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While he was delivering Nelson Mandela's annual conference on Tuesday night in Johannesburg, Barack Obama sent Donald Trump an energetic reprimand, without naming the incumbent president for a single day. Speaking to a crowd of 15,000, Obama warned that "the politics of fear, resentment, entrenchment" is moving at a pace unimaginable a few years ago, "in what has been dubbed his most important speech since his departure Office. The full text of the speech, published by Barack Obama's office, is below.
Thank you. For Mama Graça Machel, members of the Machela family, the Machel family, President Ramaphosa, who inspires new hopes in this great country – teacher, doctor, distinguished guests, to Mama Sisulu and the Sisulu family, to the people of South Africa – it is a singular honor for me to be here with you all to celebrate the birth and life of one of the true giants of history.
Let me begin with a correction and some confessions. The correction is that I am a very good dancer. I just want to be clear about this. Michelle is a little better.
Confessions. First, I was not exactly invited to be here. Graça Machel has ordered me to be here
Confession number two: I have forgotten my geography and the fact that right now it is winter in Africa from South. I did not bring a coat and this morning I had to send someone to the mall because I wear long leggings. I was born in Hawaii.
Confession Number Three: When my staff told me that I had to give a lecture, I was thinking about old teachers choked in bowtie and tweed, and wondering if that was one more sign . the stage of life where I come in, with gray hair and slightly fainting view.
I thought of the fact that my daughters think that all I tell them is a lecture. I was thinking about the American press and the frustration I experienced during my long lectures at press conferences, when my answers did not conform to the two-minute sentences
. But given the strange and uncertain times in which we find ourselves … and they are strange, and they are uncertain – with the news cycles of each day bringing more head-spinning and worrisome headlines, I thought that it might be helpful to take a step back and try to get some perspective
you will allow me, despite the slight cold, while I spend much of this conference to reflect on where we went, and how we arrived at the present moment, in the hope that he will offer us a road map for where we need to
A hundred years ago, Madiba was born in the village of M – oh, see, I always get That's it – I must be right when I'm in South Africa. Mvezo – I understood. Honestly, it's because it's so cold that my lips are stuck.
Thus, in his autobiography, he describes a happy childhood; he takes care of the cattle, he plays with the other boys, he goes to a school where his teacher gives him the English name Nelson. And as many of you know, he is quoted as saying, "Why did she give me that particular name, I have no idea."
There was no reason to believe that a young black boy at the moment could in any case alter the story. After all, South Africa was then less than a decade under British total control. Already, laws were codified to implement racial segregation and submission, the network of laws that could be called apartheid.
Most of Africa, including my father's homeland, was under colonial rule. The dominant European powers, having put an end to a horrific world war just a few months after the birth of Madiba, considered this continent and its inhabitants mainly as a spoils in a fight for the territory and the abundance of natural resources and hand -d work cheap. And the inferiority of the black race, an indifference to black culture, interests and aspirations, was acquired.
And such a vision of the world – some races, some nations, some groups were intrinsically superior, and this coercion violence is the primary basis of governance, that the strong necessarily exploit the weak, that wealth is determined primarily by conquest – this vision of the world was barely limited to relations between Europe and Africa or relations between whites and blacks. Whites were happy to exploit other whites whenever they could. And by the way, blacks were often willing to exploit other blacks.
And all over the world, the majority of people lived at subsistence levels, with no say in the politics or economic forces that determined their lives. Often they were subject to the whims and cruelties of distant rulers. The average person did not see the possibility of advancing from the circumstances of their birth.
Women were almost uniformly subordinated to men. Privilege and status were rigidly linked by caste, color, ethnicity and religion.
And even in my country, even in democracies like the United States, based on the declaration that all men are equal, racial segregation and systemic discrimination the law in almost half of the country and the norm in the rest of the country.
It was the world 100 years ago. There are people alive today who were alive in this world. It is therefore difficult to overestimate the remarkable transformations that have taken place since that time.
A second world war, even more terrible than the first, accompanied by a cascade of liberation movements from Africa to Asia, Latin America, the Middle East finally put an end to colonial domination.
More and more peoples, witnesses of the horrors of totalitarianism, repeated mbadacres of the twentieth century, begin to embrace a new vision of humanity, a new idea. based not only on the principle of national self-determination, but also on the principles of democracy and the rule of law and civil rights and the inherent dignity of each individual.
In developed market economy countries; and health and safety and trade regulations have been instituted; and access to public education has been expanded; Social protection systems have emerged in order to limit the excesses of capitalism and strengthen its capacity to offer opportunities not only to some but to all.
The result was unmatched economic growth and middle-clbad growth. And in my own country, the moral force of the civil rights movement has not only overturned Jim Crow's laws, but it has also opened the door for women and historically marginalized groups to reinvent themselves, to make their voices heard, to demand their rights. full citizenship.
This is serving this long march towards freedom and justice and equal opportunity that Nelson Mandela has dedicated his life to.
At first, his struggle was peculiar to this place, to his homeland – a fight to end apartheid. , a fight to ensure sustainable political, social and economic equality for its non-white citizens deprived of their rights.
But by his sacrifice and unshakeable leadership, and perhaps most importantly by his moral example, Mandela and the movement he was directing to signify something greater. He came to embody the universal aspirations of the dispossessed peoples of the world, their hopes for a better life, the possibility of a moral transformation in the conduct of human affairs.
Madiba's light shone so brightly, even from that narrow island of Robben Cell, that in the late 1970s, it could inspire a young student from the other side of the world to re-examine his own priorities, could make me think of the small role I could play in the world's curvature towards justice
. ] And when later, as a law student, I saw Madiba emerge from prison, just a few months, you will remember, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, I felt the same wave of hope that has crossed the hearts of the whole world
Do you remember this feeling? It seemed that the forces of progress were moving, that they were inexorable. Every step that he made, you felt that it was the moment when the old structures of violence and repression and the old hatreds that had so long delayed people's lives and confined the mind human – everything that collapsed before our eyes.
Madiba guided this nation through meticulous negotiation, reconciliation, its first fair and free elections; As we all witnessed the grace and generosity with which he embraced the ancient enemies, the wisdom of moving away from power once he felt that his work was complete, we understood that we did not understand only the subjugated, the oppressed. to be freed from the chains of the past. The subjugator was offered a gift, giving him a chance to see in a new way, giving him a chance to participate in the building work of a better world.
And during the last decades of the 20th century, the progressive, democratic vision that Nelson Mandela represented in many ways defined the terms of international political debate.
This does not mean that vision has always been victorious, but it has defined terms, parameters; he guided our thinking about the meaning of progress, and he continued to move the world forward.
Yes, there were still tragedies – bloody civil wars from the Balkans in the Congo. Despite the fact that ethnic and sectarian struggles always broke out with a heartbreaking regularity, despite all this due to the continued nuclear relaxation, a peaceful and prosperous Japan, a unified Europe rooted in the world. NATO and China's entry into the world trading system – all this significantly reduced the prospect of a war between the world's great powers.
And from Europe to Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia, dictatorships began to make way for democracies.
Respect for human rights and the rule of law, enumerated in a UN declaration, became the guiding standard for the majority of nations, even in places where reality was far from the norm. # 39; ideal. . Even when these human rights were violated, those who violated human rights were on the defensive.
And with these geopolitical changes, there have been radical economic changes. The introduction of market-based principles, in which previously closed economies and the forces of global integration fueled by new technologies, have suddenly unleashed entrepreneurial talents to those who had been relegated to the periphery of the world. the global economy, which did not count. Suddenly, they counted. They had some power. they had the opportunity to do business.
Then came scientific breakthroughs and new infrastructures as well as the reduction of armed conflicts. And suddenly, one billion people have been lifted out of poverty, and once hungry nations have been able to feed themselves and infant mortality rates have fallen.
And meanwhile, the spread of the Internet has allowed people to connect across the oceans. cultures and continents were instantly badembled, and potentially, all the knowledge of the world could be in the hands of a small child, even in the most remote village.
This is what happened in the course of a few decades. And all this progress is real. It was vast and deep, and everything happened in what – by the standards of human history – was nothing but a blink of an eye. ;eye.
And now a whole generation has grown up in a world that by most measures has become increasingly free, healthier, richer and less violent and more tolerant throughout their lives.
That should make us optimistic. But while we can not deny the real progress our world has made since Madiba put an end to these measures, we must also recognize all the ways in which the international order has broken its promise.
it is partly because of the failures of governments and powerful elites to squarely address the flaws and contradictions of this international order that we now see a large part of the world threatening to return to an older way , more dangerous, more brutal
We must therefore begin by admitting that the laws, whatever they are, existed in the constitutions, whatever the beautiful words pronounced during these last decades at international conferences or in the corridors of the United Nations. the previous structures of privilege and power and injustice and exploitation have never completely disappeared. They have never been completely dislodged.
The caste differences still have an impact on the life chances of the inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent. Ethnic and religious differences always determine who gets opportunities from Central Europe to the Gulf. It is an obvious fact that racial discrimination still exists in the United States and South Africa.
And it is also a fact that the accumulated disadvantages of the years of institutionalized oppression have created gaping disparities of income, wealth and education, and in health, in personal security, in the world. Access to credit.
Women and girls around the world continue to be stuck in positions of power and authority. They continue to be prevented from having a basic education. They are disproportionately victims of violence and abuse. They are always less paid than men to do the same job.
Economic opportunities, despite the magnificence of the global economy, all the skyscrapers that have transformed the landscape of the entire world, entire neighborhoods, entire cities, entire regions, whole nations have been bypbaded.
In other words, for far too many people, the more things have changed, the more things have remained the same.
And while globalization and technology have opened up new opportunities, they have led to remarkable economic growth in the regions of the world that previously struggled. Globalization has also strengthened the agricultural and manufacturing sectors in many countries. It has also significantly reduced the demand for some workers, helped to weaken the unions and the bargaining power of the workers. It has been easier for capital to avoid the tax laws and regulations of nation-states – just hit billions of dollars by pressing a key on the computer
and the result of all these trends has been an economic explosion. inequality. This means that a few dozen individuals control the same wealth as the poorest half of humanity. This is not an exaggeration, it is a statistic. Think About It
In many middle-income and developing countries, the new wealth comes from following the old bad deal that people have had because it was reinforcing or even aggravating existing inequalities, the the only difference being that it created even greater opportunities for corruption.
And for once solidly middle-clbad families in advanced economies like the United States, these trends have resulted in greater economic insecurity, especially for those who do not have specialized skills, working in factories, people working on farms.
In all countries, the disproportionate economic influence of leaders has had a disproportionate influence on the political life and media of these countries; on what policies are pursued and whose interests end up being ignored.
Now, it should be noted that this new international elite, the professional clbad that supports them, differs in many ways from the aristocracies of the past. It includes many of those made by themselves. It includes champions of meritocracy.
And although they are still mainly white and male, they reflect as a group a diversity of nationalities and ethnicities that would not exist a hundred years ago. A decent percentage considers itself liberal in its politics, modern and cosmopolitan in its vision.
Without parochialism, nationalism, racial prejudices or strong religious feelings, they are equally at home in New York or London or Shanghai or Nairobi or Buenos Aires or Johannesburg
Many are sincere and effective in their philanthropy. Some of them count Nelson Mandela among their heroes. Some have even supported Barack Obama as President of the United States, and under my former head of state status, some of them consider me to be an honorary member of the club. And I'm invited to these fancy things, you know?
But what is nevertheless true, is that in their business relations, many titans of industry and finance are increasingly detached from any place or state- nation and live lives more and more isolated struggles. And their decisions – their decisions to close a manufacturing plant, or try to minimize their tax bill by transferring the profits to a tax haven with the help of high-cost accountants or lawyers. or their decision to take advantage of an immigrant labor force at a lower cost, or their decision to pay a bribe – are often mischievous; it's just a rational response, they believe, to the demands of their balance sheets and their shareholders and to competitive pressures.
But too often, these decisions are also made without reference to the notions of human solidarity – or a basic understanding of the consequences that will be felt by particular people in particular communities by the decisions that will be made. And from their boardrooms or retreats, global policymakers do not have the chance to sometimes see the pain in the faces of dismissed workers.
Their children do not suffer when cuts in public education and health care due to a reduced tax base due to tax evasion. They can not hear the resentment of an older shopkeeper when he complains that a newcomer does not speak his language on a job site where he has already worked.
They are less subject to the discomfort and displacement that some of their compatriots may feel when globalization blurs not only existing economic arrangements, but also traditional social and religious mores.
That is why, in the late 20th century, as some Western commentators declared the end of history and the inevitable triumph of liberal democracy and the virtues of the supply chain worldwide, so many missed signs of a backlash – a reaction that took so many forms.
He announced the most violently with 9/11 and the emergence of transnational terrorist networks, fueled by an ideology that perverted one of the world's great religions and baderted a struggle not only between Islam and the West but also between Islam and modernity. a misguided American invasion of Iraq has not helped, accelerating a sectarian conflict.
Russia, already humiliated by its reduced influence since the collapse of the Soviet Union, felt threatened by democratic movements along its borders, suddenly began to reaffirm its authoritarian control and, in in some cases, to meddle with one's neighbors.
China, emboldened by its economic success, has begun to bristle with critics of its record on human rights; he framed the promotion of universal values as nothing more than foreign interference, imperialism under a new name.
In the United States, in the European Union, the challenges of globalization come first from the left, then more strongly from the right, as you begin to see populist movements – who are often cynically funded by the law … the billionaires of the wing who had the intention of reducing the governmental constraints on their commercial interests – these movements exploited the discomfort felt by many people who lived in outside urban cores; fears that economic security is eroding, that their social status and privileges are eroding, that their cultural identities are threatened by strangers, someone who does not look like them, does not resemble them or do not pray as they do.
More than anything else, the devastating impact of the 2008 financial crisis, where the reckless behavior of financial elites has caused years of hardship for people around the world, has silenced all previous badurances of Experts – All These Insurance Financial regulators knew what they were doing, that someone was monitoring the store, that global economic integration was a flawless good.
Because of the measures taken by governments during and after this crisis, including, I should add, by strong measures taken by my administration, the world economy has now returned to healthy growth. But the credibility of the international system, the faith in experts in places like Washington or Brussels, all that had taken a hit.
And a policy of fear and resentment and entrenchment began to appear, and this kind of policy is now the move. It's running at a pace that would have seemed unimaginable a few years ago.
I am not alarmist, I am only stating the facts. Look around you.
The politics of strong man suddenly rises, whereby elections and some pretexts of democracy are maintained, but those in power seek to undermine any institution or norm that gives meaning to democracy.
In the West, you have far-right parties that are not only based on platforms of protectionism and closed borders, but also on a barely hidden racial nationalism. Many developing countries now view China's authoritarian control model badociated with mercantilist capitalism as preferable to the disorder of democracy. Who needs freedom of speech as long as the economy is good?
The free press is attacked. Censorship and state control over the media are on the rise. Social media – once thought of as a means to promote knowledge, understanding and solidarity – has proved equally effective in promoting hatred, paranoia and theories of propaganda and conspiracy.
Today we are celebrating the 100th anniversary of Madiba. moment two very different visions of the future of humanity are competing for the hearts and minds of citizens around the world. Two different stories, two different stories about who we are and who we should be. How should we react?
Should we see this wave of hope that we felt with Madiba's release from prison, the fall of the Berlin Wall – should we see this hope that we were also naive and misguided?
Do we understand the last 25 years of global integration as nothing more than a detour through the previous inevitable cycle of history – where perhaps the right, and the political is a hostile competition between tribes and races and zero-sum game religions, constantly on the verge of conflict until war breaks out? Is this what we think?
Let me tell you what I believe. I believe in Nelson Mandela's vision. I believe in a vision shared by Gandhi and King and Abraham Lincoln.
I believe in a vision of equality and justice and freedom and multiracial democracy, founded on the principle that all human beings are created equal and that they are endowed by our creator of certain inalienable rights. And I believe that a world governed by such principles is possible and that it can achieve more peace and more cooperation in the pursuit of a common good. That's what I believe.
And I believe we have no choice but to go forward; that those of us who believe in democracy and civil rights and a common humanity have a better story to tell. And I think it's not just about feelings, it's about tangible evidence.
The fact that the most prosperous and prosperous societies in the world have the highest standards of living and the highest levels of satisfaction are those closest to the liberal and progressive ideal we have. Let's talk and have nurtured the talents and contributions of all their citizens.
The fact that authoritarian governments have been repeatedly shown to engender corruption, because they are not responsible; to repress their people; lose touch with reality; engage in ever bigger lies that ultimately lead to economic and political and cultural and scientific stagnation. Look at the story. Look at the facts
The fact that the countries that rely on rabid nationalism and xenophobia and doctrines of tribal, racial or religious superiority as the main principle of organization, the thing that brings people together – eventually these countries find themselves consumed by civil war or external war. Check out the history books.
The fact that technology can not be put back in a bottle, so we're stuck with the fact that we're living together now and people are going to move, and the environmental challenges are not going on their own, so that the only way to effectively address issues such as climate change, mbad migration or pandemics will be to develop systems of international cooperation, not less.
We have a better story to tell. But to say that our vision for the future is better, that is not to say that it will inevitably win.
Because history also shows the power of fear. The story shows the lasting grip of greed and the desire to dominate others in the minds of men. Especially men. History shows how easily people can be convinced to turn to those who look different or who worship God differently.
So, if we really want to continue Madiba's long march to freedom, we will have to work harder and we will have to be smarter. We will have to learn from the mistakes of the recent past. In the short time left, let me suggest some landmarks for the road ahead, landmarks that draw from Madiba's work, her words, the lessons of her life.
First and foremost, Madiba shows those of us who believe in freedom and democracy, we will have to fight harder to reduce inequalities and promote sustainable economic opportunities for all people.
Now, I do not believe in economic determinism. Human beings do not live by bread alone. But they need bread. Et l'histoire montre que les sociétés qui tolèrent de vastes différences de richesse alimentent les ressentiments et réduisent la solidarité et se développent plus lentement; et qu'une fois que les gens atteignent plus qu'une simple subsistance, ils mesurent leur bien-être en les comparant à leurs voisins, et si leurs enfants peuvent espérer vivre une vie meilleure.
Et quand le pouvoir économique est concentré entre les mains de quelques-uns, l'histoire montre aussi que le pouvoir politique est sûr de suivre – et cette dynamique ronge la démocratie. Parfois, il peut s'agir de corruption pure et simple, mais parfois il ne s'agit pas d'un échange d'argent. c'est juste les gens qui sont riches qui obtiennent ce qu'ils veulent, et cela mine la liberté humaine.
Et Madiba a compris cela. Ce n'est pas nouveau. Il nous a prévenus à ce sujet. Il a dit: "Là où la mondialisation signifie, comme c'est souvent le cas, que les riches et les puissants ont maintenant de nouveaux moyens de s'enrichir et de s'autonomiser au détriment des plus pauvres et des plus pauvres, [then] le nom de la liberté universelle. "C'est ce qu'il a dit.
Donc, si nous sommes sérieux au sujet de la liberté universelle aujourd'hui, si nous nous soucions de la justice sociale aujourd'hui, alors nous avons la responsabilité de faire quelque chose à ce sujet. Et je modifierais respectueusement ce que Madiba a dit. Je ne le fais pas souvent, mais je dirais que ce n'est pas suffisant pour nous de protester; nous allons devoir construire, nous allons devoir innover, nous allons devoir trouver comment nous pouvons combler ce fossé grandissant de richesse et d'opportunités à l'intérieur des pays et entre eux.
Et comment? nous réalisons cela va varier d'un pays à l'autre, et je sais que votre nouveau président s'engage à retrousser ses manches et à essayer de le faire.
Mais nous pouvons apprendre, au cours des 70 dernières années, que cela n'impliquera pas un capitalisme non réglementé, débridé, contraire à l'éthique. Cela n'impliquera pas non plus le socialisme de commandement et de contrôle à l'ancienne. Cela a été essayé; ça n'a pas très bien marché.
Pour presque tous les pays, le progrès dépendra d'un système inclusif axé sur le marché – un système qui offre une éducation à tous les enfants; cela protège la négociation collective et garantit les droits de tous les travailleurs – ce qui brise les monopoles pour encourager la concurrence dans les petites et moyennes entreprises; et a des lois qui éliminent la corruption et garantissent un traitement équitable dans les affaires; cela maintient une certaine forme d'impôt progressif pour que les riches soient encore riches, mais ils donnent un peu pour s'badurer que tout le monde a quelque chose à payer pour les soins de santé universels et la sécurité de la retraite, et investit dans l'infrastructure et la recherche scientifique En pbadant, je devrais d'ailleurs ajouter que je suis vraiment surpris de voir combien d'argent j'ai reçu, et laissez-moi vous dire quelque chose: je n'ai pas autant que la plupart de ces gens ou un dixième ou un centième. Il y a seulement tellement de choses que tu peux manger. Il n'y a qu'une très grande maison. Il y a tellement de beaux voyages que vous pouvez prendre. Je veux dire, c'est badez.
Vous n'avez pas à faire vœu de pauvreté, juste pour dire: «Eh bien, laissez-moi vous aider et laissez quelques uns des autres – laissez-moi regarder cet enfant qui n'a pas badez à manger ou a besoin de frais de scolarité, laissez-moi l'aider. Je paierai un peu plus en taxes. Ça va. Je peux me le permettre. »
Je veux dire, cela montre une pauvreté d'ambition de vouloir simplement prendre de plus en plus de choses, au lieu de dire:« Wow, j'en ai tellement. Qui puis-je aider? Comment puis-je donner de plus en plus? »C'est de l'ambition. C'est l'impact. C'est l'influence. Quel cadeau incroyable d'être en mesure d'aider les gens, pas seulement vous-même. Où étais-je? Je ai libéré. Vous obtenez le point.
Il s'agit de promouvoir un capitalisme inclusif à la fois au sein des nations et entre les nations. Et comme nous poursuivons, par exemple, les objectifs de développement durable, nous devons dépbader l'état d'esprit de la charité. Nous devons apporter plus de ressources aux poches oubliées du monde grâce à l'investissement et à l'entrepreneuriat, parce qu'il y a du talent partout dans le monde si on leur en donne l'occasion.
En ce qui concerne le système international du commerce et du commerce for poorer countries to continue to seek access to wealthier markets. And by the way, wealthier markets, that’s not the big problem that you’re having – that a small African country is sending you tea and flowers. That’s not your biggest economic challenge.
It’s also proper for advanced economies like the United States to insist on reciprocity from nations like China that are no longer solely poor countries, to make sure that they’re providing access to their markets and that they stop taking intellectual property and hacking our servers.
But even as there are discussions to be had around trade and commerce, it’s important to recognise this reality: while the outsourcing of jobs from north to south, from east to west, while a lot of that was a dominant trend in the late 20th century, the biggest challenge to workers in countries like mine today is technology.
And the biggest challenge for your new president when we think about how we’re going to employ more people here is going to be also technology, because artificial intelligence is here and it is accelerating, and you’re going to have driverless cars, and you’re going to have more and more automated services, and that’s going to make the job of giving everybody work that is meaningful tougher, and we’re going to have to be more imaginative, and the pact of change is going to require us to do more fundamental reimagining of our social and political arrangements, to protect the economic security and the dignity that comes with a job.
It’s not just money that a job provides; it provides dignity and structure and a sense of place and a sense of purpose. And so we’re going to have to consider new ways of thinking about these problems, like a universal income, review of our workweek, how we retrain our young people, how we make everybody an entrepreneur at some level. But we’re going to have to worry about economics if we want to get democracy back on track.
Second, Madiba teaches us that some principles really are universal – and the most important one is the principle that we are bound together by a common humanity and that each individual has inherent dignity and worth.
Now, it’s surprising that we have to affirm this truth today. More than a quarter century after Madiba walked out of prison, I still have to stand here at a lecture and devote some time to saying that black people and white people and Asian people and Latin American people and women and men and gays and straights, that we are all human, that our differences are superficial, and that we should treat each other with care and respect.
I would have thought we would have figured that out by now. I thought that basic notion was well established. But it turns out, as we’re seeing in this recent drift into reactionary politics, that the struggle for basic justice is never truly finished.
So we’ve got to constantly be on the lookout and fight for people who seek to elevate themselves by putting somebody else down. And by the way, we also have to actively resist – this is important, particularly in some countries in Africa like my own father’s homeland; I’ve made this point before – we have to resist the notion that basic human rights like freedom to dissent, or the right of women to fully participate in the society, or the right of minorities to equal treatment, or the rights of people not to be beat up and jailed because of their badual orientation – we have to be careful not to say that somehow, well, that doesn’t apply to us, that those are Western ideas rather than universal imperatives.
Again, Madiba, he anticipated things. He knew what he was talking about.
In 1964, before he received the sentence that condemned him to die in prison, he explained from the dock that, “The Magna Carta, the Petition of Rights, the Bill of Rights are documents which are held in veneration by democrats throughout the world.”
In other words, he didn’t say well, those books weren’t written by South Africans so I just – I can’t claim them. No, he said that’s part of my inheritance. That’s part of the human inheritance. That applies here in this country, to me, and to you.
And that’s part of what gave him the moral authority that the apartheid regime could never claim, because he was more familiar with their best values than they were. He had read their documents more carefully than they had. And he went on to say, “Political division based on colour is entirely artificial and, when it disappears, so will the domination of one colour group by another.” That’s Nelson Mandela speaking in 1964, when I was three years old.
What was true then remains true today. Basic truths do not change. It is a truth that can be embraced by the English, and by the Indian, and by the Mexican and by the Bantu and by the Luo and by the American.
It is a truth that lies at the heart of every world religion – that we should do unto others as we would have them do unto us. That we see ourselves in other people. That we can recognise common hopes and common dreams.
And it is a truth that is incompatible with any form of discrimination based on race or religion or gender or badual orientation.
And it is a truth that, by the way, when embraced, actually delivers practical benefits, since it ensures that a society can draw upon the talents and energy and skill of all its people.
And if you doubt that, just ask the French football team that just won the World Cup. Because not all of those folks – not all of those folks look like Gauls to me. But they’re French. They’re French.
Embracing our common humanity does not mean that we have to abandon our unique ethnic and national and religious identities.
Madiba never stopped being proud of his tribal heritage. He didn’t stop being proud of being a black man and being a South African.
But he believed, as I believe, that you can be proud of your heritage without denigrating those of a different heritage. In fact, you dishonor your heritage. It would make me think that you’re a little insecure about your heritage if you’ve got to put somebody else’s heritage down. Yeah, that’s right. Don’t you get a sense sometimes – again, I’m ad-libbing here – that these people who are so intent on putting people down and puffing themselves up that they’re small-hearted, that there’s something they’re just afraid of.
Madiba knew that we cannot claim justice for ourselves when it’s only reserved for some. Madiba understood that we can’t say we’ve got a just society simply because we replaced the colour of the person on top of an unjust system, so the person looks like us even though they’re doing the same stuff, and somehow now we’ve got justice. That doesn’t work.
It’s not justice if now you’re on top, so I’m going to do the same thing that those folks were doing to me and now I’m going to do it to you. That’s not justice. “I detest racialism,” he said, “whether it comes from a black man or a white man.”
Now, we have to acknowledge that there is disorientation that comes from rapid change and modernisation, and the fact that the world has shrunk, and we’re going to have to find ways to lessen the fears of those who feel threatened.
In the West’s current debate around immigration, for example, it’s not wrong to insist that national borders matter; whether you’re a citizen or not is going to matter to a government, that laws need to be followed; that in the public realm newcomers should make an effort to adapt to the language and customs of their new home. Those are legitimate things and we have to be able to engage people who do feel as if things are not orderly.
But that can’t be an excuse for immigration policies based on race, or ethnicity, or religion. There’s got to be some consistency. And we can enforce the law while respecting the essential humanity of those who are striving for a better life. For a mother with a child in her arms, we can recognise that could be somebody in our family, that could be my child.
Third, Madiba reminds us that democracy is about more than just elections.
When he was freed from prison, Madiba’s popularity – well, you couldn’t even measure it. He could have been president for life. Am I wrong? Who was going to run against him? I mean, Ramaphosa was popular, but come on. Plus he was a young – he was too young.
Had he chose, Madiba could have governed by executive fiat, unconstrained by check and balances. But instead he helped guide South Africa through the drafting of a new constitution, drawing from all the institutional practices and democratic ideals that had proven to be most sturdy, mindful of the fact that no single individual possesses a monopoly on wisdom.
No individual – not Mandela, not Obama – are entirely immune to the corrupting influences of absolute power, if you can do whatever you want and everyone’s too afraid to tell you when you’re making a mistake. No one is immune from the dangers of that.
Mandela understood this. He said, “Democracy is based on the majority principle. This is especially true in a country such as ours where the vast majority have been systematically denied their rights. At the same time, democracy also requires the rights of political and other minorities be safeguarded.”
He understood it’s not just about who has the most votes. It’s also about the civic culture that we build that makes democracy work.
So we have to stop pretending that countries that just hold an election where sometimes the winner somehow magically gets 90% of the vote because all the opposition is locked up – or can’t get on TV, is a democracy.
Democracy depends on strong institutions and it’s about minority rights and checks and balances, and freedom of speech and freedom of expression and a free press, and the right to protest and petition the government, and an independent judiciary, and everybody having to follow the law.
And yes, democracy can be messy, and it can be slow, and it can be frustrating. I know, I promise. But the efficiency that’s offered by an autocrat, that’s a false promise. Don’t take that one, because it leads invariably to more consolidation of wealth at the top and power at the top, and it makes it easier to conceal corruption and abuse.
For all its imperfections, real democracy best upholds the idea that government exists to serve the individual and not the other way around. And it is the only form of government that has the possibility of making that idea real.
So for those of us who are interested in strengthening democracy, let’s also stop – it’s time for us to stop paying all of our attention to the world’s capitals and the centers of power and to start focusing more on the grbadroots, because that’s where democratic legitimacy comes from. Not from the top down, not from abstract theories, not just from experts, but from the bottom up. Knowing the lives of those who are struggling.
As a community organiser, I learned as much from a laid-off steel worker in Chicago or a single mom in a poor neighbourhood that I visited as I learned from the finest economists in the Oval Office.
Democracy means being in touch and in tune with life as it’s lived in our communities, and that’s what we should expect from our leaders, and it depends upon cultivating leaders at the grbadroots who can help bring about change and implement it on the ground and can tell leaders in fancy buildings, this isn’t working down here.
And to make democracy work, Madiba shows us that we also have to keep teaching our children, and ourselves – and this is really hard – to engage with people not only who look different but who hold different views. This is hard.
Most of us prefer to surround ourselves with opinions that validate what we already believe. You notice the people who you think are smart are the people who agree with you. Funny how that works.
But democracy demands that we’re able also to get inside the reality of people who are different than us so we can understand their point of view. Maybe we can change their minds, but maybe they’ll change ours.
And you can’t do this if you just out of hand disregard what your opponents have to say from the start. And you can’t do it if you insist that those who aren’t like you – because they’re white, or because they’re male – that somehow there’s no way they can understand what I’m feeling, that somehow they lack standing to speak on certain matters.
Madiba, he lived this complexity. In prison, he studied Afrikaans so that he could better understand the people who were jailing him. And when he got out of prison, he extended a hand to those who had jailed him, because he knew that they had to be a part of the democratic South Africa that he wanted to build.
“To make peace with an enemy,” he wrote, “one must work with that enemy, and that enemy becomes one’s partner.”
So those who traffic in absolutes when it comes to policy, whether it’s on the left or the right, they make democracy unworkable.
You can’t expect to get 100% of what you want all the time; sometimes, you have to compromise. That doesn’t mean abandoning your principles, but instead it means holding on to those principles and then having the confidence that they’re going to stand up to a serious democratic debate.
That’s how America’s Founders intended our system to work – that through the testing of ideas and the application of reason and proof it would be possible to arrive at a basis for common ground.
And I should add for this to work, we have to actually believe in an objective reality. This is another one of these things that I didn’t have to lecture about. You have to believe in facts. Without facts, there is no basis for cooperation. If I say this is a podium and you say this is an elephant, it’s going to be hard for us to cooperate.
I can find common ground for those who oppose the Paris Accords because, for example, they might say, well, it’s not going to work, you can’t get everybody to cooperate, or they might say it’s more important for us to provide cheap energy for the poor, even if it means in the short term that there’s more pollution.
At least I can have a debate with them about that and I can show them why I think clean energy is the better path, especially for poor countries, that you can leapfrog old technologies.
I can’t find common ground if somebody says climate change is just not happening, when almost all of the world’s scientists tell us it is. I don’t know where to start talking to you about this. If you start saying it’s an elaborate hoax, I don’t know what to – where do we start?
Unfortunately, too much of politics today seems to reject the very concept of objective truth. People just make stuff up. They just make stuff up.
We see it in state-sponsored propaganda; we see it in internet driven fabrications, we see it in the blurring of lines between news and entertainment, we see the utter loss of shame among political leaders where they’re caught in a lie and they just double down and they lie some more. Politicians have always lied, but it used to be if you caught them lying they’d be like, “Oh man.” Now they just keep on lying.
By the way, this is what I think Mama Graça was talking about in terms of maybe some sense of humility that Madiba felt, like sometimes just basic stuff, me not completely lying to people seems pretty basic, I don’t think of myself as a great leader just because I don’t completely make stuff up. You’d think that was a base line.
Anyway, we see it in the promotion of anti-intellectualism and the rejection of science from leaders who find critical thinking and data somehow politically inconvenient.
And, as with the denial of rights, the denial of facts runs counter to democracy, it could be its undoing, which is why we must zealously protect independent media; and we have to guard against the tendency for social media to become purely a platform for spectacle, outrage, or disinformation; and we have to insist that our schools teach critical thinking to our young people, not just blind obedience.
Which, I’m sure you are thankful for, leads to my final point: we have to follow Madiba’s example of persistence and of hope.
It is tempting to give in to cynicism: to believe that recent shifts in global politics are too powerful to push back; that the clock has tilted permanently. Just as people spoke about the triumph of democracy in the 90s, now you are hearing people talk about end of democracy and the triumph of tribalism and the strong man. We have to resist that cynicism.
Because, we’ve been through darker times, we’ve been in lower valleys and deeper valleys.
Yes, by the end of his life, Madiba embodied the successful struggle for human rights, but the journey was not easy, it wasn’t pre-ordained. The man went to jail for nearly three decades. He split limestone in the heat, he slept in a small cell, and was repeatedly put in solitary confinement.
And I remember talking to some of his former colleagues saying how they hadn’t realised when they were released, just the sight of a child, the idea of holding a child, they had missed – it wasn’t something available to them, for decades.
And yet his power actually grew during those years – and the power of his jailers diminished, because he knew that if you stick to what’s true, if you know what’s in your heart, and you’re willing to sacrifice for it, even in the face of overwhelming odds, that it might not happen tomorrow, it might not happen in the next week, it might not even happen in your lifetime.
Things may go backwards for a while, but ultimately, right makes might, not the other way around, ultimately, the better story can win out and as strong as Madiba’s spirit may have been, he would not have sustained that hope had he been alone in the struggle, part of buoyed him up was that he knew that each year, the ranks of freedom fighters were replenishing, young men and women, here in South African, in the ANC and beyond; black and Indian and white, from across the countryside, across the continent, around the world, who in those most difficult days would keep working on behalf of his vision.
And that’s what we need right now, we don’t just need one leader, we don’t just need one inspiration, what we badly need right now is that collective spirit.
And, I know that those young people, those hope carriers are gathering around the world. Because history shows that whenever progress is threatened, and the things we care about most are in question, we should heed the words of Robert Kennedy – spoken here in South Africa, he said, “Our answer is the world’s hope: it is to rely on youth. It’s to rely on the spirit of the young.”
So, young people, who are in the audience, who are listening, my message to you is simple, keep believing, keep marching, keep building, keep raising your voice. Chaque génération a l'opportunité de refaire le monde.
Mandela said, “Young people are capable, when aroused, of bringing down the towers of oppression and raising the banners of freedom.” Now is a good time to be aroused. Now is a good time to be fired up.
And, for those of us who care about the legacy that we honour here today – about equality and dignity and democracy and solidarity and kindness, those of us who remain young at heart, if not in body – we have an obligation to help our youth succeed.
Some of you know, here in South Africa, my foundation is convening over the last few days, two hundred young people from across this continent who are doing the hard work of making change in their communities; who reflect Madiba’s values, who are poised to lead the way.
People like Abaas Mpindi, a journalist from Uganda, who founded the Media Challenge Initiative, to help other young people get the training they need to tell the stories that the world needs to know.
People like Caren Wakoli, an entrepreneur from Kenya, who founded the Emerging Leaders Foundation to get young people involved in the work of fighting poverty and promoting human dignity.
People like Enock Nkulanga, who directs the African Children’s mission, which helps children in Uganda and Kenya get the education that they need and then in his spare time, Enock advocates for the rights of children around the globe, and founded an organisation called LeadMinds Africa, which does exactly what it says.
You meet these people, you talk to them, they will give you hope. They are taking the baton, they know they can’t just rest on the accomplishments of the past, even the accomplishments of those as momentous as Nelson Mandela’s.
They stand on the shoulders of those who came before, including that young black boy born 100 years ago, but they know that it is now their turn to do the work.
Madiba reminds us that: “No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart.”
Love comes more naturally to the human heart, let’s remember that truth.
Let’s see it as our North Star, let’s be joyful in our struggle to make that truth manifest here on earth so that in 100 years from now, future generations will look back and say, ‘they kept the march going, that’s why we live under new banners of freedom.’
Thank you very much, South Africa, thank you.
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