Continuity and Change in Finland’s Women, Peace and Security National Action Plans: Liberal peacebuilding, justifications of women’s participation, and Nordic national branding from 2008 to 2023

Abstract

The Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda, grounded in ten United Nations Security Council resolutions, calls on member states to advance women’s participation in conflict prevention and peace processes and to protect women and girls from gendered harms in crises. While the agenda emerged from sustained feminist activism, it has also been subject to extensive feminist critique concerning its transformative potential, its entanglement with liberal peacebuilding, and its reproduction of global power hierarchies. This thesis examines how Finland conceptualises women’s participation and liberal peace within its four National Action Plans (NAPs) for the implementation of the WPS agenda, published in 2008, 2012, 2018 and 2023, and how these conceptualisations have evolved over time. The thesis analysis is guided by liberal peacebuilding theory and feminist critiques of the WPS agenda, allowing the thesis to interrogate how the NAPs justify women’s participation—whether as an intrinsic right or as an instrumental means to strengthen peace processes—and how these justifications align with different models of liberal peacebuilding. Questions of liberal peace conceptualisation, justifications of participation, colonial complicity, and Nordic branding are central to the analytical framework. The study utilises qualitative content analysis (QCA) which enables a systematic examination of recurring themes, shifts in emphasis, and implicit assumptions within the NAPs. The findings show that while Finland’s NAPs have become more intersectional and contextually nuanced over time, they consistently uphold liberal peacebuilding logics that prioritise stability, legitimacy, and institutional effectiveness. Instrumental, effectiveness-based justifications for women’s participation dominate, especially in international and high level contexts. Intrinsic rights based arguments appear more implicitly or at the grassroots level. The NAPs also contribute to Finland’s broader foreign policy branding as a gender equal Nordic state and a responsible peacebuilder, reinforcing soft power aspirations while leaving underlying power structures largely undisturbed. By findings of this research it can be concluded that Finland’s NAPs promote a version of liberal peace that is aspirational in its commitments to inclusion yet constrained by existing institutional and geopolitical frameworks.