What I Learned

Swanee Hunt
Founding director of the Women and Public Policy Program, Harvard ' s Kennedy School of Government

When I studied World War II, I always wondered about the policymakers sitting behind their big mahogany desks as Hitler overran Europe. Then, during the Bosnian war, I was the U.S. ambassador in Vienna. Suddenly I was behind a big mahogany desk, hearing horrifying reports from embassy personnel who were interviewing the refugees pouring into Austria. The responsibility was awesome. I couldn't sleep at night. I wondered if I should resign my position to protest the fact that my country was not intervening. I decided I could do more by working inside than I could by leaving, but it was a terrible moral dilemma for me. I used every bit of connection I had to try to convince the president to intervene. And when Clinton finally intervened, the war was over very quickly. Meanwhile, 200,000 people died needlessly.

What I learned is that women in every conflict are trying to prevent war, are trying to stop it once it starts and are trying to stabilize after the peace agreement is signed because they don't want their kids getting killed. So we would be so much smarter at a foreign-policy level to support their work, and for the most part, Washington is clueless and the U.N. is clueless about that.

Women tend to be less corrupt, and when you're talking about developing countries, that is enormous. What they tell me is, "We know that any money we put into our own pockets is not going to hospitals and schools that will help the children in this country." They think of the whole country as their family.

All over the world, women leaders struggle to balance the responsibilities of their families and their jobs. We need to pass on to the next generation the idea that your family is more than your own children. This will allow women to let other people help raise their kids, for one thing. You don't have to be the sole influence on your kids. That will allow more women to be out in the world, working with their passions, shaping the future of many, many, many, many more kids.

Sherry Lansing
Philanthropist, former movie executive