How Norms Take Shape in United Nations Peacekeeping: The Case of Bangladesh

In your lecture, you outlined that Bangladesh has engaged in UN peacekeeping missions for nearly four decades now. What were the reasons or the incentives for this engagement back then, and what is the situation like today?

Bangladesh became involved in United Nations peacekeeping at the end of the Cold War, a moment of significant transformation in global politics, and a plethora of reasons worked behind it. First, participation enabled Bangladesh to maintain constructive relations with Western powers, particularly the United States of America. Second, it provided an opportunity to show the country as a responsible member of the international community, committed to global peace and security under the auspices of the United Nations. Financial incentives also played a role, particularly in the early years.

Bangladesh’s continued participation today is shaped primarily by foreign policy considerations, adherence to the UN Charter, and the institutional interests of the Bangladesh Armed Forces. Peacekeeping remains central to the country’s international identity and strategic outlook.

What are the central norms the UN requires peacekeeping troops to comply with? How are these norms communicated and conveyed in recruiting, training and preparing personnel for peace missions?

The United Nations emphasises several core norms for peacekeeping personnel: commitment to democratic principles, protection of civilians, respect for human rights, advancement of gender equality, and prevention of gender-based violence. In Bangladesh, these norms are institutionalised through structured pre-deployment training at the Bangladesh Institute of Peace Support Operation Training (BIPSOT). Personnel from the armed forces, police, and civilian sectors undergo specialised courses covering protection of civilians; international humanitarian law; Women, Peace and Security (WPS); conflict-related sexual violence; civil-military coordination; logistics; and language training. The norms covered in training include respect for civilian control of the military, political neutrality, rigorous human rights protection, gender mainstreaming, judicious restraint in the use of force, and robust accountability within multinational command structures. This systematic preparation ensures that peacekeeping norms become operational standards embedded in professional practice.

In the case of Bangladesh, what roles do domestic political cultures as well as military institutions play with regard to compliance with peacekeeping norms? On a different note: in which ways has its long-standing involvement in peacekeeping operations influenced the country’s armed forces, as well as its domestic policy and foreign policy?

This was the focus of my research at the College for Social Sciences and Humanities. I examine how nearly four decades of peacekeeping engagement have shaped Bangladesh’s armed forces and broader policy orientation. Over this period, Bangladeshi personnel have participated in 63 missions across 40 countries. Such sustained exposure has influenced institutional attitudes toward civil-military relations, democratic norms, and gender mainstreaming within the armed forces. For example, the demonstrations in July and August 2024 and the military’s firm position on upholding people’s desire and unwillingness to assume power in spite of prevailing circumstances bear witness to this change.

At the national level, successive governments have prioritised peacekeeping as a key pillar of foreign policy, reiterating Bangladesh’s commitment to the UN Charter and multilateralism. Given that many contemporary missions are located in Africa, Bangladesh has expanded its diplomatic efforts in key African states. Participation has also facilitated professional cooperation with foreign militaries, exposure to international operational standards, and adoption of evolving military practices through joint military exercises, multinational command structures and standardised rules of engagements in peacekeeping missions. Peacekeeping has thus enabled Bangladesh to project a positive international image and, in many ways, to ‘punch above its weight’ in global affairs.

Are there any findings on the attitudes in Bangladesh’s society towards the engagement in UN peacekeeping and the norms advocated by the UN?

Despite Bangladesh’s long-standing involvement in UN peacekeeping, scholarly engagement with the societal dimension remains limited. Some academic work, conducted by myself and colleagues, including Niloy R. Biswas at the University of Dhaka, has explored aspects of this engagement. Both retired and active military officers have also penned down their mission experiences, as a basis for studying various technical and policy aspects of Bangladesh in these missions. However, comprehensive research on how peacekeeping participation has shaped the armed forces institutionally and how the broader public perceives this engagement remains underdeveloped. This represents an important knowledge gap.

As part of its Uniformed Gender Parity Strategy, the UN sets targets for the representation of women in peace operations – how is this being implemented practically in Bangladesh?

Bangladesh played an active role in promoting UN Security Council Resolution 1325, which calls for increased participation of women in peace and security processes. Institutional reforms followed domestically: women were commissioned as officers in 2000 and recruited as soldiers in 2006. Since 2019, Female Engagement Teams have been incorporated into battalion deployments, and women are now routinely included in major contingents. To date, 1,718 Bangladeshi women have participated in UN peace operations, with 373 currently deployed.

To incentivise women, the armed forces offer six months of paid maternity leave, flexible working arrangements, and equal access to military academies and training institutions. Four of the country’s thirteen military schools, known as Cadet Colleges, are exclusively for girls and serve as feeder institutions for recruitment.

Bangladesh has been a strong advocate for gender equality in peacekeeping and has adopted a Defence Action Plan to support the implementation of its National Action Plan (NAP) on Women, Peace and Security (2019–2025). The country took a lead role in the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) in October 2000. Gender Advisor positions and Gender Focal Points have been established to mainstream gender considerations institutionally. As a top contributor to United Nations peacekeeping, Bangladesh continues to prioritise the deployment of women personnel across all mission roles. Since 2018, women peacekeepers have received pre-deployment training at the Bangladesh Institute of Peace Support Operation Training (BIPSOT), which also offers different courses on conflict, gender and security topics. Seminars and workshops to promote dialogue on gender parity in peace operations are held regularly, reflecting the continued resolve of the armed forces to strengthen an inclusive, gender-responsive institution aligned with global standards.

What do we know about how women who are or were active in UN troops are being perceived in Bangladesh’s society?

Bangladesh has demonstrated a sustained institutional commitment to gender mainstreaming within UN peacekeeping. However, progress has unfolded within a broader socio-political environment marked by structural constraints and normative ambivalence. While women are now eligible to serve as officers across all branches of the armed forces, their representation within the rank-and-file remains comparatively limited – though this is gradually evolving. This imbalance is not unique to Bangladesh; rather, it reflects enduring institutional hierarchies and recruitment patterns common to many military establishments globally.

The challenges of gender mainstreaming extend beyond institutional policy into deeper societal norms. Prevailing expectations regarding women’s primary responsibilities within the family, combined with protectionist attitudes toward women in security roles, continue to shape both recruitment and deployment patterns. Whilst a few, mostly Western countries, have slowly moved towards greater parity across the board on military and police duties performed by women, most South Asian countries contest such gender mainstreaming. In several contexts, reluctance to place women in combat or politically sensitive assignments is often justified through narratives of biological vulnerability or through symbolic constructions of women as bearers of national honour and communal identity. These deeply rooted cultural frames complicate efforts to normalise women’s full-spectrum participation in military institutions.

Empirical evidence shows the persistence of structural barriers. A 2022 study conducted by the Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance, Cornell University (USA), and the Elsie Initiative, collaborating with scholars from the University of Dhaka, applied the Measuring Opportunities for Women in Peace Operations (MOWIP) framework to Bangladesh. It identified several obstacles to meaningful participation: the relatively small number of women within the armed forces, enduring societal expectations regarding domestic roles, and the persistence of ‘gender protection norms’, which assume that women soldiers require heightened protection.