Together with our partners, we work to ensure that peace activists play an active role in implementing peace agreements as well as in processes of dealing with the past after armed conflicts – thereby contributing to the prevention of violent conflict and renewed escalation.

Peace is more than the absence of war. Patriarchal power relations, structural violence and physical or psychological violence against women are also obstacles on the path to lasting peace. This is why we are committed to peacebuilding with a feminist, intersectional perspective. And because our understanding of peace is comprehensive.

What does security mean to you? Which people, places, sounds and senses make you feel safe? What is threatening your safety? These questions are central in discussions within our global network of feminist peace activists. Therefore, we chose to focus on safety and security for this second edition of the «Feminists Connecting for Peace» magazine.

Our network is spread out across the world, yet we feel and act in solidarity with each other. Supporting feminist peacebuilders and making their work visible is at the core of our vision and practice. The "Feminists Connecting for Peace" magazine is a co-creation of activists from our global network. The first edition focuses on Demilitarization.

The second issue of the magazine is dedicated to the topic of "Security".

Since the beginning of the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, there have been calls for rearmament and higher military spending. As a feminist peace organisation, we oppose the claim that more weapons lead to more security. We call for demilitarisation and disarmament, because this is the only way to achieve real peace and genuine security. Our board member Margo OkazawaRey and our programme and network manager Annemarie Sancar explain why the world is at a crossroads today.

In the Annual Report 2022, you will learn everything important about our work in the past year - and why feminist visions of peace were put to a tough test.

The second issue focuses on the topic of "security". What does security mean from a feminist perspective? How does this understanding conflict with a military understanding of security? Read the nine contributions from our network.

In this article, our director Deborah Schibler explains why the common images and narratives of peace processes need to become feminist. It was published in the March issue of à propos, the magazine of KOFF swisspeace.

Three different countries and contexts, each with different peace agreements and challenges in implementation. And yet, the three women from our partner organisations in Colombia, Nepal and the Philippines found many commonalities – in the experiences and insights shared by women peacebuilders and in what it takes to sustain peace. At a public panel in Bern, the three women talked about the importance of feminist principles in peacebuilding, particularly to prevent backsliding into armed violence, of safe spaces and self-care for activists and of not losing sight of the goal – sustainable peace.