Speaker 1: Hi, This is Milan Vervier and this is Kim Azarelli.
Speaker 1: We are co authors of the book Fast Forward, How
Speaker 1: Women Can Achieve Power and Purpose. And you're listening to
Speaker 1: Seneca Women Conversations on Power and Purpose, brought to you
Speaker 1: by the Seneca Women Podcast Network and I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Mary Robinson shows what happens when women lead. She made
Speaker 1: history when she was elected the first woman President of Ireland.
Speaker 1: She's also served as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
Speaker 1: as well as the Special Envoy of the U N
Speaker 1: Secretary General for Climate Change, and today she continues to
Speaker 1: use her power for purpose as a leading advocate for
Speaker 1: climate justice. Mary sat down with Milan at the Seneca
Speaker 1: Women Forum at Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the conversation
Speaker 1: is just as relevant today. Listen to why climate change
Speaker 1: is a woman's issue, why women's leadership is crucial to
Speaker 1: creating the world we want to see, and what every
Speaker 1: one of us can do to help all women succeed.
Speaker 1: Enjoy our conversation and stick around for our top takeaways.
Speaker 1: President Mary Robinson, the first woman President of Ireland. M So, Mary,
Speaker 1: you not only were president of your country, you were
Speaker 1: the High UN Commissioner for Human Rights. You are currently
Speaker 1: the U n Special Envoy for Climate This has been
Speaker 1: a very busy time for Mary here in New York.
Speaker 1: You were the recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Speaker 1: And if I go on and on as I surely could,
Speaker 1: we wouldn't have much of a conversation. So I will
Speaker 1: go to a sub jeck that I think is much
Speaker 1: on our mind today and one in which you are
Speaker 1: an extraordinary leader, and that's climate change. We have been
Speaker 1: horrified by the power and force of the recent hurricanes
Speaker 1: and the destruction that lay in the wake of them,
Speaker 1: the catastrophic fire storms and droughts that are cropping up
Speaker 1: in places that never experienced that, And I think many
Speaker 1: of us are very very concerned about are we doing enough?
Speaker 1: What could we be doing, what should we be doing.
Speaker 1: You have been involved in this issue for many, many
Speaker 1: years now, and maybe we could start this conversation about
Speaker 1: how you began, Where did it start with you, and
Speaker 1: how did you become involved in it? Well, Milan, it's
Speaker 1: nice of you to say many many years, but actually
Speaker 1: I'm a relative newcomer. I served as you and High
Speaker 1: Commissioner for Human Rights for five years from two seven
Speaker 1: to two thousand and two, and I never made any
Speaker 1: significant speech on climate because it has been dealt with
Speaker 1: by another part of the u N. We were in
Speaker 1: silos and it was only after my term as High
Speaker 1: Commissioner I established a small organization here in New York
Speaker 1: called Realizing Rights to work on economic and social rights
Speaker 1: in African countries. Had colleagues and at the Aspen Institute
Speaker 1: in Washington, night colleagues in Geneva. Small number, but we
Speaker 1: were working on right to health, right to food. And
Speaker 1: I was also unrepresident of ox FAM, so ox FAM
Speaker 1: wire wheeling me out as well around Africa, and from
Speaker 1: two thousand and two to two thousand and eight I
Speaker 1: kept hearing this constant phrase, things are so much worse,
Speaker 1: and the worst was we don't know. Went to sel
Speaker 1: we don't know, went to harvest we we we saw
Speaker 1: and then the rainy season doesn't come, or we get
Speaker 1: monsoon rains when we shouldn't and flash flooding and then
Speaker 1: long periods of drought and all over Africa. And this
Speaker 1: was way before in the developed world we fully realized
Speaker 1: that climate change wasn't something of the future, it was now.
Speaker 1: And I remember being before Copenhagen OXFAM organized these hearings
Speaker 1: with climate witnesses, if you like. And I was on
Speaker 1: a jury with my dear friend, our spishop two two,
Speaker 1: and we had five African farmers talking to us, and
Speaker 1: I saw that too, too, was getting very depressed at
Speaker 1: their very real stories of how bad it was in
Speaker 1: different parts of Africa. And I said, well, look, I
Speaker 1: come from the west of Ireland. My father was a
Speaker 1: doctor and he used to bring me out on long
Speaker 1: medical calls because I was the only girl wedged between
Speaker 1: four brothers. That's how I got interested in human rights
Speaker 1: and gender and all that. But but you know, we
Speaker 1: would meet the farming community and inevitably, whatever the weather,
Speaker 1: the farmers would complain. So I said to these five
Speaker 1: African farmers, you know, is this just a little bit worse?
Speaker 1: But you know, are you just complaining like farmers do?
Speaker 1: And I remember Constance of Kellett, who became a friend afterwards,
Speaker 1: from a northern Uganda rising tall woman, rising to a
Speaker 1: full house and saying, in a very deliberate voice, this
Speaker 1: is outside our experience. And it was a very telling phrase,
Speaker 1: because the experience of a small village is probably a
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty years if you count grandparents talking to grandchildren,
Speaker 1: talking to their children. You know. So there's a long
Speaker 1: experience and this was outside their experience and it has
Speaker 1: become worse and we now see the devastation, as you say,
Speaker 1: in the Caribbean. So one of the things you have
Speaker 1: really focused on in this process, besides the justice component,
Speaker 1: which is incredibly important, is women's leadership in climate Can
Speaker 1: you tell us a little bit more about what we
Speaker 1: can be doing, what we should be doing well. I
Speaker 1: established a foundation on climate justice because I could see
Speaker 1: the injustice of climate change, the disproportionate impact on poor
Speaker 1: countries and poor communities and rich countries. The poor communities
Speaker 1: that were hit by Katrina, that were hit by Sunday
Speaker 1: that took much longer to recover, that have been hitting
Speaker 1: now in Florida and in Texas and all the more
Speaker 1: so in Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands and
Speaker 1: the rest of the of the Caribbean. And who's picking
Speaker 1: up the pieces? That's what I learned. Who puts food
Speaker 1: on the table, who has to go further into out
Speaker 1: for water, and who forms a women's group to try
Speaker 1: and make her community resilient. That's happening all over the world.
Speaker 1: Women are becoming the frontline defenders of their communities in
Speaker 1: the context of climate change. And what we decided in
Speaker 1: can Kun, the Conference on Climate just after Copenhagen. Copenhagen
Speaker 1: was regarded as a sort of failure. It was just
Speaker 1: saved from being a failure by an accord, but it
Speaker 1: wasn't within the UN system. To the great credit, Mexico
Speaker 1: in Cancun brought it back into the UN system and
Speaker 1: started the road, the long road to Paris of several conferences.
Speaker 1: And in Cancun we realized that three women had presided
Speaker 1: over conferences, and Connie Headguard had presided at Copenhagen, and
Speaker 1: down Mark might and Patricia Espinosa and was going to
Speaker 1: preside or it was in the process presiding in can
Speaker 1: Kuhn and Mighty Masheban would have the next one in Durban,
Speaker 1: and they it was actually Patricia Espinosa said, why don't
Speaker 1: we form a troika of women leaders and make it
Speaker 1: women ministers, women heads of agencies. And we decided to
Speaker 1: have a few male ministers, but we keep men decidedly
Speaker 1: in their place. You know, a minority, a supportive minority,
Speaker 1: which they should be. And U and it's become a
Speaker 1: very real focal point within the system of these annual
Speaker 1: climate conferences, the most important of which, of course was Paris.
Speaker 1: And we've met before these and we've planned and because
Speaker 1: these are women ministers they're at the table, and women
Speaker 1: heads of agencies, they know how to move that agenda.
Speaker 1: And we've just had a meeting here that you were at.
Speaker 1: We meet at seven in the morning, key to getting
Speaker 1: business seven in the morning out by about eight thirty,
Speaker 1: and it's very good. People turn up, we get our
Speaker 1: business done and then they go off to do their
Speaker 1: their other business. And we have managed to get gender
Speaker 1: parity as a principle in the cop we're now working
Speaker 1: on a gender action plan. And why is it important
Speaker 1: For the reasons that I was giving, It is just
Speaker 1: so starkly evident that when you undermine poor livelihoods, it
Speaker 1: is women who literally have to pick up the pieces.
Speaker 1: So the troika of women leaders at the ministerial heads
Speaker 1: of agency level are now focusing on getting grassroots women
Speaker 1: in at the table so they can tell their stories
Speaker 1: because a lot of the climate discussion has become very
Speaker 1: technical and very abstract, and if you don't have the
Speaker 1: real human story there people don't understand, and we've been
Speaker 1: successful in bringing that story more and more, and I
Speaker 1: would love to see it really part of the actual
Speaker 1: gender way of going forward. It's a women's issue as
Speaker 1: much as any other women and the stories that women
Speaker 1: can tell as frontline defenders are really impactful. They change
Speaker 1: in the dynamic, so from climate to high level political leadership,
Speaker 1: this is one of the areas women succeeding at the
Speaker 1: highest levels in politics, including parliaments, including so many other
Speaker 1: critical positions. It's the most difficult place for us still,
Speaker 1: it's where we've made the least progress. Do you have
Speaker 1: a sense of how we can accelerate things a little bit? Well,
Speaker 1: I can certainly share what was my feeling when I
Speaker 1: was elected President of Ireland, and I felt it was
Speaker 1: so important to do it proudly as a woman, an
Speaker 1: advantage to be a woman that I drew on the strength. Now,
Speaker 1: the presidency in Ireland is not like here in the
Speaker 1: United States or in many other countries. It's an non
Speaker 1: executive presidency, so it's actually a more subtle form of power.
Speaker 1: It's a moral leadership because the real political power is
Speaker 1: with the Prime Minister, whom we call the Tichuk and
Speaker 1: the government, the cabinet government. But the president has real
Speaker 1: powers under the constitution and most importantly is directly elected
Speaker 1: by the people. And that is what I found so
Speaker 1: interesting and so intriguing and what and I found it
Speaker 1: really important to understand the importance of symbols. And I
Speaker 1: said on the night of my election, and all the
Speaker 1: incredible excitement because I was going against the odds. There
Speaker 1: were odds of a hundred to one against me winning,
Speaker 1: and I didn't even back myself, you know. But but
Speaker 1: on that night I said that I would put a
Speaker 1: light in the window of my official residence for all
Speaker 1: of those who had to emigrate from Ireland. Over the
Speaker 1: years and over the decades, that light took on a
Speaker 1: life of its own. It was in the kitchen, you
Speaker 1: could see it from the public road, and it's somehow
Speaker 1: helped to shape an Irish identity, helped us to build
Speaker 1: a peace process and understand that we had to be
Speaker 1: open to the other, open more and um, you know,
Speaker 1: it was, it was and it was very good for
Speaker 1: me because when I became High Commissioner for a Human
Speaker 1: Rights it was a harder rule. It was a more
Speaker 1: role of being in some way responsible for leadership on
Speaker 1: human rights around the world. But I had no big stick,
Speaker 1: I had no enforcement. I could only use the moral voice,
Speaker 1: and so that was a continuation success. But I do
Speaker 1: believe that, you know, women in leadership is changing, for
Speaker 1: example Africa particularly, I mean I'm seeing women really taking
Speaker 1: leadership positions. Unfortunately, not enough at the presidential level. When
Speaker 1: Ellen Johnson Surly step tests down, there will be no
Speaker 1: women president in Africa. There'll be two vice presidents in
Speaker 1: the whole continent of fifty four countries. So you know,
Speaker 1: we have a lot of work to do. But there
Speaker 1: are a lot of women ministers, there is a lot
Speaker 1: of sense. Rassi Michelle, who's a fellow elder with me,
Speaker 1: the elders that Nelson Madela brought together. She is a
Speaker 1: powerful voice for women leader women's leadership of an economic
Speaker 1: sense as well, and I think women in the business
Speaker 1: community can do a lot more. I'm glad you touched
Speaker 1: on the business community, and unfortunately the clock is going
Speaker 1: very quickly here and I I wanted to ask if
Speaker 1: there were was one bit of advice you could give
Speaker 1: us for how we could fast forward, and maybe you
Speaker 1: could get business into your answer as well, what would
Speaker 1: that be, what could we take away? I think it's
Speaker 1: something that we all know. Women need mentoring, Young women
Speaker 1: need mentoring, Women in the workplace need mentoring. So look,
Speaker 1: you're a very amazing group of women leaders here in
Speaker 1: the audience. Each of you should be mentoring. Many of
Speaker 1: you probably are mentoring. And know, you know, women like
Speaker 1: Mindy Lubber has done a huge amount for climate and
Speaker 1: is a great leader of women. The networking is also
Speaker 1: part of that, and we saw in the clip earlier
Speaker 1: the importance of the support group. But you know, even
Speaker 1: if you go out of here today and say, I'm
Speaker 1: going to actually be more alert to one or two
Speaker 1: women in my workplace, in my enterprise, in my whatever
Speaker 1: it is, and just you know, give them that support.
Speaker 1: Men don't mentor in a vocal but you watch, you know,
Speaker 1: when there's you know, a male boss, the young men
Speaker 1: come in and they become like their male boss, and
Speaker 1: the male boss notices them more than the young women
Speaker 1: in his You know, it's a it's a kind of
Speaker 1: inherent mentoring. They don't have to talk about it because
Speaker 1: they're men. But we have to, we have to find
Speaker 1: a way very strongly to redress the patriarchy to redress
Speaker 1: them Santoni, which is here in society. It's an underlying
Speaker 1: reality of power and to change that we have to
Speaker 1: be more supportive of each other and more supportive of
Speaker 1: mentoring young women. So please do that because that will
Speaker 1: make a difference. Okay, And I think that's a great
Speaker 1: point to end on because we're going to talk some
Speaker 1: more about how we need to change that narrative and
Speaker 1: that paradigm. So Mary, thank you for this, for all
Speaker 1: that you do hate her advice, You'll never go wrong,
Speaker 1: and we truly will make a difference together. And I
Speaker 1: can be busy in my old age, you know. Okay,
Speaker 1: stay tuned for our takeaways after this break. What a
Speaker 1: great conversation with Mary Robinson. To learn more about her work,
Speaker 1: go to the Mary Robinson Foundation and also check out
Speaker 1: Mary's podcast, Mothers of Invention. Here are my top takeaways. First,
Speaker 1: be a light that inspires others to pursue their passion
Speaker 1: and beat the odds. Mary was told that she couldn't
Speaker 1: be elected President of Ireland. Her odds were a hundred
Speaker 1: to one, but she went for it anyway and put
Speaker 1: her own unique stamp on history. Second, understand that climate
Speaker 1: change is a woman's issue. Women are disproportionately affected by
Speaker 1: climate change and are also critical to the solution. Help
Speaker 1: spread the word about Mary's work and the work of
Speaker 1: other women at the FOE for of Climate Justice. Lastly,
Speaker 1: if we want to see more women in leadership, there
Speaker 1: is something each of us can do. Be a mentor
Speaker 1: to a young woman. Whether it's five minutes a month
Speaker 1: or five hours, your support is crucial to empowering the
Speaker 1: next generation. You're listening to Seneca Women Conversations on Power
Speaker 1: and Purpose, brought to you by the Seneca Women podcast
Speaker 1: Network and I Heart Radio with support from founding partner
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Speaker 1: information on Seneca Women, follow us on social media, visit
Speaker 1: our website Seneca Women dot com, and check out the
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Speaker 1: great day,