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This article considers the role and influence of women’s groups and larger national women’s social movements during two different constitutional moments: the lead-up to the finalisation of the 1982 patriation of the Canadian Constitution and the lead-up to the 1998 Good Friday agreement in Northern Ireland. We argue that while women were successful in ensuring women’s participation and consideration of women’s issues in these constitutional negotiations, those accomplishments did not lead to a significant increase of women’s representation in formal politics. In both the Canadian government-sponsored National Action Committee on the Status of Women and the political party, the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition, women’s descriptive representation in formal politics did not improve dramatically as a result of women’s participation in either constitutional process which suggests the need for guarantees of greater representation, such as what women’s electoral quotas would constitute. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay offers an explanation for how and why women's rights are included in contemporary peace agreements. I identify six causal mechanisms by which women secured participation and women's rights in the peace processes of Burundi (1998-2000) and Northern Ireland (1996-98). First, violent conflict and peace talks produce the conditions of 'grievance' and 'optimism' necessary for social movement mobilization. Second, women use 'procedural grafting' to demand inclusion in peace processes. Third, they use 'strategic essentialism' to overcome the ethno-political divisions of the conflict. Fourth, women call upon relevant practices used in peace processes of the Global South. Fifth, high-level actors may influence peace processes to further international objectives. Sixth, women's involvement with transnational feminist networks facilitates the reproduction of international human rights language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]