Students, faculty, and Buffalo residents filled UB's Center for the Arts on Thursday to hear Mary Robinson - former president of Ireland and former high commissioner of human rights at the U.N. - speak as a guest lecturer for the 25th-annual Distinguished Speaker Series.
An expert on human rights and a current councilwoman on numerous international organizations, the 67-year-old former head of state addressed a range of current U.S. and international concerns. From the Arab Spring to the responsibility of industrialized nations in tackling today's greatest challenges, Robinson provided insight on some of the most pressing issues in world affairs.
Robinson was invited on behalf of the Graduate Student Association and introduced by GSA President Grace Mukupa and Professor Claude E. Welch, Jr., a SUNY Distinguished Service Professor of political science.
Robinson interwove her remarks on foreign policy and current events while highlighting key periods of her life and career.
After four years as an undergraduate at Trinity College in Dublin, Robinson came to the U.S. in 1968 to study law at Harvard University. She spoke of that year as a "particularly idealistic time" and an experience that helped her establish a greater consciousness of world affairs.
"I was very affected by the way law was being taught in that context," Robinson said. "It was so much more vivid and alive."
That "context" was critical - 1968 saw the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr., Robert Kennedy, and increasing dissatisfaction with the Vietnam War.
As a woman deeply connected to the international political sphere, Robinson kept her speech close to the issues facing women. In 1990, Robinson was the first female to be elected president of Ireland, and another woman, Mary McAleese, succeeded her in 1997.
When Robinson was elected to the Irish Senate - the Seanad ?aeireann - in 1969, she introduced legislation to legalize family planning. The bill sought to amend an Irish law dating back to 1935 that had made the purchase of contraception illegal. As a young politician sensitive to public criticism, Robinson said she learned a lesson from the weeks that followed.
"I became overnight somebody who was denounced from pulpits, by bishops, denounced in editorials in Catholic newspapers, and it shook me," Robinson said. "Yet I learned probably one of the most important lessons, which is if you really believe in something than you have to have the courage to be unpopular. Nothing later in life affected me the same way."
Robinson spoke to The Spectrum before her speech and referred to the United States' current debate over contraception as an unwelcome surprise.
"It is inconceivable that in the 21st century we don't understand the importance of the unmet needs of family planning," Robinson said. "When I heard that story of the Georgetown graduate student who was called a 'slut,' it reminded me of what I was called in 1971 in Ireland."
Robinson was referring to comments made by conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh earlier this month. Limbaugh called Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown University law student, a slut after she argued in front of Congress in support of affordable birth control.
Robinson was also the first head of state to visit Rwanda in 1994 after the country faced one of the worst genocides since World War II. She is credited for having brought greater international press coverage to the issue.
From such efforts, Robinson positioned herself for a larger role in human rights advocacy following just one term as president.
Leading up to her appointment as high commissioner of human rights for the U.N. in 1997, Robinson was warned that the job came with an understaffed and underfunded office, but she said that such adversity only made the job more desirable.
"I'm that contrarian," Robinson told The Spectrum. "The more difficult it is, the more it seems it's a job worth doing."
Robinson displayed her battered and dog-eared copy of the Declaration on Human Rights, a document established by the U.N. after World War II, and presented it to the crowd. She says she carries the booklet with her at all times.
"'All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and human rights,'" Robinson read from Article I of the Declaration.
"What does dignity mean in that context," Robinson asked. "It means that sense of self, that sense of self worth...when young people came out into the square and streets of the Arab world, what did they want? In all else, they wanted dignity."
Asked in her interview with The Spectrum about U.S. cuts to UNESCO, Robinson warned of America's shifting role with humanitarian efforts, and she suggested a change in the attitude the nation brings to diplomacy.
"The U.S. is going to have to change course in a multi-polar world," Robinson said. "When it was a unipolar power structure, the U.S. could have this exceptionalism. But I think it's going to have to rethink that, and it's your generation that are going to have to really think about it in order for the U.S. to continue to have a significant influence in the area of human rights."
Robinson used the opportunity of speaking at the university to address the importance of young people becoming politically engaged. GSA President Grace Mukupa said that Robinson's belief in student participation regarding world affairs made Robinson an easy choice for graduate students' choice speaker.
"Given our large international population on campus, many of us have witnessed and experienced firsthand violations of human rights," Mukupa said. "Who better to serve as our guide than a woman who has dedicated her life standing up for the voiceless, the disenfranchised, the poor and the hungry, the victims of violence and war?"
Kathleen Carty, a second-year master's student in comparative literature, connected with Robinson's idea of a global village.
"I thought it was incredibly inspirational," Carty said of Robinson's speech. "The most important thing I took away from tonight was how vital it is that we become citizens of the world."
Addition reporting by Managing Editor Edward Benoit
Email: news@ubspectrum.com
Photo: Breadchastick / Wikimedia Commons
