"It is better to sweat in peace than bleed in war"- Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit

Security is everybody's business. Women who hold up half the sky and are worst affected must have their voices heard. Gender sensitive foreign policy is not about adding and stirring women or women addressing women's issues. It is not about women addressing women's issues but about a counterhegemonic discourse , and a rearticulation of the uses of power in the international domain. It is equally about bringing an anticolonial lens and not just ticking off the boxes of 1325.democratisation of security and foreign policies and placing it squarely in the arena of debate and dialogue."

Meenakshi Gopinath is Founder and Director of WISCOMP (Women in Security, Conflict Management and Peace), an initiative that seeks to promote the leadership of South Asian women in the areas of peace, security and regional cooperation. She is Principal Emerita, Lady Shri Ram College, New Delhi, a leading women’s college in India where she was Principal for 26 years. Dr. Gopinath was the first woman to serve as a member of the National Security Advisory Board (NSAB) of India.

WISCOMP (Women in Security, Conflict Management and Peace) is a pioneering South Asian research and training initiative that foregrounds leadership of women in peace and security and promotes cultures of pluralism and coexistence in the region.

The knowledge generated through research is disseminated by WISCOMP to civil society actors and educational institutions (schools, colleges and universities) through diverse methodologies that include training workshops, symposiums, roundtables, film festivals, installations, exhibitions, public lectures, curricular development and innovative pedagogy. Our channel offers some of these resources. To know more about WISCOMP’s work visit www.wiscomp.org or connect with us at [email protected] or +91-11-24648450.