What? The project seeks to understand how expertise and professionalisation shape African regional WPS goals and implementation practices. In light of the previously activist aims of including women in conflict resolution and peacebuilding, this project investigates how the formalization of women, peace and security (WPS) agenda is enacted by the African Union and its civil society networks. Why? Considering African women’s role in advocating for women’s inclusion in peace and security governance, multiple conflicts on the continent and the African Union’s strong WPS agenda, we need to better understand the formalization of WPS in African institutions. This project taps into the debates around the negative effects of professionalisation and institutionalisation of an activist agenda. How? Theoretically, the project develops the theory of aspirational politics to understand the dynamic relationship between activist pressures and international organizations. Methodologically, this project uses multi-sited political ethnography which involves document analysis, key interlocutor interviews with African Union and regional civil society WPS actors as well as observations.