“For peacebuilding, we need dialogue and cohesion. Women at all social levels can be peace builders. But we need a change in mindset. Stereotypical ideas about women must change. Instead, women need to occupy positions of authority in both government and private sectors.

This change must come at two levels: in the local villages and in higher government settings. Traditions that promote male dominance, while relegating women to background positions, should be disregarded.”

“But change must also come from women themselves. They must start believing in themselves. They must show themselves as problem solvers. Women should not shy away when given a chance to take the lead. They should also treat their daughters at home in a way that makes them feel as important as their brothers.“

We recently talked to Rosebell Kagumire about women’s rights and peacebuilding. Rosebell is a powerful Pan-African feminist voice, as well as curator and editor of the African Feminism web platform. She is also a member of the r0g_agency’s strategic advisory board.

Here are some of her thoughts:

“We still live in a heavily patriarchal world. We have the economics of war and conflict. And when you look particularly at Africa, you have governments still struggling with legitimacy stemming from poor nation building as a heritage of colonialism. You have different nations within a country; those identities cannot be suppressed. And of course, resource conflicts are at the heart of this capitalist, patriarchal, imperialistic system that we are living under.

We need to change the systems. We need systems that serve the people. That guarantees everybody’s dignity. That allows everybody to be heard, to live as they wish without violence, without harassment. Therefore, we have to eliminate hierarchies. Because the competition for resources and power creates hierarchies and vice versa. Men are better and more worthy than women and children. White people are better and more worthy than black and other peoples. Heterosexual people are the norm and the rest of the people can be hunted or made miserable. These are the current hierarchies that have to be addressed in their complexity, because millions of women in the world are not just marginalized because of being women, but discriminated against based on other factors as well.”