Rekindling hope for an inclusive peace agreement in South Sudan

South Sudanese women have played an important role in peace and security processes since well before their country’s independence, in 2011. Their achievements, beginning with the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA)—the agreement that set South Sudan on the path towards nationhood—represent an important example of success for women’s participation in peace and security.

Since the outbreak of the civil war in 2013, however, women have been more and more sidelined from decision-making processes, even as they have been heavily affected by insecurity and violence. Presently, a peace agreement is in place—the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS), signed in 2018—which is meant to restore the path toward stability and democratic transition. However, implementation has remained heavily delayed.

A new effort, the Tumaini Peace Initiative, has been launched in 2024 to break the impasse. The initiative creates opportunities for women to play, once again, central roles in the negotiations. However, whether South Sudanese women are present and exercise substantive influence remains far from certain.

How South Sudanese women broke the glass ceiling

South Sudanese women have played an active role in the country’s path towards peace. Their efforts were already visible in the 2005 CPA, which ended the long war between South Sudanese rebels and the Government of Sudan, and helped create inclusion norms, including a 25 percent quota for women in public institutions. Women also participated actively in the 2011 self-determination referendum, representing 51 percent of registered voters.

A major achievement for women’s participation was the adoption of South Sudan’s first National Action Plan (NAP) on Women, Peace and Security (WPS), in 2015. Developed through broad consultations with civil society, including women-led organisations, the NAP aimed to strengthen women’s participation in social, civil and political life. A second NAP was later adopted for 2023–2027.

Women have also been delegates within the negotiations that led to the signing of the R-ARCSS. In fact, women organised across political parties, civil society, faith actors, diaspora, even refugees and internally displaced communities, in order to ensure an agreement attentive to women’s needs and priorities. This helped secure important gains, including gender-sensitive implementation mechanisms, and an increase in the women’s quota to 35 percent.

Yet, South Sudanese women’s influence has always been strongest through informal and parallel spaces. In formal processes, instead, their participation has always been met with some resistance, and even when normative gains were made, lack of implementation meant that their goals remained unfulfilled.

The risk of women being sidelined in the face of renewed conflict

The R-ARCSS mandates women’s representation in all decision-making bodies through the 35 percent quota. Women have been appointed to key positions, including within the Transitional Government of National Unity. This, indeed, reflects the impact of South Sudanese women’s advocacy to date.

However, this mandate has largely remained on paper. As implementation of the gender-specific provisions of the R-ARCSS has been delayed, women inside and outside formal institutions have been gradually sidelined. Outside negotiation spaces, the renewed conflict has also severely affected women. Violence has narrowed civic space, disrupted institution-building and reduced pathways for inclusive political participation. Conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence has reached endemic levels. More generally, insecurity has increased the risks for women seeking to participate in political and civic processes, adding to existing barriers linked to patriarchal norms and poverty.

The situation has been further worsened by recent cuts in development aid, which have affected women-led organisations in particular, constraining their work and reducing their ability to organise, advocate and participate.

A new opportunity to move out of the impasse

Launched in Nairobi in May 2024, with strong backing by Kenya, the initiative seeks to engage the armed groups that had not yet signed the R-ARCSS, and to create conditions for a more comprehensive settlement, eventually leading to elections.

Importantly, the Initiative began with backing from Christian churches and was facilitated by the Community of Sant’Egidio. Kenya’s involvement then turned it into a formal high-level process, led by Major-General Lazarus Sumbeiywo, a senior Kenyan representative with considerable mediation experience.

Concerns remain about women’s participation in the Tumaini Initiative, however. The process has so far largely reflected the same patterns of sidelining seen in previous efforts. While some South Sudanese women have been included as delegates, they were the first to note that women’s participation risks becoming symbolic. Women’s groups outside high-level meetings have not been consistently consulted, and it remains unclear how gender provisions are being integrated into draft agreements.

The Tumaini Initiative risks, in other words, repeating the same limitations seen in the R-ARCSS process. Women are present in transition structures, but leadership, co-chairing and agenda-setting roles are limited. When inclusive norms are discussed, they often seem used to demonstrate compliance with the WPS agenda, without affecting the real distribution of power among participants.

Still, the Tumaini Initiative is gaining momentum and could become a new channel for women’s agency and influence. The women’s movement in South Sudan remains strong, with organisations and networks such as the South Sudan Women Coalition for Peace and the Women’s Bloc of South Sudan continuing to advocate for women’s participation. In 2015, these groups had endorsed a seven-point agenda for a gender-responsive peace agreement, including consultation on security reforms and holistic psychosocial services for survivors of violence. The agenda remains an advocacy tool as powerful today as it was in 2015.

Leaning on what matter for women’s participation

Since 2005 South Sudanese women have participated in peace and security decision-making and achieved important milestones. They have done so despite a global pattern in which women’s efforts to gain voice and influence, even under the WPS agenda, have often faced resistance and produced limited change.

As the Tumaini Initiative opens a possible new phase, South Sudanese women can still play an important role, but there are, today, greater risks compared to the past. In understanding how best women can exert influence (and how best to support them in doing so), several lessons stand out.

To begin with, numbers matter: even limited initial inclusion can be used to push for broader representation, and increased participation improves the chance that women’s issues are reflected in outcomes. Diverse and credible representation is also essential, combining younger women with respected senior figures who can access political actors and command trust.

Preparation and timing are also important. Peace processes move quickly, requiring continuous monitoring and readiness to respond. Women advocates need sustained engagement, while external supporters must make resources available at the right time. Advocacy must also be proactive, responsive, continuous and multi-level, supported by technical teams able to monitor developments, conduct research and support real-time engagement.

Finally, attention should be paid to the emotional and political challenges of negotiation spaces. These are often ruthless environments requiring resilience and preparedness, not only technically, but also mentally.

If the Tumaini Peace Initiative is to become an opportunity capable of reviving both the South Sudanese peace process and women’s participation in it, additional efforts are needed. In this regard, Kenya’s central role in the Initiative provides an opportunity, given its strong policies on women’s participation and its own NAP on Women, Peace and Security. Links between Kenyan women-led organisations, Kenyan institutions and South Sudanese CSOs can be used to encourage mediators to remain attentive to women’s roles inside and outside Track I processes.

Lastly, international and regional actors should also monitor the process and provide targeted support. Although broader funding cuts cannot be reversed in the short-term, well-timed investments could help ensure that women are present at key meetings and able to make formal contributions to any future draft agreement.