First impressions
In 1998, nearly a decade after his influential post-Cold War piece, 'The End of History?', Francis Fukuyama addressed himself to the question of Women and the Evolution of World Politics in the influential journal, Foreign Affairs. Commenting on what was then an emerging gender gap in support for (US) national defence spending, he announced that it was quite evident that women were more peaceful than men. Women, he argued, are different.
At that time he detected a 'feminization' of politics and an ominous shift to 'a less status and military-power-oriented world', at least in the world's democracies. (He did not at that time foresee the dramatic reversal of this trend, also in the world’s democracies, soon to be brought about by the 'war on terror'.)
His explanation was that an underlying biological difference was being exacerbated by demographics. Deploying a fashionable mixture of socio-biology and free-market economics derived from social Darwinism, Fukuyama argued that the competitive, war-prone nature of international relations was largely determined by masculine biology: 'female chimps have relationships; male chimps practise realpolitik'. But now, he explained, there was another, rather more political factor to take into account: the demographic changes in which 'elderly women are predicted to form powerful voting blocs in democratic countries by the mid-twenty-first century'. He warned that the supremacy of a 'strategic/instrumentalist rationality' in foreign policy might have to give way to a more pacific and cooperative orientation, because of a shift in gender relations.
He went on to caution against such an outcome, arguing that democracies continue to live surrounded by a world where 'toughness and aggression in international politics is necessary. The military must maintain combat readiness, which in turn necessitates sex segregation, lest disruption should occur in the requisite male bonding…' and so on, and so forth.
Journeying to Guatemala
Our 17-hours in flight from London to Guatemala City has given me ample time to ponder Fukuyama's predictions for the evolutionary impact of women on global politics. I am far less inclined than he to put the following closing sentiment from Kavita Ramdas' fine background article to one of the themes of this Nobel Women's Initiative summit, down to biological difference. But there certainly is something different in the approach. She says:
"The Nobel Women’s Initiative offers principled, non-violent examples of collective action that can mobilize and inspire people to work for long-term systemic change. The gathering in Guatemala comes at a critical moment in the world’s trajectory: women’s movements the world over have the potential to breathe new life into a global movement that can resist militarism, reclaim peace and justice, and restore human dignity to all."
On the panel that Ramdas chairs of this conference, Zaynab al Sawi from Sudan’s Women's Empowerment for Peace, Lway Aye Nang, from the Women’s League of Burma and Katana Gege Bukaro, from the Solidarity of Activist Women for Human Rights in the Congo will address 'Women’s organising, activism and struggles in situations of conflict, post-conflict and militarism'. This emphasis on best practise that ordinary people can share and do is a long-standing strength of the women's movement. And here it will be directly addressing a major challenge in today's world, how to transform 'victimhood' into a powerful agenda for change against the forces of militarism.
I am looking forward to this session all the more because, as Ramdas so clearly outlines for us in her unrelenting overview, it is set in a global context where there are no illusions about the mixed role that existing 'democracies' play in exactly this area of powermongering.
So it is with a certain amount of weariness that I start out on my journey - aware that the UK, as she says, earns, 'more income from arms sales to developing countries than they gave in aid' and that together with the other four permanent members of the UN Security Council, we account for 88% of the world's conventional arms exports that cause such mayhem to life and limb all over the world.
Yet something intangible begins to change as soon as we leave Houston airport for Guatemala City. The flight is full of young Guatemalans who want to talk, to tell us what we mustn't miss in their country and to predict great things for their country's future. They want to know all about the Nobel Women’s Initiative, and we are forced to wake up from our semi-comatose travelling postures, and tell them something of what is afoot. (I am very glad to hear that Barbara Schieber has made contact with us from her online newspaper The Guatemala Times, and that this remarkable exercise in 'citizen journalism with quality' in Guate is eager and willing to take this task on! )
Then here we are in Guatemala City airport and the sense of a joyous welcome increases. It is not only the first sight of the waving olive branch logo of the Nobel Women’s Initiative waiting to greet Mairead Corrigan Maguire. It is something to do with the way that all the young men out for a good Friday night on the town grin when they catch the eye of two middle-aged, middle class females in the back of the taxi, as if the inevitability and fecundity of life is just that - a joy!
I’m on the look-out for Guatemalan images of womanhood and they are everywhere! In my hotel room, the brochure opens with the following, myth-festooned greeting from the General Manager:
"Sobre retablos dorados de pequenas iglesias,entre piramides abrazadas por lo verde, envueltas en humo y plegarias que suben a encontrase con lo mistico y divino, las mujeres bordaban con hilos magicos los colores del arco iris y multiplesdiosas de fertilidad daban fuerza a las flores, a las entrellas y a las hermosas bestias de la selva..."
accompanied by a (rough) translation:
"On golden altarpieces of small churches, pyramids embraced by the green, wrapped in smoke and prayers that go up to meet with the mystical and divine, women embroidered with the magical thread colors of the rainbow and many goddesses of fertility gave force to flowers, stars and the beautiful beasts of the jungle. These lands arrived men of corn to raise their spirit and build a face to be recognised by the gods. Inspired in this beautiful legend the Real Intercontinental Hotel Guatemala opens its doors with the firm intention to be recognised by these people and their guests as the best option of high quality service..."
Well, it’s one notion of womanhood, and it is accompanied by another from a magazine thoughtfully left on the table, 'Mujer de Negocios' which opens with a piece asking, 'Intuicion Feminina? Es real, podemos confiar en ella?', followed by another on 'Hombres: su Nuevo rol en la vida' - and full of pictures of redoubtable and blooming young Guatemalan women in suits. Either way, and underpinning both, the sense is tangible of leaving behind us the angry and disappointed world of old democracies, and coming to somewhere which is convinced, rightly or wrongly, that it may just be their turn next...
It is the same renewal of energies which one senses in the message on the openDemocracy website from Dr. Nurgul Djanaeva from the 'Forum of Women’s NGOs of Kyrgyzstan' when she writes about her '50 days' campaign for 50 women, for 50% in politics', and says that the aim is to train women politicians not only in the 'capacity to win' but also the 'capacity to be a 'good' governor' or representative of the people – what a thoroughly good, and I’m tempted to say, what a thoroughly novel - idea! So, I'm really looking forward to the sessions now - we shall have to see what Guatemala can do for this wonderful women’s initiative - the outlook seems promising!
