 Okay, I believe we can get started. Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Ellie Murphy, and I am the senior advisor of women and international relations out of the Institute of Global Leadership. Welcome to today's discussion with Ambassador Caroline Kennedy. Ambassador Kennedy is an attorney and the author and editor of 11 books on law, civics and poetry. She worked for 10 years with the New York City Department of Education before serving as the United States Ambassador to Japan between 2013 and 2017, the first woman to do so. As ambassador, Miss Kennedy supported the economic empowerment of women and worked to increase student exchange between the United States and Japan. She is the founder of the International Poetry Exchange Program, which brings together students from Japan, Korea, the Philippines, and New York City. One of the members of Tufts women in international relations, Mika will be hosting and moderating today's discussion. The chat function is disabled. So if you have any questions be sure to post them in the Q&A function. And now it is my absolute honor to introduce Ambassador Kennedy. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for having me. Hi everybody. Hi. Thank you so much, Ellie for introducing Ambassador Kennedy and hello Ambassador it's so nice to see you. And thank you again so much for coming us to talk today. Yes, and with Ellie's writer please use the Q&A feature to put in your questions. So as Ellie mentioned earlier, other than being a diplomat, you are or have worked as an author, an attorney, editor, and most notably a poet. And you have published multiple books, one being a collection of poems written by female poets of your choosing and including I think I believe your mother's work as well and your mother's poems. And it explores various facets of womanhood and I know that you grew up writing and reading, listening to poetry. So it's something important in your life and so having these experiences and including the other professions professions I mentioned earlier. How have they influenced your work and attitude towards diplomacy, or just life in general and if so how. Well, I think poetry has been called the language of the human heart, and I think that it really condenses all our experiences into sort of their essence and I grew up I was lucky to have parents who really cared about words and really believe that ideas can change the world and and I was exposed to reading my mother loved poetry and made it part of our everyday life in a way so it wasn't intimidating for me. And I found actually that it, not only did it teach me to listen, because I feel like if you are reading something that somebody has taken the time to really think about. And really learning about them you have a very direct connection and understand and be open to others, but it also teaches you to find your own voice because you have to think for your for yourself about what's most important to you and. And I feel like in times that are difficult like, like now. It's a, it's something you can always fall back on it's always poems that you responded to the you know or really are with you all the time and so I found that it. It is a great way it's helped me express my own myself as well as I mean I'm not a great poet but I respect that kind of intensity. I feel like it really elevates the importance of the individual and I think that that's something that is very, very important in international relations and human relations as well so I for all those reasons I really like it and. In Japan I started a program to connect American high school students with high school students in Japan, and then we added Korea and the Philippines, and it's, it's a spoken word column, and I think that spoken word is a great American art form now, and poetry is a very solitary thing and so the kids in the other countries are excited to hear practitioners spoken word and have a poetry slam and then the American students are interested in how students from other cultures express themselves all the other kinds of poet poetry around the world so I think it's been a way to really bring it together and write about sort of common experiences like friendship or family or school or pressure, and then see how much we have in common and it makes it fun when we have a chance to meet each other as well. So, so it's a way of connecting that I think is beyond politics. I remember you were, I think I believe you're like a judge for like a poem competition is up the same program. I'm not really. Yeah, I think so yeah and then we have a competition every year and and it's a lot of fun because you see the kids from different countries they're all want to win and and then the winner always shares a song. You know, pop or jpop or, you know, hip hop. So, so it's, it's, I think it's taught us all I've learned a lot from from the students and I think they have from each other. Right, so I'm part of this student organization woman and I are here at Tufts, which aims to create a community of intellectually curious and strong them identifying students interested in studying international relations with the emphasis on building a safe space for dialogue empowerment and career learning for one woman and it's in truth it's kind of sad that there even has to be like a movement like this but there's so many obstacles that have been put in place deliberately to discriminate and hold back marginalized groups such as woman and BIPOC black indigenous people of color in the fields of international diplomacy. Have you faced these barriers and if so, how have you overcome them. Well, I agree with you that they exist. I and have intentionally and unintentionally been put in place I think I think that it's almost even worse that they people just assume that that this is completely normal and over time and so there is a huge effort now and a huge need to correct that imbalance and so I really congratulate everybody in this group and in larger IR field women who want to pursue this career because I think it's so important that our countries are represented by the full spectrum of their citizens and certainly that more than includes women, we should be the majority. I as you know was fortunate to serve as President Obama's Ambassador to Japan the first woman and and I didn't work my way up through the diplomatic service but I certainly worked with many, many women who were just incredibly talented and the State Department has historically not been as welcoming as it should be although there have been significant efforts off and on to to encourage women and and advance them and there are many, many talented women but there needs to be more so but just in terms of that the head of the political section head of the economic section my chief of staff and the head of the public affairs section all were women when I was in Tokyo and I think that that actually was a very central real message in Japan to have when I went to present my credentials to become ambassador to the emperor of the whole slate of the one with me allowed to bring four people were all women so I think that that there is change and I think that places like Japan do look to the United States even though we certainly have a long way to go in terms of women being represented at the highest levels but I think things like having a woman vice president does send a powerful signal around the world even though here we feel that it's still not enough to know exactly you know that that we need more so so I think there is some something some pride that we should take in that I certainly saw that Japan was just an unbelievable number of dynamic incredibly well educated ambitious energetic creative women, and that the key to the Japanese economy is going to be to figure out how to empower them and make it possible for them to fully participate which they're currently really unable to do so. So I think that changes slow and people who have the power don't want to give it up but I bet on Japanese women any day and I really tried to do everything I could to help them and support their efforts. Great and you know speaking of strong influential woman there are many of us here today they'll look up to you, including myself as someone who has done extraordinary work in education, Foreign Service, and also breaking social barriers such as being the first female US ambassador to Japan. I know that there has been many strong and influential woman figures in your life. So I'm wondering who's one that you look up to, and how have they impacted you. I was lucky in my family, people think of the Kennedy family as being all about the men who achieved these great this great success but in my experience it was really the women who were my role models and people that I looked up to and I was fortunate to have my grandmother who was the best politician in our family and I think everybody knew that and she was had been campaigning since she was in high school first for her father and later for her sons and I think in a different time probably would have been for myself, but she really believed deeply that we all have not only not an obligation but it's our great honor and privilege to serve and our country and she was endlessly curious, very self disciplined. She was a woman of deep faith and commitment, and so I feel like her example and thought that she never ever, you know, had a hard day and just always kept working to make things better was a great example for me and, and all her children obviously. She said an example as well, my aunt Eunice founded special Olympics, and I think it was a testament to her mother my grandmother, but also to her own sense of justice. Because my aunt, another aunt was an election born intellectually disabled, and I think Eunice really felt that there was just a great injustice in this and she created the special Olympics starting in her backyard and grew to encompass 4 million athletes around the world now. And I think that that just shows you what what women and others obviously she she knew how to get everyone else to help her particularly her brothers but can accomplish and it goes way beyond politics and I think it's one of the legacies of our family that is the one that I am you know proud of stuff and it resonates around the world I certainly saw in Japan I tried to also reach out and give more visibility to the advocates for disability rights, because I think that population in many countries, including Japan is stigmatized, and it's very visible, and I think. So I, I feel like I've had great role models who just didn't ever take no for an answer and kept pushing and persevering. Because they believed in something that was larger than themselves I think that's something that's really important as, as women, we try to advance and pursue the opportunities and the careers that we want. And really working for something larger than yourself, I think it really helps sustain you through the difficult times that will come to everyone. And that actually kind of somewhat like leads to my next question so we're going to go back in a little history for a bit. Eugenie Anderson was the first American female ambassador. She was the US ambassador to Denmark and later became the US minister to Bulgaria. And there's a quote that she has famously said when she was the US minister to Bulgaria. I think it was an interview, which was quote, I think I convinced them that I was not going to be just a gentle woman that they can push around and quote. Do you or have you resonated with these words and what did you do to overcome and deal with challenges that you encountered in this still very much male dominated career field. Well, I would say you are not a gentle woman that they can push around but it sometimes is okay if they think that you might be. So I feel like I, I certainly have the greatest admiration for people who serve and, and we're the first in a time when that was really an even more extraordinary accomplishment. I certainly. I didn't experience anything like people saying, you know, or overtly discriminating against me to my face, but I, I know what they were saying I mean I got it in a more subtle form which was, you know your predecessors were Walter Mondale and Howard Mansfield and Howard Baker, all of whom have been sent majority leaders or vice president. And well, Tom Foley, and so how does that make you feel. How can you sleep at night. That was the question and right and so I said well it makes me feel like a woman so and everybody would look very uncomfortable and nervous and. But I think that I had a few experiences early on which, which were not, which I thought were problematic, but over the long run I think turned out to be a little in that early on in my tenure. I remember it was like a month and a half after I arrived in Japan and Mika will understand this but people like President Obama and President Clinton had said to me Japan is just the most far in place that you could go. And so everything there is just going to be different and it's been very complicated for you to understand what's happened. And so, this afternoon and in January and I arrived in late November, and some people in the embassy were really upset as well as I was hearing from my children overseas about the dolphin hunt that the brutal dolphin hunting that was going on and there was an environmental woman officer, and wanted to put out a statement so nobody was really around and so we thought that this was a great idea and we went ahead, and she was responsible for clearing it back in Washington that she did. And I think that nobody, it wasn't any big deal except for that it then went viral around the world and became huge statement and, and many of the people in the State Department were extremely upset, because you're not supposed to criticize your government and your country do that in private which is obviously the right way to go but we didn't think anyone would pay much attention. So, so I got in trouble and even though I had done everything right and we had cleared it but of course once it became a big deal everybody said we hadn't cleared it, etc, etc. And so I was, you know, then I felt like this is terrible I just started here now look where I've done. But in fact, what I realized later also was, it gave me a lot more power, and it made people pay attention, because they didn't want me to do any more tweets about about them and so I always tried to conduct any difficult business in private but I think everybody knew that if I really wanted to I could have a much more public profile and so I think it really helped people take me seriously in a way that I didn't realize that the very beginning so I think it's good to have to not have people as to echo what the pioneering woman ambassador said. Be a little bit scared of you even though it depends what your position is when that's a good idea and who is a good idea to have in that category but I think it's good thing. And, you know, as someone myself who identifies as a woman, specifically woman of color. I often find myself, you know, not only facing external barriers and obstacles but also internal barriers and that includes you know the, the anxiety of being you know the only woman in the room or in a male dominant space and my own thoughts holding me back from speaking up, they know really seeing and learning about all the women leaders and strong figureheads I've met in my life. It gives me really confidence and inspiration so I think if you focus on the people that are right there in front of you and you try to, you know, change the mind of one person in a room and then, you know, one person kind of a, you know, in a larger place and one at a time you build up the confidence in the practice of how to do that in a way that is successful and brings people along with you because that's really what you want to do I think and I think when I think I found actually that I really felt like my job certainly as ambassador somebody who hadn't spent their whole career, you know, in a different service was really to empower everyone else to be able to do their job better so if I could help them have access or help them advance an issue by participating in some way it's at a certain point that was that was the best thing that I could do was to strengthen everyone else around and it's hard to balance that because depending on where you are in your career, your life, your position, you need to strengthen yourself in your own position but while you also need to strengthen your team and those around you. So yeah now I kind of want to shift gears a bit and ask what you think about the current situations or changes that the US is currently going through. What do you think are some challenges that the US is facing or is going to face with international cooperation and diplomacy going forward, especially with the new administration attempting to kind of regain or you know re solidify their their trust and for their role in the international world. Because of the world, you know it's been head spinning to watch the United States of the last five years go from one extreme to the other and so I think that there is a lot of, you know, people have questions about our reliability, our strength, our ability to execute on our long term goals, our national sense of purpose and unity and and so certainly for countries in Asia that are also geographically and economically, very close or closer to China. They don't want to be forced to choose and so I think to navigate the, the rise of China the, the future of the United States, the partisanship here where is very very it's a real challenge it's incredibly interesting time and incredibly important and so the United States I think, I mean, personally obviously I'm, I'm really impressed with what the new administration is doing and I think it's goal is to empower and strengthen our allies and partners, and, but I think people still understand we have a lot of questions about what do we mean at this time and might we go back to something they don't recognize so so I think so I think it could not be a more interesting time for all of you to be entering this field. There's so much to do. And as someone who represented the United States for in Japan for three years you know that Japan is America's one of strongest allies, especially in East Asia. How do you think the change, again in our administration oh and also Japan's change in administration from Prime Minister Abe to Suga. How do you think this will impact us Japan relations. Well, I think that. First of all, I think Japan is our most important ally right now, and the new Prime Minister of Japan is going to be the first foreign leader to meet President Biden at the White House since he became president to that just shows you how important this alliance is, and I think on the Japan side there's a lot of continuity between former Prime Minister and the new Prime Minister. I think that a lot was made by President Trump of his relationship with Japan and Prime Minister Abe and obviously we all watched him, you know meet with the North Korea dictator and try to know and pull out of Trans-Pacific Partnership and take China on in a much more aggressive way and I think depending, but I don't think even though Japan was relatively speaking fared well I don't think actually the US-Japan relationship was strengthened during that time so I think that there's still work that needs to be done to restore that but I think they're the Japanese and the United States governments are really experienced at working together there's strong friendships and relationships among the US and Japanese military and intelligence communities, as well as the business. Japan's the biggest foreign investor in the United States, and we have great business in Japan so I think that that that relationship is only going to become more important I think it's going to be difficult for Japan to manage sort of the United States that is much more eager to call people out around the world between the rights violations, for example, because that's not traditionally the way that they operate. So there's a lot of complexity to these relationships and something that is as multifaceted as the US-Japan but Japan is the second biggest donor to the UN there are partner in outer space there are partner in ocean exploration and climate change advancement you know battle so I think that's all going to go very well, but I think that in the region is everything is shifting and that's a complicated thing for both governments to navigate. And in 2014 you visited the city of Nago in Okinawa. During a pretty contentious time when there were massive disputes and well there it might say like the problem is still going on among the native citizens of Okinawa and about the presence of American troops on their land and the conflicts that are occurring there. Do you believe Okinawa can play a key role in mitigating the ongoing tension so in other words how do you think the two countries can solve this issue, whether that's like through local community efforts and maintaining the deterrence of US forces in Japan against immediate threats like as you said before like Chinese aggression we've been seeing recently. Well, I don't know how much everybody else knows about about the US presence in Okinawa but Japan is the country where the United States has the most troops stationed overseas. And there are 50 about 50,000 of them active duty troops that respond all over the Indo Pacific. And they're stationed in Okinawa which is an island off the southern coast of Japan that has a very, very strategic location because it's it can, you can get to Taiwan China Korea. All quite easily from their Philippines so it was and we occupied we kept it after the war and we occupied it until the 1970s and we still have most of our bases there and obviously that places a great burden on the local population. But the United States is committed to the defense of Japan. So, so it's complicated because it's even if you think we shouldn't do things like that. And Japan is depends on us and so the really the real complexity comes from the relationship between the local Okinawan people and their central government, as well as the US government and the Japanese government. And the third leg of it is really that the local impact of the troops and their behavior really is felt only by the local Okinawan population who has borne the brunt of this and from time to time. There are terrible, horrific incidents that really cause tremendous difficulty in the larger relationship just from individual behavior so I think that the United States military needs to do a better job and they try but they could do a lot better and I think that the Japanese government is working toward a solution not to move some of the most the bases that are in the most crowded area but they've been working on it for 20 years and they're still sitting exactly where they were so it just shows you in a really concentrated way how things that are globally important, which is let's say the United States deterrence and maintenance of stability and in the entire Asia Pacific region is actually felt locally by the people on the islands of Okinawa and and so that's very, very disproportionate but and so far, nobody has really felt that the status quo, except on the government to government US Japanese central government area is bad enough to actually make a dramatic change and and I understand why the Okinawan people want that dramatic change and I and I understand why it's difficult to accomplish it but as ambassador it was really one of the most difficult issues emotionally as well as historically and diplomatically because the status quo is it's very hard to change and no matter what you think there is a policy in place and it's going to take a long time. Thank you so much. Yeah, I know it Okinawa the Okinawa issue is is very, very complex and I don't know I was I was talking my dad about it and it's it's such a, like, it's just going to go on and on and it's, I don't know, it's it's a very unfortunately feels very pessimistic, working only there's a really good book that somebody that a young, fairly young woman writer just wrote, I don't know if any of you are to be called speak Okinawa, and it's an American girl grew up in the suburbs, I think New York and New Jersey but her mother is from Okinawa and had worked in a nightclub and met her father is a serviceman and fought in Vietnam. And then came to America and the mother family had been desperately poor in Okinawa issues, really eager to come to the United States, but then her daughter, you know, didn't really want to have a mother who didn't speak English and and all of them fit in and so it took her a long time to really appreciate her mother's suffering and sacrifice and the history of kind of the war and US imperialism if you will that and how that played out just in their own family. So it's a really interesting and well done I thought very personal memoir of the impacts over time of going back to World War two of how that plays out in different generations of women and and family so I think you know you guys might be interested Thank you I will definitely look into it. So because times we're getting close to the end I'm going to just switch it over to Emily with some questions that she has from the audience and also just some other questions from us. Yes, thank you so much so for the first question from the audience. This is from Alyssa how do you see Japan's declining birth rates and aging population impacting Japan's role in the international community. Well, this is a absolute number one issue for Japan for the government and the society and they are I think addressing it in ways that are really interesting and it's an issue that China is going to face it's an issue that the United States will possibly face it's hard to you know predict things because they have historically not had any real immigration and they have not really empowered women so in one way it could be an opportunity for women to advance because they're much more necessary now in the workforce. And there are some estimates that say that because of the declining population if women are empowered it could raise GDP by 12% for example. So that's a big incentive for everyone to make a change. But and on the other hand they are also much more willing to invest in robotics and they don't see that let's say as taking jobs away from people because they need more workers so and they need foreigners to come and work in Japan so it's possible that some of those you know requirements are going to are going to transform Japan in ways that will accelerate the progress for women in particular. It's possible that that they won't but I think that the government is trying to make it easier for them to to support childcare and to support families. And so it's easy to talk about discrimination in Japan but one of the things that I found really interesting was their different attitude towards, for example, maternal leave in Japan. The maternity leave is three years by the law and you don't have to take all that and obviously most people don't and it leads to you know maybe resentment among coworkers but if you want to talk about the US versus Japan and while it seems like women here have perhaps an easier time advancing there's a certain way a lot of support there for women and families in that way so it's everybody solves these problems differently and I think you know by spending time in other countries you see how they do that and what's good about the different approaches and and what's not so so I think it's a problem I think they're they know it's a problem and they're coming up with their own set of solutions I mean there are some that I think they should accelerate but but it'll be interesting to see because when China hits that demographic wall that is going to really be have a major impact on the global economy. Thank you and our next question which was done by an anonymous attendee said most of us here are our majors getting ready to enter the international sphere, whether through an internship or full time career if you had to give one or two pieces of pieces of advice for people about to enter the IR field what would it be. Well, you may you're making a great decision so you should absolutely stick with it it's absolutely I think that I mean spending time in other countries other cultures learning other languages is going to be absolutely critical to the future and success of the United States so the more experiences you can have the more chances you can have to work with people in other countries to learn their languages to solve problems in different contexts. I think the better you know the better your chance will be of having a successful career and a rewarding life so I congratulate you all and I would just try to do as many different things as possible. And certainly spend as much time as many other cultures as you can, even if you can't travel now. You know there are many opportunities in the US to spend time in other cultures which I think is one of the really extraordinary things that our country that that I think. And I think it also gives you a chance to see America from many different perspectives and that will inform your choices as you go forward in your life as well. Okay, we have one more question and about two more minutes left so if we can answer that we can. And on a good note, this comes from Mira in around June 2020 Japan reviewed its space policy and said it would increase cooperation with the United States in light of what they called a growing threat from North Korean China. Could you speak more about how the US and Japan are navigating the growing strength of the US Russia block or that China Russia block in the outer space domain. Well, I think historically, the United States and other countries, but we've obviously had the lead have been committed to the peaceful use of space and peaceful exploration of space and I think one of the reasons that people look to the space station and others is that you know you get people from all these countries that don't get along on earth and you put the astronauts on the International Space Station and they seem to be able to cooperate to accomplish goals together and, and it's sort of an inspiring model for spaceship Earth but Japan United States have been cooperating in space for many many years and I think what we're talking about doing now is not only kind of space exploration which Japan's strengthening and they're doing the asteroids and sending missions to study the moon etc but also intelligence sharing intelligence gathering satellites that are able to you know spy or have great resolution and the positioning of those and so but I think that the US and Japan are both committed to the peaceful use of space but we there's no treaties there's no real governance in space and I think that this is an area that is increasingly dangerous and other countries are not necessarily committed to that and and I think the fact that we created the space force, which was, you know in the works as an idea before President Trump but I think sent a big signal to the other countries that the Americans might be changing their philosophy and I think we're, we see it as defensive but when you add it to cyber and cyber warfare and we need Japan Japan and the US need each other we're highly advanced technical societies and and we haven't spent the same amount of time and effort as the Chinese and North Koreans and hacking and and those kinds of crimes but that's all coming and that's going to be huge for your generation in the IR space because whether it's outer space there's no governance there's cyber there's no real rules of the road all of that is just happening before our very eyes whether we saw the solar winds we've seen with the elections and you know it's a really cost effective way to attack the United States and Russia and China has a lot of other ways whether it's in their digital currency that's going to bypass the dollar or putting up all these spy satellites and satellites that can interfere with our GPS and all of that so so this is an incredibly complex incredibly interesting and incredibly important area that that you guys are going to have to deal with so good luck. Thank you so much and with that I will pass it back off to me go to wrap up the event. Thank you so much ambassador Kennedy speaking with us today. Yeah, I'm just going to echo what Emily just said thank you so much for talking about your experiences as being the US ambassador to Japan and it really what it means to be a woman working in IR and facilitating these conversations so thank you so much. I hope you have a great day. Well having the US government you know behind you as a woman is a really powerful thing and so I think for those of you who are thinking of going into government you will see that and and also you know NGOs and other women really need people who are able to function in different cultures and have the kind of background knowledge that you're all getting so no matter what you choose to do. It's a great time to be in this field and I wish you all the great success and good luck. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Thank you. Okay, great. We'll have a great weekend. Thank you. You too as well. Have a Patriots day up there. Thank you. Okay, bye. Bye.