Description
Much work on accountability in security governance neglects the critical role and concept of integrity, which refers to the moral values, norms and rules underpinning the behaviour of individuals, institutions and organisations and the processes and procedures of policy implementation. Integrity is commonly connected to anti-corruption work, and increasingly in security sector reform and governance spaces. Yet, it has a wider application and relevance. Through a case study on UN responses to peacekeeper-perpetrated SEA, this paper argues that integrity is a useful lens for analysing practices of implementation of frameworks and responses to gender and protection issues in security governance. An integrity approach connects values underpinning norms in gender and protection frameworks to specific sets of practices to promote and address violations of these values. This paper makes a conceptual contribution to the literature on gender and protection by centring and integrity lens that allows exploration of how normative and ethical ideals are translated into specific practices, processes and institutions that are themselves shaped by value-based behaviours. It makes an analytical contribution by applying the concept and practice of an integrity system to analysing how implementation of policies and frameworks happens.
