To Be a Mother is to Be a Peacemaker

Or,How Leymah Gbowee Convinced Liberian Women to Fight for Peace

by Viviana Rizzo

“But I’m only a mother”

“Only? Are you sure?”

This is the question that Leymah Gbowee asked to the women of her community who wanted to take a part in building peace in Liberia. 

“And does that seem like nothing for you?”

2011 Nobel Peace Prize winner, Gbowee, is the person who brought peace back in her Country, Liberia, after 14 years of a violent civil war. She led an army of women dressed in white, united in the mass movement named “Liberia’s Women Mass Action for Peace”, Under the aegis of WIPNET, the organization founded by the same Gbowee. They were women so brave that they protested against war lords and pushed them to find a compromise to reach a satisfactory peace agreement. They did it through protests, sit-ins and sex strikes. They succeeded in their efforts by blocking the party delegates inside the conference hall where the negotiation was taking place. Moreover, after the peace agreement was signed, these women also had a major role in post-conflict reconstruction of State institutions, in disarmament and reconciliation processes. They even helped to elect the first woman president in Africa, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

A story of pain and courage was that of Leymah Gbowee. Her youth was framed by the horrors of an armed conflict which seemed to never cease and by the betrayal of a man she thought she could trust, a man who inflicted physical and verbal violence upon her, which destroyed her self-esteem. A struggling mother, afraid, living in the uncertainty of a refugee camp, a life fading under gunshots. She didn’t have an easy life both because of domestic violence and the second civil war, started by the rebel forces that wanted to take the power from Charles Taylor, the dictator who provoked the first one to take control of the country and its precious resources. And yet, where did she find the strength and courage to fight tyrants and war lords? From a gaze: in a refugee camp arranged by the Church of her city, she started to look at the women and mothers from the ethnic groups opposing hers in that time and she understood her suffering is the same of those women, that same fear was her fear, the grief of having lost their husband, brothers, father, children, partner. They were all human. What were the differences? There were none, so why were they destroying each other? After a  dozen years of fighting and violence, it was time to put an end to all of that. The men weren’t inclined to build peace, so it was the women’s moment. Leymah Gbowee, then, decided to bring together all Liberian women, from any classes, religious faith and ethnicity, and to fight for peace. But how? Many of them felt discouraged, scared or even not good enough. Who were they, if not only women, mothers? For Gbowee, there resides their power: their inclination to give care distinguishing the female gender as a consequence of a certain socialization process.

“‘Who are you as a woman?’

‘I’m nobody . . . a mother. A children-mother.’

‘What are the things you do as a mother? Do you work to make money for your children?’

‘Yessss…’

‘Then you are also a provider.’

A smile. ‘Yes. I am a provider.’

‘Do you work in your church?’

‘Yes…’

‘So you are also a leader. Do you help to solve problems in the church? In your community?’

‘Yes, I do’

‘Aaah. So you are a peacemaker’

‘I am! I am a peacemaker!’

Again, the meeting swept us up in excitement”

(from Leymah Gbowee’s “Mighty Be Our Power”, p. 117-118)

According to the scientific literature of the sector, this approach is called maternal activism, that is the adoption and reversal of an essentialist gender definition, which reduces women to their potential to give birth, as a means to produce social change. This approach was successful in a context such as the Liberian war, where traditional imaginary relations related to gender roles still took place, because women become mothers not only of their children, but also of the nation, so they have the right to take care of the future of their country. Here, thus, motherhood is associated with agency and to women’s power because, as they take care of their children, they do it for their whole community.

Indeed, according to Oyeronke Oyewumi (Shin, 2020), motherhood is the foundation of the social, family-related, identity, ideological and ethics structures of African societies. “[Oyewumi] contends that ‘there is no sisterhood without motherhood’ in many African societies, and argues that the concept of motherhood is ‘the most important source and model of solidarity’ by examining the concept of omoya in the Yoruba tradition, which means “my mother’s child or children’” (Shin, 2020:8); a definition that goes beyond the gender and encapsulates the collectivity.

Moreover, other scholars suggest that certain human characteristics that are considered to be feminine (or motherly) could be efficient instruments for Peacebuilding. Betty Reardon in her “Sexism and the War System” said that building a peace system was only possible by the synthesis of those characteristics that she called masculine, such as justice and equality, and the feminine ones, care and equity. Moreover, she asserted women have a better ability to foresee the impacts of actions and choice on people and society and own a holistic vision of the issues in the social and cultural structures of the communities they inhabit. These abilities can be fundamental in peacebuilding efforts, as it was introduced by Johan Galtung, the founder of peace studies, in his Transcend Method: the ideal conflict/peace worker is a woman, because she tends to be more empathic. Empathy, creativity and non-violence are the ingredients of the peaceful transformation of violent conflicts.

Leymah Gbowee was right and that’s how she convinced so many women to join the peace movement. A mother is not only a mother: a woman who takes care of her children acts upon society, because she also cares for her own community and because education is the main tool to build a more just, peaceful and inclusive society.