This is a collaborative effort by PRIO and Indian partners, including Malaviya Centre for Peace Research (MCPR) at Banaras Hindu University, Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group (CRG), Women in Security, Conflict Management and Peace (WISCOMP) and North Eastern Social Research Centre (NESRC).

Our goal is to investigate what women’s empowerment might mean in different contexts, especially in protracted conflict without third party mediation in Northeast India, and a post-conflict setting with heavy multilateral and international involvement in Nepal. We approach this question by studying how gendered political power is transformed in conflict, assuming that differences in the forms and expressions of gendered power relations during and after conflict impact on how ‘empowerment’ might be achieved.