Within the CEWS, information is expected to be collected from the RECs and regional mechanisms (RMs) for collation and analysis, both at the sub-regional and the regional levels. This information is to be used as an early warning mechanism, to prevent potential confl icts from breaking out or escalating into full-blown ones. While women are the most victimised during violent confl icts, they were until recently excluded from the confl ict-resolution and post-confl ict reconstruction processes in Africa. The AU and the RECs have made signifi cant
progress towards establishing early warning mechanisms, through local peace structures and recruited fi eld monitors.3
An important and positive development within the PSC Protocol is that it accedes to a broader approach to security, which is human security. Accordingly, human security implies the ‘security of the individual with respect to the satis-faction of the basic needs of life; it also encompasses the creation of social, politi-cal, economic, military, environmental and cultural conditions necessary for sur-vival … and ensuring that each individual has opportunities and choices to fulfi l his/her own potential’.4 Thus, as Caroline Thomas suggests, human insecurity should not be understood as an inevitable occurrence. On the contrary, it should be understood and explained as a direct result of existing power structures that determine who enjoys security or not. In this sense, human security entails more than physical survival; it is also about emancipation from oppressive power structures that are global, national, regional or local in origin or scope.5 It is within this conceptual framework that human security should be conceived in relation to the gender dimension of the PSC.
The fact that the PSC has a broader perspective on human security ensures that there is a greater propensity for women’s issues to be taken into considera-tion as part of social, political or economic issues than when the emphasis is on the traditional conception of security, which has the state as the reference point.
Once this is the case, women and gender issues are relegated to the background, with the state taking priority. The reasoning behind the prioritisation of the state was that if the state is protected and secure the needs of the citizens, including women, will naturally be met. Unfortunately, in Africa and perhaps elsewhere, this is not necessarily the case. The state has not been the guardian of the broader security of the people; on the contrary, it has been a source of threats and insecurity for the people, including women.
The nature of and methodology for data collection, at grassroots level, within the early warning system is such that it presents an opportunity to have a gen-dered dimension of early warning, where women’s issues are brought to the fore-front. According to Schmeidl and Piza-Lopez, engendering early warning ‘is not only concerned with including women into early warning systems, but on sensi-tising the entire process by training both men and women on how to use gender analysis to fi ne-tune early warning and allow for a more appropriate and diverse range of response actions’.6 This should be carried out during all the stages of early warning, which are the collection and collation of information, based on
agreed indicators; the analysis of this information and dataset; the development of worst-case scenarios and best-case scenarios; and the transmission of this fi nal information to policy makers for preventive action.
According to the PSC Protocol, the CEWS is expected to develop early warning module indicators on the basis of clearly defi ned and accepted political, economic, social, military and humanitarian indicators (article 12.4). These indicators have further been sub-divided into categories such as justice and rule of law, human rights, ethnic tensions, arms proliferation, military expenditure, resources, cor-ruption, and economic indicators such as poverty levels. What is clear within the CEWS is the fact that even though it has achieved some outputs in terms of daily news reports and highlights, and has submitted some early warning reports to the PSC, the system is not engendered. Most information and the subsequent analysis, derived and transmitted to the Council, are generic in nature. For example, the majority of these reports are country-specifi c, while information and analysis are not sex-aggregated. For example, a 12 March 2010 ECOWAS Early Warning System (ECOWARN) report on Senegal specifi ed that French soldiers in Senegal were to be reduced drastically from 1 200 to 300 after April 2010.7 This has implications for the employees of these soldiers, and those with small businesses around the base. This information did not indicate how many employees were women or men, although it gave a fi gure of 3 000 employees. The majority of em-ployees and business owners around the bases would be women. Disaggregating this data would ensure that early responses to such reports targeted those hit the hardest.
In another scenario, a report on Nigeria highlighted a rally by hundreds of women in Abuja. According to the report, at least 109 people were killed in the ethnic clashes that resulted from this rally, and many of these people were said to be women and children. The fact that the report mentioned the number of women was a result of the fact that women had undertaken the rally. Would women have been mentioned if the rally had been organised by a group of people that included men? More often early warning is engendered only in relation to indicators such as human rights and human traffi cking. However, gender sensi-tivity should not be limited to only obvious indicators. Gender should be main-streamed in early warning activities. Knowing which group in a society is most affected by a particular issue has implications for the kind of response mecha-nism that needs to be established by the PSC.