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Ralf Willinger -

Human Rights organisations are increasingly using International law and the UN to draw public attention to human rights violations and to put pressure on the oppressors responsible. The civil peace movement can make use of these mechanisms for their purposes as well. One example at the level of international human rights law, is the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child; another is the UN Human Rights Council. In both cases there is a reporting mechanism to monitor states’ compliance with their obligations under the Convention and implementation of the respective rights in which the participation of civil society is explicitly provided for.

David Gee -

Ask a teacher what her purpose is and how she goes about it, and you can expect a simple answer: she supports young people to grow by teaching them things. We know why we need bakers, too; they feed people by baking us bread. So what are soldiers[2] for?

On 14th June 2013 the Norwegian parliament decided to introduce conscription for women. The question was on the agenda of all the political parties’ yearly meetings this spring, spearheaded by women from a young generation. The most surprising thing, bearing in mind the Norwegian context, is that the socialist party’s young women were at the very front in calling for this change. The surprise is because this party, and especially the younger generation, have in the past taken a strong antimilitaristic stand. Now, their main argument is that women should have the same rights, as well as taking the same duties, as men. What has happened? Why is conscription for women so important to introduce? What has happened with the former feminist stand that was based on values of worthiness, anti-patriarchy and non-hierarchy, and not automatic equality on the male society’s premises?