movement, Globally. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Betty has worked with development for over eight years for various organisations in the Asia Pacific. She is the youngest member on the board of directors of the Association of Women in Development. She's also an advisor with FRIDA Young Feminist Fund and a member of the Women Deliver Young Leaders Program. Betty advocates strongly for climate change and, being from Fiji, climate change is something that Betty has grown up with. Betty Barkha: It's scary, every single time you hear tin rattling, because our roofs are made of tin. That's scary. I think our fear would always be if it would be our tin or our home. I think it's just scary, being able to visualise that sort of thing. Andrea...

Andrea Thiis-Evensen talks to Dr Eleanor Gordon, who has worked with peace and security for 10 years, making a huge difference to the lives of hundreds of women. Her work has included building state security and justice institutions, working with demobilised guerrilla groups, addressing war crimes and human rights violations, promoting gender equality and inclusive approaches to peacebuilding, and addressing issues related to organised crime and terrorism. EPISODE TRANSCRIPT [Introduction audio] Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Hey, my name is Andrea Thiis-Evensen. Welcome back to Peace and Gender. In this podcast I'm trying to highlight the issues around gendered inequalities by meeting the people who are actually seeking solutions. I'm trying to get to know not only their research, but also their personal story. In this episode I'm going to be talking to Eleanor Gordon, who worked for the UN with Peace and Security for 10 years. Eleanor Gordon: A large group of women wanted to return to Srebrenica. They didn't have any homes. The homes had been completely destroyed. Their husbands and their children had been killed. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Eleanor is, in many ways, a living proof that you can make a difference if you just put your mind to it. Eleanor has worked with building state security and justice institutions. She's worked with demobilising guerrilla groups, addressing war crimes and human right violations, promoting gender equality and inclusive approaches to peacebuilding and she's addressed issues relating to organised crime and terrorism. This is Eleanor's story. Eleanor Gordon: Whilst I was writing up my PhD I decided to do some voluntary work for a peacekeeping training centre because I felt that I had exposure to lots of aspects of what I was interested in and where I wanted to work. All bar the military and I felt that that was a gap in my knowledge and understanding so I decided to do some voluntary work. I was an intern at the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre in Canada for eight months and I completed my doctorate while I was there and it happened also to coincide with an opportunity with UNHCR. There was a UN volunteer's position within UNHCR in Bosnia that I found out about and I was recommended for it. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Eleanor was working for the UNHCR, which is the UN refugee agency. She was head of a small satellite office in eastern Republic Srpska, part of Bosnia and Herzegovina. One of her responsibilities was to facilitate the return of displaced people. Eleanor Gordon: So basically Bosniaks returning to their pre-war homes who had been forcibly displaced. I was responsible for facilitating the first return, minority return to Srebrenica. Yeah that experience probably has - yeah, has framed the way I've seen my subsequent engagement. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: When Eleanor was working in Bosnia she wasn't just sitting around in an office. Eleanor Gordon: If you're right down at the municipal level you're generally working in the field and that's the most - for me, that's the most enjoyable work, when you're in direct contact with the people that you're ostensibly there to help. So yeah we would have an office but every day we would be out. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: I wanted to know if there was a particular moment in Eleanor's career that still stays with her today. Eleanor was working for the UN in Srebrenica. In 1995 Serbian forces separated the Bosnian civilians at Srebrenica, putting women and girls on buses sending them to Bosnian-held territory. The men and boys who were left behind were murdered and it has been estimated that over 7000 Bosniaks were killed. Eleanor Gordon: I was reflecting on this and I just couldn't get away from this particular event, so I found it really difficult to - because it, yeah it's quite a long time ago and my memory is failing. So when I was head of the UNHCR satellite office covering Srebrenica, I was responsible for facilitating the first minority return to Srebrenica...

Andrea Thiis-Evensen meets Dr Maria Tanyag, who specialises in the neglect of women’s sexual health in crisis areas, and examines the major consequences this neglect can have on society. EPISODE TRANSCRIPT Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Hey, my name is Andrea Thiis-Evensen and welcome back to Peace and Gender. In this podcast I am trying to highlight the issues surrounding gendered inequalities. I’m doing this by meeting the people who are actually seeking solutions, trying to get to know both their research and their personal story. These topics may not meet the mainstream media agenda, but they are issues that really deserve attention. Maria Tanyag: You have women who could have lived had they had access to health. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Today I’m going to talk to Dr Maria Tanyag about the issues around women’s sexual health. Maria is a feminist researcher and she has a PhD in politics and international relations. But first, why did Maria start looking into this issue? Maria Tanyag: Growing up in the Philippines I was specifically motivated to do further research because of the - what I was then observing as gender-specific barriers to women’s health. We have among the strictest laws around abortion, access to contraception. For me, growing up - especially as I was also developing as a person and as a woman, I was seeing these and noticing these inequalities more because it’s very personal and as most feminists would say, the personal is political. When I was starting to observe all these inequalities that women distinctly faced, I was prompted to understand, what are the reasons why these barriers are there in place? Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Despite how far she thought we’d come when it came to gender inequality, Maria started seeing all these inequalities when it came to women and equality. Maria Tanyag: While there is a global push to promote gender equality, and we’ve made significant progress already, we are still yet to understand why many women, and girls, die from pregnancy related complications. Why, despite a broad support and understanding that gender equality matters, we are still seeing the prevalence of, for most parts, preventable maternal deaths in many societies. That to me is a fundamental inequality and it’s a paradox, that we can see a lot of women in many societies, sometimes within the same society, progressing. Yet you have women who could have lived had they access to health care, reliable health information around their own bodies. That is, for me, a global problem that needs urgent attention. Because if we have - if we do not bridge that health gap we are seeing a lot of progress being built on the invisible deaths and sacrifices of women, especially those in crisis settings, who are enduring a lot of this specific violence because of all these broader politics and inequalities that prevent them from accessing health. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: This is what Maria started researching. Maria Tanyag: There’s a lot of talk about inclusive post-disaster recovery, inclusive peace building, and all of these things are important and they matter, but for me the question is why, in all of these things, the hierarchy always put women’s health at the bottom? There seems to be a deliberate neglect, or forgetting that women for women to be able to fully participate in political and economic decision making, they must also, in the first place, be able to have control and decision making over their own bodies. So my research has really shown that women and girls, through dominant peace and security development agendas are being made responsible as well in post-disaster and post-conflict recovery and rehabilitation. But it is being built on their invisible sacrifices because we are not recognising the contributions that they are making. One evidence of that lack of recognition is the lack of support towards sexual and reproductive health, which is so fundamental. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Even in Australia, if you...

In this episode of Peace and Gender, Andrea Thiis-Evensen meets up with Dr. Lesley Pruitt and Dr. Helen Berents to discuss why it is important to look at youth when talking about conflict, and how important it is to see past young people's gender when discussing migrants. TRANSCRIPT Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Hey, my name is Andrea Thiis-Evensen. Welcome back to Peace and Gender; a podcast for the people who are interested in learning a bit more about gender, peace and conflict. A topic that’s come up a lot in this podcast is how they’re so many stereotypes regarding men and women, such as in militaries or in diplomacy. Today we will be looking at the gender stereotypes around young migrants. Why are young migrant men seen as inherently dangerous, while young women are seen as victims? Why are so many young men fleeing their countries? Lesley Pruitt and Helen Berents have studied this and in today’s episode, they will discuss the importance of looking at young people when talking about conflict. Also how important it is to try and change the dialog - this gender stereotype dialogue around young migrants. Lesley is a senior lecturer at Monash University and Helen is a lecturer in the school of justice at Queensland University of Technology, but why did Lesley and Helen start studying youth conflict and peace building? Here is Helen. Helen Berents: In some ways, to answer the question, I have to note that I lived overseas when I was a kid, with my family. We lived in Latin America; obviously in a very privileged position as ex-pats and I went to an international school. I think it was the first time that I kind of encountered very visibly these questions of inequality and confront ideas of poverty. I was quite young and thinking about all that meant. Being young and encountering people who were my age and in such different situations. How young people coped in those environments - I think kind of sat in the back of my head. As I got to do my honours and post-grad work, that was where my interests took me; because I couldn’t help but ask, why we weren’t talking about young people when we were talking about questions of inequality and questions of peace building and responding to violence. They’re always there when you look, and yet we don’t talk about them. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Here is Lesley. Lesley Pruitt: I was a first generation high school graduate; neither of my parents finished school. Now being a PhD graduate is like a thing that I couldn’t have envisioned probably as a little child; I didn’t know anybody that had a PhD, maybe my school teachers I knew that had college degrees. What I did know and what I learned through that time with many amazing young people around me was that young people are interested; they’re engaged; they’re knowledgeable; and not just the young people who come from a background that expects them to excel academically or to engage in politics. All young people have various capacities for that and deserve to be listened to. That’s always been a passion of mine, is supporting young people in the next generation and thinking about how we can think together and how we can have intergenerational leadership to make the change that we need to affect society that’s more inclusive for everyone. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Why is it important to look at young people when it comes to conflict and peace? Lesley Pruitt: Oh, we could be here all day Andrea. [Laughter] Lesley Pruitt: We are the people to ask about this; we are a very passionate about convincing people; especially in our fields and international relations, which often completely overlooks young people. Often pays no attention to them whatsoever or when it does, talks about them only under these tropes; these stereotypes; [unclear]; young people as perpetrators; and young people as victims. That - this idea that young people fall into one or the other of those and that’s where they stay. We and other scholars that are working on young people in...

Andrea Thiis-Evensen meets Dr Claire Duncanson, a senior lecturer in International Relations at the University of Edinburgh, who talks about her studies of military masculinities, and the importance of looking at the political economy of building peace. TRANSCRIPT Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Hey, my name is Andrea Thiis-Evensen, and welcome to Peace and Gender, a podcast about the people behind the research on gender, peace, and security. Who are they and why do they research these issues? Claire Duncanson: You know, there is a real temptation to talk about women as being an alternative to men. The kind of idea, oh, well if women were in charge then we wouldn't have so many wars. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: In this episode, you will meet Claire Duncanson. Claire Duncanson: I'm visiting here from the University of Edinburgh. I am a Senior Lecturer in International Relations at the University of Edinburgh. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Today, Claire will be talking about her studies on masculinities in British militaries and her focus on women and the political economy of building peace. In this episode, I am trying to figure out if there is a link between peace and gender. [Music playing] Claire started with a degree in Politics, Philosophy, and History. Then she did a Master in Peace Studies. After this, she started thinking about her PhD. Claire Duncanson: I knew I wanted to combine my interests in gender and feminism with international development, human rights and international politics. I suppose initially I was thinking I would do something about the impact of international interventions, war, humanitarian intervention on women. But at the same time, I was aware that the world didn't necessarily need another white middle-class feminist going into war zones to try and tell that story. There were lots. So, at the time - this was early-2000s - there were lots of the so-called new wars from the 1990s, lots of researching coming out of them about the gendered aspects but written by feminists from those parts of the world, which made more sense to me. So, I thought rather than do that, I would try and focus on the masculinities of those who were doing the intervention. You know, the masculinities of the interveners. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Claire decided to study changing masculinities in the British military. Claire Duncanson: So, I was particularly interested in the question of whether militarised masculinities change when militaries and their operational environment changes. So, as militaries turn to focus, as many have, onto peace operations, peace support, humanitarian intervention, then what kind of impact does that have on militarised masculinities? Because for a long time the archetypal military masculinity has been associated with combat and force, the idea that war makes men and men make war. That has been thought to be one of the factors that have enabled recruitment of men to the military. You know, it's a chance to prove your toughness and your manhood. So, I was really - yeah, in my work on the British military, in particular, it was really interesting, I think, that when you - so I did some interviews, some focus groups, but also spent a lot of time reading the autobiographies of British soldiers and military doctrine and training material. It seemed to me that when militaries are focused more on peace support in some ways soldiers find that very frustrating and emasculating. It's like this isn't why we joined up. We wanted to be the tough guys and yet we're tasked with doing this peace support stuff. Quite a lot of explicit reflection on how this was emasculating. At the same time, that wasn't the only discourse you can see. You could also see a discourse where soldiers and the British military, in general, were constructing peacekeeping or peacebuilding as manly activity in the sense that anyone could be the tough guy but actually, it takes a real superior masculinity to be good at this peace support stuff. You need...

In this episode, Andrea Thiis-Evensen meets April Robinson and Tatjana Bosevska, who talk about their research project looking at prejudice-motivated crimes towards Muslim women in Australia today. TRANSCRIPT Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Hey my name is Andrea Thiis-Evensen and welcome to Peace and Gender, the podcast about the people behind the research on gender, peace, and security. In each episode, I will meet up with new people coming from all around the world, who specialise in gender, peace and security. In this podcast, I'm trying to not only get a better understanding of the studies, but also the people behind the papers and research and projects. Who are they? Why do they research these issues? April Robinson: My name is April Robinson. Tatjana Bosevska: My name is Tatjana Bosevska. Talking is not my strong point. [Laughter] Andrea Thiis-Evensen: That's okay. Tatjana Bosevska: I've been put on the spot. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: April Robinson and Tatjana Bosevska met while studying international community development. April is an interfaith research and network developer at the Uniting Church and Tatjana recently completed her Masters in Gender and Development. In this episode, they will be talking about their research project that looks at prejudice-motivated crimes towards Muslim women in Australia today. First, I wanted to know, when did April and Tatjana start studying these issues? Here is April's story. April Robinson: I started studying when I was mature-aged student. I'd had my second child and I'd had an epiphany that I actually had a brain and wanted to use it. It was an incredible moment. I never thought I was academically inclined until I'd had my second child. I really wanted to do something more. I didn't know what I wanted to do. I'd started off in Politics and Psychology, because I really was interested in those two areas. I did a winter subject in Indigenous Studies and some of my classmates were doing something called Community Development. I'd never heard of it before. I was a complete novice, so I switched to it and I have never looked back. It's been an incredible degree and I've met the most amazing people. My peers taught me just as much as my teachers did. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: What about Tatjana? Tatjana Bosevska: I initially started studying International Community Development. It wasn't until I was given the opportunity to do my first internship in a woman's rights organisation in Thailand that I realised that what I wanted to do was gender and development, more specifically. Being around grassroots women's organisations and various social movements, I knew that once I came back and once I finished my International Community Development degree that I just wanted to specialise in gender. I just progressed and did my Master's in gender, specifically. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: When April did her honours degree on the Australian identity, she realised something that led her to the project she's working on today. April Robinson: I've never really felt like I've fitted in and I'm saying that as a white Australian, who is a few generations Australian. I've never had overt - I've never had any racism. I've never been in any racist situations myself, but I've seen it a lot. I thought that if I didn't feel like I fit in, into a very white Australia, how does it feel for other people who have overt racist situations occurring to them every single day? I wanted to explore that area and what it means to have a national identity and a sense of belonging within your country. Andrea Thiis-Evensen: Their project, Resilient Women Against Prejudice-Motivated Crimes, focus on Muslim women in Australia today. April Robinson: The reason we focus on Muslim women is because Muslim women can be - if they're wearing a hijab, or a scarf, or a veil - they can be explicit in their religiosity. There's a lot of fear around Islam at the moment. There wasn't a lot of empirical evidence around the violence that happened...

Peace and Gender is a new podcast about the people behind the research on gender, peace, and security. In this episode, AndreaThiis-Evensen meets up with Professor Karin Aggestam, a Swedish researcher who specialises in the underrepresentation of women and LGBT people in diplomacy. This is the first in a series – a collaboration betwen Mojo News (Monash Journalism) and Monash Gender, Peace and Security, a group of policy and community engaged scholars whose research is focused in this area. The aim is to use the research to inform people, educators and policy-makers on the gendered politics of armed conflict and the search for peace. TRANSCRIPT Andrea: Hey, my name is Andrea Thiis-Evensen. Welcome to Peace and Gender, the podcast about the people behind the research on gender, peace and security. In this podcast series I'm going to meet up with new professors and academics coming from all around the world who specialise in gender, peace and security. In this podcast I'm trying to not only get a better understanding of the studies, but also the people behind the papers and research. Who are they? Why do they research these issues? Most importantly, what are the issues regarding gender, peace and security that we actually need to talk about today? In this episode, you will meet Professor Karin Aggestam. Karin is a professor in political science at Lund University in Sweden. In this episode, Karin's going to talk about the underrepresentation of women in diplomacy and why this is a problem. Karin also talks about a topic that I myself had never considered which is how difficult it can be for LGBT people in diplomacy, but more on that later. To begin with, when did Karin start studying gender, peace and conflict? Karin: My area of interest in - generally like peace and conflict - has been all my career, including also as an under graduate and a post graduate. Peace and conflict has been an area which I find extremely interesting because it's also inter-disciplinary, and it provides lots of opportunity to lots of interesting stuff in academia. I've never left that area. Then I've worked also for a very long time on the Middle East, and particularly on the Israeli Palestinian conflict. When it comes to gender it's something that I already - as a PhD candidate, together with some other of my colleagues, we got together in the 1990s - in the end of the 1990s - and had a big conference on feminist perspective in international relations, which at the time was considered very new area. We had a great conference and a great launch at Lund University. That also goes a long way back in time. Andrea: Like many other professors and people, Karin has a life project within her academic world. A specific academic curiosity as she calls it, or an issue that she wants to explore. Karin: My sort of curiosity, academic curiosity, has always been driven by a search for how we can sort of enhance a peaceful world order. That's actually one reason why I did get - I was promoted to the Pufendorf Chair Professor because I have been working consistently in all my work, even though it has been very diverse, and diverse empirical domains. Also theoretically it has always had us and our overarching quest of how we can advance a more peaceful world order. Andrea: One of Karin's most recent books is Gendering Diplomacy and International Negotiation. Karin: There is so few studies in the field of diplomacy. I put together, a couple of years ago, two panels at one of the big international conferences for international studies on diplomacy, together with Ann Towns who's a professor at Gothenburg University. We had these two panels and very exciting discussions and interesting papers. From there we decided that we wanted to pull together these papers into book because - to make one step further to create a more robust theoretical field and also for empirical studies, so having a first take on that. Andrea: Karin's book addresses the critical...