Thursday, Mar 5, 2020 • 26min
Madeleine Albright on Women, Foreign Policy and the Role of Technology
Play Episode
As the first woman to be US Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright knows better than anyone about the challenges women face to get their voice heard and the importance of using their power for purpose. Listen to her conversation with Melanne Verveer at the Seneca Women Forum at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Read more
Talking about
Speakers
(3)
Madeleine Albright
Melanne Verveer
Kim Azzarelli
Transcript
Verified
Break
Melanne Verveer
01:49
Hi, this is
Melanne Verveer
.Share
Kim Azzarelli
01:59
And this is Kim Azzarelli.
Share
Melanne Verveer
02:00
We are co-authors of the book Fast Forward: How Women can Achieve Power and Purpose.
Share
Kim Azzarelli
02:06
And you're listening to Seneca Women: Conversations on Power and Purpose, brought to you by the Seneca Women Podcast Network and
iHeart Radio
. We are so excited to bring you this podcast, because we know we're at a unique moment in history where women are critical to driving both economic and social progress.Share
02:24
Now, let's get started with the conversation between
Melanne
and Madeleine Albright
, the first woman to be the US Secretary of State. We'll hear how Secretary Albright
first got the job, what it's like to be the only woman in a room with male leaders, and how tech is changing women's lives. Plus, her advice for any woman who wants to make her voice heard. And stick around after the conversation for our top takeaways. We'll be back after this break.Share
Break
Melanne Verveer
06:36
Secretary
Albright
, we are absolutely thrilled to have you with us today. We all know that you're an extraordinary leader in the area of global affairs and foreign policy
. But I know personally you're an extraordinary advocate for women's leadership, women's political participation.Share
06:57
You chair the
National Endowment For Democracy
. You really put your own power and your own experience to promote women's leadership. Maybe you could tell us how you do that and why you do that.Share
Madeleine Albright
07:12
Well, Ambassador
Verveer
, we do do that to each other. I'm delighted to be here and to have the opportunity to talk about all this. And I have to say that it is clear to me that when women are out there, and we're all working hard, we do it together, not against each other. And I think that is a very important part.Share
07:34
I am so grateful for all the things that happened. And I know I'm not supposed to say I was lucky, but basically I did manage to have my credentials together at a time that people were looking for the one woman. And so I was able to kind of parlay one thing to another.
Share
07:56
But I have to say that one of the best things, and you and I will agree on this, is that we had an opportunity to work for and with the Clintons, who believed in the fact that women should be able to pursue careers and have a chance to show what we can do together. So I'm very grateful to them.
Share
Melanne Verveer
08:15
And what is it that you do at
NDI
to promote women's political participation?Share
Madeleine Albright
08:21
Well, let me explain a little bit. Actually what is interesting, we're about to celebrate our 35th anniversary. The national, what happened was
President Reagan
was in London
speaking at Parliament, and he was saying that democracies were not real good about explaining themselves vis a vis communism. So he came back to the United States
and he started the Endowment For Democracy
, which has four institutes, Democrats and Republicans, Business and Labor.Share
08:48
And I was the original vice. chair, democratically put into place by FIAT. But what happened is, we were trying to really figure out what we needed to do, and one of the things that we have concentrated on more than anything else is how to support women, women candidates in all over the world. And we are working on that now in a number of countries, explaining how the nuts and bolts of democracy work and how societies are better off when women are politically empowered.
Share
09:20
I have to say that when I became secretary, I was the first one to put women's issues central to American
foreign policy,
and not just because I'm a feminist
, but I do believe that women, that societies are better off when women are economically and politically empowered. And then Secretary Clinton
took it to a whole, with you, a whole other level. But that was the part of it.Share
09:43
Something that we're doing now with
the
United Nations
is to explain that even when we were able to support women, there still is a lot of harassment, and very dangerous. And so with the UN
we have started something called "not the cost". Is to really show that we need to support women as they are being harassed for running for office. And so it's not just a matter of getting people to run, but to be supportive, and it does make a huge difference. And NDI
is very much the center of that.Share
Melanne Verveer
10:16
You know, it really is difficult for women in politics. And I remember a woman in
Africa
saying to me, you know, she wanted to run for the Parliament. She said, "they say to you, well, if you have a family, why aren't you with the family, and if you don't have a family there's something wrong with you. " So she said either way you can't win.Share
10:38
But when you were ambassador to the
United Nations
for the United States,
and I know that when you arrived at the UN
there weren't too many female ambassadors. But being that you were representing the United States
, you were in a very strong position of leadership. How did you support the few other women ambassadors?Share
Madeleine Albright
10:60
Let me just say it was one of the, there were 183 countries at the
UN
when I was there. And it was one of the first times I didn't have to cook lunch myself, so I asked my assistant to invite the other women to the residence, so that I could meet them. And I get there and there's 6 other women out of the 183. There was Canada,
Philippines
, Kazakhstan,
Trinidad Tobago
, Jamaica
, Liechtenstein
and me.Share
Melanne Verveer
11:28
All these years later, she remembers.
Share
Madeleine Albright
11:29
So, what happened was, being the American, I created a caucus, and we called ourselves the G7. We agreed that we would always stay in touch and take each other's telephone calls. So what happened all of a sudden, one of the male ambassadors at the
UN
said "why would you be talking to Liechtenstein
? " And I said well, have yourself replaced by a woman, and I'll be very happy to take your call whenever you want.Share
12:02
But the thing that we did do we did become very good friends and supported each other in so many ways. But the interesting part is what we were able to do, because at that stage we were dealing with the issues in
Bosnia
where women were being terrorized and raped and made into refugees. And so we lobbied to get women judges on the war crimes tribunal, and we did manage to get two women judges.Share
12:27
Later we did a lot of things to do with
HIV
and AIDS
and really did try to use our power as the G7. Now there are many more women, and also women ambassadors in Washington
, but never enough, and women foreign ministers. But I think that we really need to keep pursuing that.Share
12:46
By the way, I'm gonna tell one other story about the
UN
. I think many people have heard me on this subject, and I think we've all had this experience. You're in a meeting, you're the only woman in the room, and you decide that you're going to say something and then you think "well, everybody will think it's stupid, so I won't say it". And then some man says it, and everybody thinks it's brilliant, and you're really mad at yourself.Share
13:08
And so that happened to me earlier in my government career, before the Clinton administration. And then I taught at
Georgetown
, and I tried to explain to my students that they, everybody, had to learn to interrupt. Nobody was going to raise their hands in class. My classes are a bit of a zoo, but I really have said they have to do that.Share
13:30
But the story is the following. I get to the
United Nations
, I am the only woman on the Security Council
, and most of the meetings don't take place in that fancy room, but in a room in the back. And I sit down and people start talking about a subject and I thought, well, I don't know, I won't talk today until I figure out if they like me or not. And then I saw the sign in front of me said United States
. And I thought "if I don't speak today, the voice of the United States
will not be heard, and you've got to speak".Share
Melanne Verveer
14:07
So, speaking of that, I wonder when you assume the position as the first female head of the State Department, our Foreign Minister around the world, whether you felt it was any kind of super responsibility, in a way beyond the responsibility of any Secretary of State. But being the first woman, was that extra pressure, was it?
Share
Madeleine Albright
14:33
Well, first of all, I didn't believe I'd ever be Secretary of State. What happened was
Warren Christopher,
who had been Secretary of State, made clear he was going to not be there for a second term. And so the period of the great mentioning started happening. And my name was out there, and somebody said well, a woman couldn't be Secretary of State because Arab countries would not deal with it, with an American woman.Share
14:56
And so what happened was the Arab ambassadors at the
UN
got together and they put out a statement saying, "we've had no problems dealing with Ambassador Albright
. We wouldn't have any problems with Secretary Albright
. " Then, what happened, somebody at the White House
and I never want to know who, said, "Yeah, Madeleine's
on the list, but she's second tier. "Share
Melanne Verveer
15:18
And that was the quote?
Share
Madeleine Albright
15:20
It was the quote in the post. So I never thought I'd get to be Secretary of State and I was thrilled to be. And I know as a fact that the only reason I was, was because of
Hillary
. And the reason I know that is because President Clinton
said so publicly when we were abroad one time. We had this stick, we often travel together, and I would introduce her, and she would introduce him.Share
15:43
And he actually said that during this period of the great mentioning,
Hillary
would come to him and say, "Why wouldn't you name Madeline? She's closest to your views and expresses them better than anybody else. And besides, it would make your mother happy. " So that is how it happened.Share
15:58
But partially, and I'm not just saying this because I'm sitting with you and
Hillary
is coming on, is that the partnership that we all had and the support that we have for each other, I think made a very, very big difference. The thing that happened, one of my first trips actually, was to the Gulf Cooperation Council Meeting, it was in Kuwait
.Share
16:18
And I'm sitting there with the other Foreign Ministers, and they end up by saying, you know, this was a great meeting. I said, well perhaps you've noticed I'm not dressed exactly as my predecessors have been, and thank you very much, you've been very kind to me, and next time we'll talk about women's rights. And we did.
Share
16:37
And I did feel that I was representing a great country and that I had a huge opportunity to show that we were able to do what we had to do. I did work hard, and I did believe that I had to deliver, and I think there were advantages to it. But there was always the issue of how you go to a country and start a conversation and say what you have to? Which mostly like what you have to, has to do with human rights and women's rights.
Share
17:05
So I'd be somewhere, and I'd be nice and charming as best I could. And all of a sudden I'd say "I've come a long way, so I must be frank". And so I really told it like it is. But there was a responsibility about being the first woman, there's no question.
Share
Melanne Verveer
17:21
So you then succeeded to lead the way for two other women to be named Secretary of State in fairly short order, given a 20-year span. And it was certainly a trailblazing recognition that of the role that you started and then others followed. And I understand, and maybe you could tell us if this is true, that your granddaughter was hearing you one night opine about this great role that you had played. Was she impressed?
Share
Madeleine Albright
17:59
No. What happened was my granddaughter, about eight years ago, when she was seven, said to her mother "So what's the big deal about grandma Maddie being Secretary of State? Only girls are Secretary of State. " And so in her lifetime there have been
Condi
and Hillary
, you know. And since then, actually, I have said there are some little boys out there who have been impressed by the fact that a man can be Secretary of State, sort of.Share
Melanne Verveer
18:33
We have really achieved something when we don't have to comment on the first anymore, when it can become normal. We're talking here a lot today about
technology
and innovation. Have you experienced um the importance of technology
in terms of advancing the kinds of things that you've been working on, particularly for women?Share
Madeleine Albright
18:56
No question, has made a huge difference. And I have been very interested in my role, first with the
National Democratic Institute
, about how democratizing technology
really can be or should be, in terms of allowing information to people and really connecting people in many ways.Share
19:15
I do think, and I talk about this all the time, is that
technology
has made it possible, I sometimes talk about the woman Kenyan farmer who no longer has to walk miles to pay her bills, she can do it with her phone. Which has changed the possibilities of her life not only with her family, but the possibilities of having employment of a variety of different kinds. And I think it really has made a difference.Share
19:44
And also um in terms of women being able to create businesses, whether it's in
India
or the Middle East
, and a lot of that does have to do with technology
. There are upsides and downsides to technology
, and one of the things I've talked about is, and this speaks to the larger things that are going on in the world, there are two megatrends out there. One is globalization
uh and the other is technology
.Share
20:10
They both have positive and downsides to them. So, on
globalization
, I think most of us are beneficiaries of it, but it's faceless. And so people do want to know what their identities are. We all want to know our ethnic, religious, linguistic. And that's patriotic. But if my identity hates your identity, it's very dangerous. And nationalism and hyper nationalism is very, very dangerous.Share
20:36
The other is
technology,
which is positive for all the reasons that we've already spoken about, but it also has a downside. It has disaggregated voices, and I sometimes talk about Egypt
on this, is that people were summoned to Tahrir Square
by social media. The issue is that they were all in their kind of echo chambers, and only listened to what they already knew. And God forbid I should say this, but I think the elections in Egypt
were held too soon.Share
21:06
And so um the
Muslim Brotherhood
was organized, the people in Tahrir Square
were not, and the Muslim Brotherhood
wins and there were results from that. And so I think we need to understand the positives and negatives of technology
.Share
21:20
And by the way, I used this line fairly frequently, and I always say it's completely plagiarized from
Silicon Valley
, but it explains so well, what is going on. People are talking to their governments on 21st century technology
, the governments listen to them on 20th century technology
, and provide 19th century responses. So there's no faith in institutions.Share
21:45
So, well, there's a lot. And then I've just been at some seminars on
artificial intelligence
. I do think that we have not fully understood the impact of technology
on all our economies, and we need to grasp what artificial intelligence
is going to do even more, and how we deal with that as societies.Share
Melanne Verveer
22:06
Well, and I know one of the things troubling about
AI
is who's doing the inputting and where is the presence of women in this field. Because what's gonna come out is going to be essentially what was put in. And you won't have the kind of predominant or even fair representation, like is in this room.Share
Madeleine Albright
22:30
I do think that some of us are not, by the way, my classmates are here, and I went to
Wellesley
at sometime between the invention of the iPad and the discovery of fire. It should be true of you guys too. But I do think that those of us, and by the way, you know, we talk an awful lot about millennials, I'm a perennial. And so what we have to do is figure out how to use the technology
for the improvement of all of us.Share
Melanne Verveer
23:03
But it truly has become even a big
foreign policy
issue in terms of it being used for radicalization by violent extremists. What's happened in terms, not just in the United States
, but around Europe
in terms of trying to change elections, in a way that is truly interfering. So there's a lot that was not on the foreign policy
issue that is now.Share
Madeleine Albright
23:28
Very much so, and I think people need to understand very well. You and I are both at
Georgetown
and I think we have talked about what the curriculum for people that are in the larger field of international affairs has to be. And, you know, it isn't just taking political science and history, what we have to do is understand health issues, issues to do with any kind of scientific thing, the world is not flat.Share
23:57
And I think there are any aspects of that curriculum that we have to work on, so that people really are prepared to have the discussions About
AI
and global warming
and all the various aspects that are going on and the health issues. So it's a growth industry in the field, and it needs women. I really believe that, in terms of moving forward to get something that we want in the 21st century instead of the mess that's going on now. That, by the way, is a diplomatic term of art.Share
Melanne Verveer
24:27
You know, you never stop. You're a force of nature. And it's hard to keep track of you of any at any given time. And we also knew you're an author, and everybody has gotten your book today called "Fascism"-
Share
Madeleine Albright
24:42
Thank you.
Share
Melanne Verveer
24:45
Uh, "Fascism, a warning". And I wonder if you could tell us why you wrote it, and maybe people will get into the book that much faster when they leave here.
Share
Madeleine Albright
24:56
Well, first of all, it has a very bland title. And some people think it's alarmist, and it's supposed to be. And the reason I wrote it, I actually was going to write it no matter who had gotten elected, because I felt very much that there were divisions in our society, created some by
technology
and not a full understanding of it. And I really speeded up the writing of it, more after the election. And It is supposed to be, I decided that it had to be historical.Share
25:29
A lot of it is uh personal to me. I was born in
Czechoslovakia
in 1937 and the Nazis came in in 1939. And a lot of people died as a result of fascism. As it turns out, I learned 38 members of my family did. And so, I think that, so it was very personal, but also I thought it needed to be put into historic context. So I begin with Mussolini,
and then Hitler,
and then I Franco
.Share
25:59
And then I talk about various places now in the world where I'm very worried by the dictatorial, authoritarian leaders. And the best quote in the book, actually, comes from
Mussolini
. And he said, "If you pluck a chicken one feather at a time, nobody notices".Share
26:19
So there's a lot of feather plucking going on now, and you can't say those words too quickly together. Yeah, but I do think there is a warning about the kinds of things that are going on. And I have, the part that I learned in writing the book is
Mussolini
, Hitler
and Franco
came to power constitutionally.Share
26:46
Mussolini
, there were complications with party politics in the end of World War I,
and King Emmanuel turned power over to him. Hitler
, there were various issues going on in Germany
. Some as a result of the Versailles Treaty
, some financial and the Weimar Republic
wasn't strong. So Von Hindenburg
turned power over to Hitler.
Then also in Spain
. There was a weak government that folded and the King there turned it over to Franco
.Share
27:14
The countries that I write about now, starting with
Orbán
in Hungary
, and what's going on in Poland
and in the Philippines
with Duterte,
and Turkey
with Erdogan
and Chávez
and Maduro
in Venezuela
. They were all elected. And I think it's only, and I do say, the communism is also fascism. There they had revolutions, but all the other ones were people that were elected. And I think we need to understand what the conditions are that create this.Share
27:45
You know, we're all familiar with that saying, see something, say something. I have added something to that, which is do something. We cannot normalize what is going on. And my to-do list really does include saying, it is very important for there to be freedom of the press, the press is not the enemy of the people, to have a judicial branch that is judicious. And to not think that our leaders can be above the law.
Share
28:19
And then I do think people need to run for office or support those that do. And then, something that I think is actually hard to do, which is to talk with the people that we disagree with. I don't like the word tolerance, because it's tolerate, put up with. I think we need to respect those views. I don't want to be in an echo chamber. I want to learn a lot.
Share
28:45
By the way, you should all be glad that you live here and not in
Washington
. Because in Washington
I listen to right wing radio as I drive, and do a little yelling and a few hand gestures, and so it's possible that I'm dangerous.Share
Melanne Verveer
28:59
It may be the secret of longevity!
Share
Madeleine Albright
29:01
But then I don't think there's ever been a book or a speech that doesn't quote
Robert Frost
. So my quote is, the older I get, the younger are my teachers. And I think we need to support those young people that marched because of Parkland
and all that. That's what we need to be.Share
Melanne Verveer
29:20
Well, Madam Secretary, we're glad you're perennial and may you continue to lead. And thank you.
Share
Madeleine Albright
29:31
Thank you
Share
Kim Azzarelli
29:40
Stay tuned for our takeaways after this break.
Share
Break
Melanne Verveer
30:53
That was an incredible conversation with
Madeleine Albright
. It's really worth checking out her book, "Fascism: a warning". A couple of important takeaways.Share
31:03
First, sometimes to make your voice heard, you have to learn to interrupt. Secretary
Albright
teaches at Georgetown
, and she insists that her students interrupt in class. Second. it's not just enough to speak up. Everyone knows the saying "see something, say something". Secretary Albright
ads "do something". Finally, we have to talk with the people we disagree with. As Secretary Albright
suggests, it's important that we try to respect other people's views.Share
Add podcast
🇮🇹 Made with love & passion in Italy. 🌎 Enjoyed everywhere
Build n. 1.36.0
Melanne Verveer
Kim Azzarelli
Madeleine Albright