The Small Arms Survey 2014: Women and Guns considers the multiple roles of women in the context of armed violence, security, and the small arms agenda. It covers the topics of violence against women and girls, the recent convergence of the small arms agenda with that of women, peace, and security and the potential impact of the Arms Trade Treaty, among others. It also includes testimonies of women with experience as soldiers, rebels, and security personnel.
Key findings:
Violence against women and girls (VAWG)
- Rates of domestic violence are higher wherever it is socially accepted as a justified response to household disputes.
- Attitudes that condone VAWG often pre-date conflicts, but they are reinforced during wars and often persist long past the formal cessation of hostilities.
- In Liberia, women are twice as likely as men to assert that a husband is sometimes justified in beating his wife, suggesting that many women have been socialized to accept domestic violence.
- In Nepal, the caste system, ethnic and economic cleavages, and the profile of the victim appear to influence the type and prevalence of VAWG. For example, women from marginalized groups are at a notably elevated risk of experiencing some type of victimization in their lifetimes.
- At the global level, development sector practitioners seek to change social norms that influence VAWG; these efforts are seen as an indispensable step towards improving the security of women and girls over the long term.
Women, peace, and security
- Until 2013, the UN Security Council resolutions (UNSCRs) on women, peace, and security, aside from references to disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR), were silent on the topics of small arms and disarmament.
- Key actors have linked four mandates in the UNSCRs on women, peace, and security to small arms, namely the protection of civilians, including from sexual violence; women’s participation in peace and security decision-making; supporting local women’s peace and conflict resolution initiatives; and DDR.
- While one-quarter of existing national action plans for the implementation of UNSCR 1325 refer to small arms, they rarely operationalize this policy linkage by requiring concrete actions. Likewise, while national action plans on small arms occasionally mention women, they do not translate this into required actions.
The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT)
- The compromises necessary for agreement on the treaty text have left the ATT with few unqualified legal obligations.
- The ATT covers a broad range of transfer-related activities and items, but an absence of definitions and a lack of prescriptive detail may result in uneven and inconsistent implementation.
- The ATT makes a significant contribution to existing legal frameworks by introducing new standards for the international transfer of conventional arms. These gains are, however, more modest in comparison with existing small arms control measures.
- As the treaty applies to exporting and non-exporting states alike, the latter have been and will continue to be involved in ATT-related arms transfer discussions, as well as in the development of global norms to curb irresponsible arms transfers.
Authorized small arms transfers
- In 2011, the top exporters of small arms and light weapons (those with annual exports of at least USD 100 million), according to available customs data, were (in descending order) the United States, Italy, Germany, Brazil, Austria, Switzerland, Israel, the Russian Federation, South Korea, Belgium, China, Turkey, Spain, and the Czech Republic.
- In 2011, the top importers of small arms and light weapons (those with annual imports of at least USD 100 million), according to available customs data, were (in descending order) the United States, Canada, Germany, Australia, Thailand, the United Kingdom, France, and Italy.
- The value of the global trade in small arms and light weapons almost doubled between 2001 and 2011, according to the UN Commodity Trade Statistics Database (UN Comtrade). The category of small arms ammunition has seen the greatest increase (USD 959 million or 205 per cent).
Transparency in the small arms trade
- The 2014 edition of the Small Arms Trade Transparency Barometer identifies Switzerland, Germany, Serbia, and the United Kingdom as the most transparent of the major exporters, while Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates are the least transparent.
- Although overall transparency improved slightly since last year, with more countries improving or maintaining their level of transparency than not, the Barometer shows that more than half of the countries under review do not provide any information on licences granted or refused, despite the categories’ overall importance to transparency.
- The ATT offers an important opportunity to increase transparency of small arms transfers. Yet, to achieve this goal, ATT reporting needs to take its inspiration not only from the UN Register of Conventional Arms, but also from UN Comtrade and national arms export reports.