The Absence of Masculinity in Gender Training for UN Peacekeepers

This essay seeks to introduce a question about the extent to which existing practices of gender training for peacekeeping personnel include any consideration of masculinity. Is there an available training programs evidence of an attempt on the part of the UN to promote among peacekeeping personnel reflection on the potential impacts of their understandings and applications of masculinity on their peacekeeping work? If it has been recognized that masculinity impacts the behaviors and actions of these personnel in a peacekeeping context as noted above, then surely there is a need for the same personnel to be made aware of this in order for the cultural imperative to be appropriately masculine within one's own culture to become less likely to result in gender-based crimes or biases within the context of peacekeeping operations.