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.... After calling for active collaboration between the US and the EU to work toward their shared objectives of a stable, peaceful, and prosperous world in which democracy prevails and human rights are respected, Ms. Wallström’s lecture turned to the global challenge of security, and in particular, to the role women might play in enhancing global security. She argued that because security concerns women in particular ways, women consequently tend to perceive security as a matter of individual and social well-being; in terms of such problems as earning enough money to feed one’s children, gaining access to education and healthcare, and living in freedom not only from violence but also from the poverty and social injustices that are often the root causes of violence. She thus proposed a redefinition of the term ‘security’ – expanding it from its standard association with defense and military issues into the daily mass destruction of people’s lives through poverty, disease, hunger, injustice and oppression. She maintained that the key to enhanced global security is sustainable development but also cautioned that economic development will be sustainable only if it is equitable and socially just, and stressed furthermore that social justice must address contemporary gender inequality.
In order to confront gender inequality head-on Wallström proposed attending to three issues that are central to the goal of equitability:
- Universal access to education: In spite of the empowerment provided by education, sixty to seventy percent of the 100 million children world wide who receive no education are girls. On the other hand, women have comprised historically the majority of the world’s educators within the small or extended family circle, at the village school, and in many other places where boys and girls are educated and trained for adult life. Educators need support in the form of training, decent pay, social recognition, facilities and equipment, all of which cost taxpayers money but must be seen by political leaders as crucial long-term investments.
- Access to clean water and sufficient food: Although water and food are indispensable to life, the soaring cost of food is threatening the lives of millions of the world’s poorest populations and is beginning to also impact the developed world. In the poorest communities women spend a substantial part of their lives fetching water from sources miles away from their villages, which in turn are already suffering food shortages due to unsustainable development and climate change. In addition, access to water for agriculture, industry and population growth is still denied to millions of people world wide, while water-borne diseases are a major cause of illness and death in the developing world.
- Mitigation of climate change. Climate change dramatically affects global security and must be fought in order to ensure a viable future for the world’s children and successive generations. On this issue Wallström noted, the EU is taking a lead, having committed itself without qualification to making a 20% cut in its members’ greenhouse gas emissions by 2020.
Wallström pointed out that although women make up the majority of the people leading insecure lives today (70% of the world’s poorest people living on less than one dollar a day, are women, and 340 million women world-wide are not expected to live past 40, largely because of gender-based violence and poverty-related illness ) women are significantly underrepresented in public life. The voices expressing concern for the connection between poverty, disease, education, injustice and violence are often those of women, who understand that real peace and security depend on social justice, participatory democracy and non-violent dialogue, but all too often they are not at the table when security policy is being discussed. Wallström explained this imbalance as the tendency of many men to “choose other men” for positions of power and influence. Invoking the shocked reactions to photos of Spain’s new minister of Defense Carme Chacon, a young mother of pacifist tendencies inspecting the troops while eight months pregnant, she also called into question the pervasive assumption that the position of Defense Minister requires stereotypical ‘male’ attributes such as strength and war expertise. She wondered instead whether we might not consider the maternal instinct to defend the family and keep the peace among its members as an equally great asset when it comes to shaping national and international security policies, and noted that in a number of countries women have been and still are actively helping to make peace by rebuilding relationships, bridging traditional divides, and focusing on the practicalities of daily life and family needs.
Wallström concluded her talk by reminding the audience that on March of 2008, the European Commissioner for External Relations organized a conference for women political leaders to discuss among other things how to give fresh impetus to implementing Resolution 1325 of 2000, which stresses women’s participation in peace negotiations, conflict resolution and preventative diplomacy. The European Union intends to support multi-country projects promoting the implementation of Resolution 1325, and is inviting the organizers of such projects to present them for selection for EU financing. As chair of the World Council of Women Leaders’ Ministerial Initiative, she promised to continue using all her influence to ensure that more women are appointed to senior political and advisory positions in governments around the world, and called on all women in positions of influence world-wide to do likewise.
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