Conclusion: A Gender-Responsive and Inclusive Peacebuilding Framework

Abstract

Chapter five provides concluding reflections, emphasizing that applying a gender-responsive conflict analysis and peacebuilding framework helps to understand how women of faith build peace. It draws on four emerging modes where Maasai and Gusii women of faith deploy religious resources as an identity, a motivator, a form of empowerment, and a resource. These modes enable them to serve in spaces and roles that would otherwise be unavailable to them due to gender inequality and social exclusion. They carve out faith or secular spaces to engage in prayer, rituals of healing, sharing of resources, and building relations across ethnic divides. While women in general may advance peace in these forms, women of faith draw from their religious bases, motivations, resources, identities, and modes to do so.