An interview with Michelle Bachelet -United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women

Citation

(2013), "An interview with Michelle Bachelet -United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women", Cross Cultural Management: An International Journal, Vol. 20 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/ccm.2013.13620baa.003

An interview with Michelle Bachelet -United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women

Article Type: Policy perspective From: Cross Cultural Management, Volume 20, Issue 2

By: Kristine Marin Kawamura, PhD; Lead Editor and Interviewer; Professor of Management; Director of MBA Programs; St Georges University; Grenada, West Indies; e-mail: kristinekawamura@yahoo.com; Phone: (1) 310 567 7603.

Riane Eisler, JD; Contributing Editor and Interviewer; President, Center for Partnership Studies; Carmel, California, USA; e-mail: eisler@partnershipway.org; Phone: (1) 831 624 8337.

Interview date: 18 December 2012.

Background

Dr Michelle Bachelet is the first Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women, which was established on 2 July 2010 by the United Nations General Assembly. UN Women works with the entire UN system, governments, civil society, and the private sector to advance women’s empowerment and gender equality worldwide. From 2006 to 2010, Dr Bachelet served as President of Chile, ending her term of office with the greatest approval ratings from people in the history of Chile. Dr Bachelet has had a long and distinguished career as a physician as well as in prominent civil society and government positions. She was Minister of Health in President Ricardo Lagos’ administration, entrusted with the task of improving health care and preparing a major healthcare reform program. In 2002, President Lagos asked Dr Bachelet to take another Cabinet post as head of the Chilean Defense Ministry. She was the first woman both in Chile and in Latin America to hold such a position, and instituted major reforms, including equal-opportunity policies for women in the military and police. In the presidential election held on 15 February 2006, she became President with 53.49 percent of the vote and became the first woman to be elected President in the history of the Republic of Chile. A long-time champion of women’s rights, Dr Bachelet has advocated for gender equality and women’s empowerment throughout her career.

Summary

Based on her extensive experience, Ms Bachelet has found that when public leaders advance the status, education, and health of women and children, are inclusive, and listen to people, they can build more caring and effective institutions and organizations. She notes that findings of an ever-growing number of studies and reports from governments, universities, think tanks, organizations, and the private sector show that countries with the highest levels of gender equality – the countries where women have the best health and education standards, economic opportunities, and political participation – are the countries that perform well and rank the highest in human development. And this higher level of success is true not only for countries but also for companies. She invites cross-cultural scholars and managers to help build a more peaceful and sustainable world, as well as more conscious and successful businesses, by engaging in inclusive and collaborative dialogue and instituting policies and programmes that promote diversity, engagement, and equality.

Interview

You have been a very influential leader in creating a healthier, more caring society in Chile. What can public leaders do to build caring institutions and organizations?

I think the best way to build caring institutions and organizations is to listen to people. This includes the people whom you serve and staff members. I have learned that listening is one of the most powerful forms of communication to build trust, which is vital to caring institutions.

Listening is very powerful because it brings new ideas forward and it allows people to voice their opinions, thoughts and experiences. People want to participate and be part of the solution. Therefore, I think this process of listening, of public engagement, is essential for public leaders to build caring institutions and organizations. Real leadership is just and inclusive.

Let me give you a very concrete example. In Chile, we succeeded in reducing the waiting times in primary care facilities by 82 percent. We reduced the number of Chilean people living in poverty, expanded free access to health care, built daycare centers and preschools that are free of charge for Chile’s poorest families, and extended the provision of pensions for older persons. We achieved these and other goals by prioritizing social welfare and social protection and by going into the field and talking to all the different stakeholders, by listening to people and taking responsive action.

In 2009 in Chile, we embarked on a project called “Let’s Build Better Health for Everyone”. This process of community participation aimed at choosing health priorities with a goal to reduce inequities. The process involved four stages. First, listening to different opinions and collecting information through 57 forums held throughout the country with some 50,000 people. Second, classifying and analyzing the information by a group of experts. Third, returning the proposals to communities for validation. Finally, incorporating the proposals into the health objectives for the decade of 2011-2020, and into the 2010 regional health planning.

I can tell you that the consultation process produced extremely valuable information for designing and carrying out effective social policies. The majority of the proposals made by the community and the health care workers were sensible, feasible, and well thought-out, and they were also innovative, efficient and oriented towards the improvement of people’s health, of people’s lives.

How does the status of women and children affect the health and wealth of societies and organizations?

The countries with the worst health indicators for women and children are countries in political and economic crisis. The reverse is also true. The countries with the highest levels of gender equality, the countries where women have the best health and education standards, and economic opportunities and political participation are the countries that are performing well and rank the highest in human development.

In other words, healthy and prosperous countries have healthy and educated girls and women. This is true not only for countries but also for companies. Nations and corporations perform better when women are able to play their full and equal role.

Now this is not just my own personal opinion or the ideology of a group of feminists, this is the finding of an ever-growing number of studies and reports from governments, universities, think tanks, organizations, and the private sector.

Let me give you some examples. The World Bank finds that greater gender equality enhances productivity, improves development outcomes for the next generation, and makes institutions more representative. The World Economic Forum in its Global Gender Gap report finds that gender equality correlates positively with economic growth across 135 countries.

Goldman Sachs finds that reducing barriers to female labor force participation would increase America’s GDP by 9 percent, the Eurozone’s by 13 percent, and Japan’s by 16 percent. Unlocking the potential of women could lead to a 14 percent rise in per capita incomes by the year 2020 in several economies, including China, Russia, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Korea.

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization finds that providing women farmers with the same access as men to land, credit, fertilizer and other inputs could increase national crop yields by up to 4 percent, advance food security and reduce hunger. In addition, the management consultants McKinsey & Company find that companies with a higher proportion of women on their management committees have the best performance.

This evidence leads us to conclude that maintaining inequality between women and men can no longer be considered an option. Given the complexity of our world, and the unprecedented economic, demographic, environmental and political challenges we face, we simply can no longer afford to waste the potential of half the world’s population.

The struggle for gender equality and women’s rights is the greatest cause of the twenty-first century.

When it comes right down to it, if nations want to survive and stay competitive, they depend on their human talent, and the skills, education, and productivity of the entire population and workforce.

When women are healthy and educated and can participate in the economy-poverty, poor health and malnutrition decline, and living standards and economic growth rise higher. Women put 90 percent of their income back into their families and the well-being of their children. A child born to a mother who can read is 50 percent more likely to survive past the age of five.

The healthiest and most vibrant societies have women who are healthy and can exercise their human rights.

What are the greatest challenges to reducing poverty and improving human rights around the world?

I think the greatest challenge is building dynamic societies in which there is a good balance of freedom and equality, where people can live free of violence, exclusion, and discrimination, and where there is an adequate balance between the well-being of individuals and the well-being of the collective society.

In order to build modern, inclusive, innovative, and just societies, we have to deal with structural problems such as inequality and exclusion and their relation to political and economic power, greed and corruption. This requires a legal and policy framework that promotes human rights, equal opportunity, consumer and environmental protection, and social protection.

Since greed and corruption promote personal enrichment at the expense of others, they thwart efforts to reduce poverty and improve human rights because the motivations and goals are not aligned with each other.

In fact, grassroots women, in a recent study, identified the non-delivery of public services such as education, health, and sanitation as a cause, consequence, and component of corrupt practices. These women also said the police force was the most corrupt government agency. The point is that corruption is a major obstacle to development and the realization of human rights around the world.

We need ethical leadership. Governments need to make sure that resources are allocated efficiently, that the labour force is well educated, that jobs are created, that consumers are protected, that people enjoy a decent standard of living and social protection, and the environment is protected.

Ethical leadership is inclusive, based on the will of the people. Ethical leadership promotes sustainable development rooted in economic, social, and environmental justice. To put it simply, ethical leadership protects the well-being of current and future generations while promoting the creativity and entrepreneurship of people.

What are your main goals for UN Women? How can cross-cultural scholars and managers advance these goals?

UN Women is working to advance women’s rights and access to justice, to expand women’s political leadership and equal economic opportunities, and to end violence against women and girls. We are working to fully engage women in peace talks and peace-building. And we are working to promote planning and budgeting for gender equality.

Overall UN Women is working together with partners worldwide to deliver on a promise written by the founders of the United Nations in the UN Charter, the promise of the equal rights of men and women. It is my firm belief that equality is fundamental to human freedom, justice, peace, and democracy.

Part of this belief is rooted in my own experience. I lived through dictatorship and the abuse of power in my home country of Chile. I have had the privilege to be a leader and promote inclusiveness.

I think that cross-cultural scholars and managers can promote diversity and equality and build a more peaceful and sustainable world-one individual and one organization at a time. This means changing processes of engagement to be more inclusive, collaborative, and driven by consensus. And it means instituting policies and programmes to support and actively promote diversity, engagement and equality.

We all have stereotypes and these can get in the way of real dialogue, communication, and problem-solving. So I think it is important for managers and staff to increase their cultural awareness and literacy so they can work well in diverse environments.

Promoting women’s rights and equality can be difficult in traditional societies. The best approach, I think, is to support local advocates so that change is not imposed from the outside but comes from within the society. Social change needs to be deeply rooted in the society to last a long time.