Society as the Battlefield: Reframing Women, Peace and Security in an Era of Hybrid Threats

Home » Women, Peace & Security

Society as the Battlefield: Reframing Women, Peace and Security in an Era of Hybrid Threats

by Dr. Lauren Van Metre | President & CEO, Women In International Security (WIIS)

The global security environment is undergoing rapid and dangerous transformation. Militarization is accelerating. Hybrid warfare is reshaping conflict. Authoritarianism is rising. At the same time, the institutions that have guided the international order for eighty years are straining under the weight of these new realities. The world is in a liminal moment—an in-between space where the old order is breaking down and the contours of the new one remain uncertain.

The Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda itself was born in a similar moment of upheaval. As the Cold War ended, dissolving norms and institutions gave rise to civil wars, ethnic violence, and violent extremism. WPS emerged from women’s cross-border solidarity—women who refused to be silent and demanded representation. They insisted that their experience – and their leadership –  shape the future of peace and security.

That same audacity today to adapt WPS to a new constellation of threats. While we celebrate the achievements of WPS, we must prepare for a profoundly different future – a  threat environment defined not only by armed conflict, but by hybrid warfare, democratic erosion, and authoritarian resurgence.

Two Strategic Certainties

For all the uncertainty of this moment, two realities are unmistakably clear: militarization is accelerating, and authoritarianism is rising. Hybrid warfare sits at the center of both. And, in a world engaged increasingly in hybrid warfare, WPS must operate not only as a peacebuilding framework, but as a strategic security doctrine.

Authoritarian powers now use disinformation, cyber operations, election interference, economic coercion, and social manipulation not merely to confuse democracies, but to break them from within. These strategies spread fear, divide societies, distort public trust, justify executive overreach, and undermine electoral integrity. Central to this approach is the manipulation of gender itself—weaponizing misogyny, restricting women’s rights, and suppressing women’s political participation as a means for eroding democracy itself. Gender is a powerful lever for authoritarian consolidation.

Western security institutions increasingly recognize that if societies are the battlefield, then citizens are the frontline of defense. NATO and other security bodies now emphasize societal resilience as a form of strategic deterrence. Yet resilience is still frequently framed as requiring only a “gender lens” or perspective. That framing is no longer sufficient.  If gender is a terrain of modern, hybrid warfare, then WPS must be a strategic countermeasure, not a simple add-on.

If adapted to hybrid warfare, the WPS pillars become a framework for societal resilience and a strategy of deterrence and prevention:

  • Prevention requires interrupting the disinformation-to-mobilization pipelines that fuel gender-based violence, political intimidation, and the suppression of women’s leadership.
  • Participation demands that women lead within security institutions as societies militarize—ensuring that necessary defense efforts do not erode democratic norms from within.
  • Protection must now include digital, political, and physical protection networks for women political leaders, journalists, activists, and movements targeted by authoritarian actors.
  • Relief and Recovery must prepare women to lead the restoration of social cohesion and democratic order when societies recoil from authoritarian capture as we have seen in November’s U.S. electoral outcomes in Virginia and New Jersey.

In an era when hybrid threats aim to fracture society itself, WPS is not a complement to security strategy—it is a security strategy. It reinforces civic fabric, strengthens democratic resilience,, and provides deterrence rooted not only in military capability, but in societal resilience.

WPS as a Political Strategy for Democratic Renewal

Recalibrating the security dimension of WPS (the “S”)  is necessary—but insufficient. We must develop a political strategy and reframe WPS as a political movement—not merely a normative framework.

According to Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem), roughly 70 percent of the world’s population now lives under authoritarian or oligarchic rule. The WPS agenda—with its core demands for participation, accountability, and inclusion—is fundamentally a democratization movement. In much of the world today, and increasingly within multilateral institutions themselves, WPS functions not as a consensus framework, but as an opposition movement.

That reality has strategic implications. Successful democratic opposition movements share several core traits—and WPS must increasingly adopt them.

First, successful movements build coalitions of coalitions. WPS cannot stand alone. It must link arms with labor, youth, faith communities, and environmental movements whose aspirations overlap with its own. That also means standing in strong solidarity with movements that have popular momentum, if they advance WPS goals.  Leaders within the WPS ecosystem must be equipped not only with policy expertise, but with the political skills needed to build, sustain, and activate broad-based alliances. 

Second, successful movements control the narrative. Fear is the fuel of authoritarianism. Hope is its antidote—and one of the most powerful political tools available. The WPS agenda must move away from narratives of  “backlash” and “erosion” and instead tell a compelling story of what is possible: the clarity and the vision of the WPS agenda.

Third, successful movements shift the arena of contestation. When governments close institutional doors, movements carry their struggle to the public. When formal processes stall, pressure is built from outside them. WPS must increasingly draw strength from civic mobilization, grassroots leadership, and public-facing advocacy, not only from technocratic processes within multilateral institutions.

By building broad coalitions, shaping narratives grounded in democratic possibility, and shifting political struggle into arenas where public voice is strongest, WPS becomes not only a policy framework but an engine of democratic renewal.  This is how movements win. And this is how WPS must now move: not as a siloed agenda tucked inside institutions, but as a bold, collective political force capable of reshaping them.

The Strategic Imperative Ahead

If fully activated—strategically, politically, and collectively—the Women, Peace and Security agenda offers not only protection for women, but a pathway toward more resilient, inclusive, and democratic societies. In a world where the frontline increasingly runs through information systems, civic trust, political participation, and social cohesion, WPS is not simply about women’s inclusion in security. It is about the future of security itself.

The above remarks were delivered by Dr. Van Metre as part of WIIS’ 1325@25 Conference, “The Future of the Women, Peace and Security Agenda: Advancing Innovation, Resilience, and Collective Action,” on November 12th, 2025.

About the Author

Dr. Lauren Van Metre is the President & CEO of WIIS, bringing over two decades of experience as a leading expert in peace and security. Her distinguished career includes key roles at the U.S. Department of Defense, the State Department, the U.S. Institute of Peace, and the National Democratic Institute, where she contributed to major conflict resolution and prevention initiatives. Her leadership has provided an invaluable contribution to policy and programming in some of the world’s most fragile and conflict-affected regions. Read her full bio here.

WIIS Research Director Dr. Karin Johnston sits down with WIIS senior fellow Dr. Joan Johnson-Freese to discuss Joan’s new book, Leadership in War and Peace: Masculine and Feminine. The book shines a light on a dimension of leadership critical to success but not often debated: leadership and the different ways women and men manifest it. The book argues that effective leadership is all about results – and effective leaders apply different leadership styles, including using both male and female lenses, in the right measure, with the right people, at the right time–using a variety of leadership characteristics to meet the moment. Watch as Karin and Joan discuss the importance of the book’s message in this political environment and its timely relevance to the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda, which celebrates its 25th anniversary this year. (This discussion was pre-recorded on June 10th, 2025).

By Maryam Rezaeizadeh

This paper critically examines the implementation of the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), arguing that dominant narratives in the region emphasizing women’s victimhood obscure their agency and capacity for peacebuilding. Drawing on personal insights, policy reports, and case studies from Afghanistan, Gaza, Iran, and Syria, this analysis examines how the WPS framework can be refined to better reflect the region’s socio-political realities. By incorporating local narratives and contextual examples, the paper proposes strategies for empowering women as active agents of peace, not passive recipients of protection.

25 Years of WPS and a Region in Crisis

Twenty-five years after the passage of UN Security Council Resolution 1325, the WPS agenda remains far from fully realized in the MENA region. Conflicts persist in Syria, Gaza, Yemen, and Afghanistan, while systemic repression in Iran and other countries continues to silence women’s voices. Yet amidst these adversities, women have emerged as critical actors in peacebuilding. From organizing underground schools in Afghanistan to leading protests in Iran, they have demonstrated remarkable resilience. However, these contributions are often excluded from formal policymaking and international narratives, reducing women to victims in need of rescue rather than recognizing them as strategic agents of change.

Women’s Agency in Conflict Zones: Case Studies from Afghanistan and Gaza

In Afghanistan, women’s resistance under the Taliban regime is both historic and ongoing. For example, Mahbouba Seraj, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee, has operated a women’s shelter and media outlet advocating for women’s health and rights despite Taliban threats. Similarly, the Afghan women’s network has continued to coordinate humanitarian responses and advocacy campaigns even after the regime change in 2021.


In Gaza, women have led grassroots initiatives providing psychological support and food distribution networks in refugee camps. During the escalation of conflict in 2023, the Women’s Affairs Center in Gaza documented numerous women-led responses to internal displacement, underscoring how women sustain communities amid devastation. These narratives, drawn from the Stimson Center report and interviews conducted by Human Rights Watch, exemplify how women in conflict zones sustain community resilience by assuming roles as informal diplomats, educators, and frontline providers of humanitarian aid. 

Structural Failures of the WPS Agenda in MENA

The WPS Agenda often fails to advance meaningful participation of women in MENA, as demonstrated by a 2024 policy analysis that critiques the top-down implementation of the WPS initiatives across the MENA region. One example is Libya’s post-2011 peace negotiations, where only two women were included among twenty participants, despite the sustained activism and organizational leadership of Libyan women at the grassroots level. This case reflects a broader regional trend in which superficial numeric inclusion is prioritized over women’s meaningful and substantive participation in peace processes. Furthermore, the Jordanian government adopted a national WPS action plan in 2018, yet grassroots women’s groups report limited access to implementation funds. Their marginalization illustrates how the agenda is often shaped by international donor priorities rather than community needs.

Cultural Adaptation of WPS: Lessons from Tunisia and Morocco

Tunisia’s 2017 law on violence against women addresses economic and political violence in the country. The law was developed with input from both feminist NGOs and Islamic legal scholars, illustrating how Islamic values can align with WPS principles when locally framed. Morocco’s ‘Moudawana’ family law reform of 2004 was another milestone  in the legal expansion of women’s agency in MENA. This reform supports women’s rights regarding travel, divorce, and self-guardianship in a patriarchal society, bolstering the third pillar of the WPS framework — Prevention. These examples demonstrate how culturally grounded legal reform can harmonize with global WPS objectives and make the implementation of WPS more effective. 

Iran and the Sanctions Paradox: Feminist Resistance in Isolation

Iran provides a distinctive case for WPS analysis. Despite not being a conventional conflict zone, Iranian women live under what can be described as “structural violence”—a system of repression, discrimination, and isolation exacerbated by international sanctions. Since the 2022 death of Mahsa Jina Amini in police custody, the grassroots movement ‘Zan, Zendegi, Azadi’ (Woman, Life, Freedom) has galvanized feminist resistance in Iran and abroad. Women like Narges Mohammadi, winner of the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize, have exposed human rights violations within Iranian prisons while organizing against gender apartheid. According to Human Rights Watch, many women have been detained since the start of the protests, with numerous reports of torture or solitary confinement. 

Iranian women in the diaspora have also been influential in documenting abuses and calling for global feminist solidarity, challenging the traditional boundaries of the WPS agenda. The WPS framework often overlooks countries under sanctions, assuming a binary between war and peace. However, Iranian women’s daily struggles under a securitized, patriarchal regime and punitive economic conditions demand broader interpretations of conflict, protection, and participation.

Rethinking the Four Pillars of WPS Through a MENA Lens

The four pillars of the WPS agenda—Participation, Protection, Prevention, and Relief & Recovery—must be reimagined through the lens of the MENA region, where women’s lived experiences in conflict and authoritarian contexts challenge traditional policy frameworks. Participation, for instance, should not be limited to formal peace negotiations but must encompass women’s active engagement in informal governance structures. In Syria, the Mazaya Women’s Center in Idlib exemplifies this broader definition by training women in leadership and trauma support, enabling them to contribute to local governance even in areas controlled by extremist groups. Similarly, the concept of Protection must move beyond narrow interpretations focused solely on gender-based violence to include systemic threats like economic deprivation, displacement, and the collapse of public services. The case of Yemen, where maternal mortality has dramatically increased due to the disintegration of healthcare infrastructure, illustrates the urgent need to expand this pillar’s scope. 

Prevention efforts should target the structural roots of violence, including authoritarianism, sectarianism, and institutional corruption. Tunisia’s transitional justice process, which integrated women’s testimonies of repression following the revolution, presents a compelling model for a comprehensive approach to prevention. Relief and Recovery should prioritize trauma-informed approaches, the rebuilding of community trust, and equitable access to education. In Afghanistan, where girls’ schooling has been banned under Taliban rule, underground networks of women educators are sustaining learning environments, often at significant personal risk. 

To complement and reinforce these four pillars, a fifth—Political Accountability—should be formally recognized. This pillar would serve to monitor and enforce both state and international actors’ commitments to WPS principles, ensuring that rhetoric is matched by responsibility and action, especially in regions prone to regression and impunity.

Policy Recommendations for Local and International Actors

To advance the WPS agenda meaningfully in the MENA, local and international actors must coordinate transformative and context-specific interventions. Regional governments must prioritize the development and implementation of national WPS action plans that are co-designed with grassroots women’s organizations and backed by dedicated budget lines. One key failure in implementing the WPS agenda has been the exclusion of civil society voices from state-led processes, resulting in superficial and largely symbolic commitments. Legal reforms should also decriminalize dissent and institutionalize protections for women human rights defenders, many of whom face repression under authoritarian regimes, as seen in both Iran and Syria. 

International institutions and donors must shift their focus from funding short-term, externally imposed aid projects to investing in long-term feminist organizing and leadership development. This includes reevaluating sanction regimes to ensure exemptions for women-led NGOs and civil society initiatives, especially in countries like Iran, where sanctions have paralyzed civic engagement. Civil society actors across the region must work toward building transnational coalitions—such as the emerging Afghan-Iranian collaborations on refugee education—that pool resources, expertise, and political capital. 

In light of growing digital threats and political repression, there is an urgent need to train a new generation of women leaders in conflict journalism, digital safety, and policy advocacy. Recent feminist initiatives have highlighted how digital spaces that were once seen as liberatory are increasingly becoming sites of surveillance and harassment, requiring targeted strategies to secure women’s online presence and participation. 

Finally, think tanks and academic institutions have a responsibility to decentralize the WPS dialogue. Hosting regional conferences in cities such as Tunis, Amman, or Beirut can shift the intellectual gravity away from Western capitals, while promoting scholarship in Arabic, Persian, and Kurdish will ensure that knowledge production around peace and security is truly indigenous. These recommendations, if adopted collaboratively, can bridge the persistent gap between global mandates and local realities, revitalizing the WPS agenda across the region.

Conclusion: Reimagining WPS Beyond the West

The WPS agenda must evolve to reflect the voices and visions of those it claims to serve. In the MENA region, women are not merely survivors of violence but architects of peace, resistance, and resilience. Their stories—from Gaza’s aid networks and Afghanistan’s underground schools to Iran’s protest movements and Yemen’s healthcare activism—should inform the future of global peace policy. Civil society actors across the region must work toward building transnational coalitions that pool resources, expertise, and political capital. By embracing these regional solidarities, the WPS agenda can better bridge the persistent gap between global mandates and local realities, ensuring a more just and effective peace policy.

About the Author

Maryam Rezaeizadeh is a public policy researcher and practitioner specializing in gender, security, and Middle Eastern affairs. She is currently a Faculty Assistant and Mentor for the Persian House at the University of Maryland’s Persian Flagship Program and a contributor to the Middle East Perspectives program at the Stimson Center. Maryam has held research roles at the Stimson Center, Wilson Center, and Center for International Policy (CIP), focusing on women’s political agency, digital activism, and informal peacebuilding in conflict zones. Her academic interests lie at the intersection of international security and social justice, with a particular emphasis on empowering women and marginalized groups in the Middle East. She holds a master’s in public policy from the University of Maryland and has published widely on gender-based resilience under authoritarian regimes.

References

Aisha Association for Women and Child Protection.” DARPE. Accessed May 20, 2025. https://darpe.me/implement-entries/aisha-association-for-woman-and-child-protection/.

Amnesty International. “Nobel Peace Prize Winner Narges Mohammadi Must Be Released Immediately and Unconditionally.” Amnesty International, October 6, 2023. https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/10/nobel-peace-prize-winner-narges-mohammadi-must-be-released-immediately-and-unconditionally/.

Chehab, Sara, “Adapting the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Agenda to the Arab World.” Middle East Council on Global Affairs, January 22, 2024. https://mecouncil.org/blog_posts/adapting-the-women-peace-and-security-wps-agenda-to-the-arab-world/.

FEMENA, “A Feminist Initiative to Make the Internet Safer,” FEMENA, July 27, 2023, https://femena.net/2023/07/27/a-feminist-initiative-to-make-the-internet-safer/.

FEMENA. “Systemic Violence Against Women in Iran: Legal Barriers, Policy Failures, and the Urgent Need for Reform.” FEMENA, March 6, 2025. https://femena.net/2025/03/06/systemic-violence-against-women-in-iran-legal-barriers-policy-failures-and-the-urgent-need-for-reform/.

FEMENA, “The War on Women in Conflict Zones,” FEMENA, November 25, 2024, https://femena.net/2024/11/25/the-war-on-women-in-conflict-zones/.

FEMENA. “The Years of Hardship and Violence: Iranian Women’s Struggle to Survive and Resist State Violence.” FEMENA, September 18, 2023. https://femena.net/2023/09/18/the-years-of-hardship-and-violence-iranian-womens-struggle-to-survive-and-resist-state-violence/.

FEMENA. “Three Years and Counting: The Struggle and Resistance of Afghan Women.” FEMENA, August 15, 2024. https://femena.net/2024/08/15/three-years-and-counting-the-struggle-and-resistance-of-afghan-women/.

FEMENA. “Transnational Repression Against Exiled Women Activists.” FEMENA, April 29, 2024. https://femena.net/2024/04/29/transnational-repression-against-exiled-women-activists/.

Gallagher, Nancy, “Amnesty International and the Idea of Muslim Women’s Human Rights,” Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies 1, no. 3 (Fall 2005): 96–107.

George, Rachel, “Failures in the Women, Peace and Security Agenda are Stunting Peace in the Middle East,” Wilson Center, June 12, 2024, https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/failures-women-peace-and-security-agenda-are-stunting-peace-middle-east.

Human Rights Watch. “Iran.” In World Report 2023. Human Rights Watch, 2023. https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2023/country-chapters/iran.

Human Rights Watch. “World Report 2025: Iran.” Human Rights Watch, January 2025. https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2025/country-chapters/iran.

Human Rights Watch, “Israel and Palestine,” in World Report 2024 (Human Rights Watch, 2024), https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2024/country-chapters/israel-and-palestine.

Human Rights Watch. “Israel and Palestine.” In World Report 2025. Human Rights Watch, 2025. https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2025/country-chapters/israel-and-palestine.

Lila Abu-Lughod, Do Muslim Women Need Saving? (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013), https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674088269.

Maloba, Nicole Mumala. “The Power Within: Decolonising Women’s Economic Narratives.” FEMNET, October 28, 2024. https://www.femnet.org/2024/10/the-power-within-decolonising-womens-economic-narratives/.

Naseh, Mitra, “One of the World’s Largest Refugee Populations, Afghans Have Faced Increasing Restrictions in Iran.” Migration Policy Institute, January 7, 2024. https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/afghan-refugees-iran

Nasruddin, Faria, “Securing the Digital Future for Women and Girls in MENA.” Wilson Center, March 18, 2024, https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/securing-digital-future-women-and-girls-mena.

Nobel Prize Outreach. “Narges Mohammadi – Facts – 2023.” NobelPrize.org. Accessed June 1, 2025. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2023/mohammadi/facts/.

Rezaei Zadeh, Maryam, “Afghan and Gazan Narratives Show Women’s Resilience in Conflict Zones,” Stimson Center, 2024, https://www.stimson.org/2024/afghan-and-gazan-narratives-show-womens-resilience-in-conflict-zones/.

Rezaei Zadeh, Maryam, “Could Iran Do More to Help Educate Afghan Refugee Children?” Stimson Center, 2025. https://www.stimson.org/2025/could-iran-do-more-to-help-educate-afghan-refugee-children/.

Sadiqi, Fatima, “The Central Role of the Family Law in the Moroccan Feminist Movement,” British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies Volume 35 (2008): https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13530190802525098

SyriaUntold. “Center of Mazaya.” SyriaUntold, November 19, 2014. https://syriauntold.com/2014/11/19/center-of-mazaya/.

Slim, Randa, and Hafsa Halawa. “Middle East Dialogue May 2024 Meeting Report.” Middle East Institute, October 3, 2024. https://www.mei.edu/publications/middle-east-dialogue-may-2024-meeting-report.

UN Women, “Research Paper: Women’s Meaningful Participation in Transitional Justice,” UN Women, March 2022, https://www.unwomen.org/en/digital-library/publications/2022/03/research-paper-womens-meaningful-participation-in-transitional-justice.

UN Women. “Tunisia Makes Historic Strides by Passing Its Landmark Law on Ending Violence Against Women.” UN Women, August 1, 2017. https://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2017/8/news-tunisia-law-on-ending-violence-against-women.

UN Women Asia and the Pacific. “National Action Plans: Women, Peace and Security.” UN Women Asia and the Pacific. Accessed June 1, 2025. https://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/focus-areas/peace-and-security/national-action-plans.

United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). “Yemen Humanitarian Emergency.” UNFPA. Accessed June 1, 2025. https://www.unfpa.org/data/emergencies/yemen-humanitarian-emergency.

United Nations Security Council, Resolution 1325 (2000) (New York: United Nations, 2000), https://www.un.org/shestandsforpeace/content/united-nations-security-council-resolution-1325-2000-sres1325-2000.

On May 13th, WIIS Research Director Dr. Karin Johnston and WIIS Fellows Duilia Mora Turner and Dr. Joan Johnson-Freese, alongside Dr. Gabriela Hoberman, spoke at the 10th annual Hemispheric Security Conference at Florida International University on women, peace, and security. Their insights on the whole-of-society approach to security and conflict showed the real-world impact of the WPS agenda. WIIS is grateful to the FIU Jack D. Gordon Institute, Fundación Taeda, and FIU LACC for spotlighting this essential work.