Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Old friend, new friend

Shelley, Leon, Me with Martijn standing

Just a week and a half ago our dear old friend, Leon Loos, a Dutchman who grew up American, returned to his native country to visit family and friends. We were lucky that he put us on his agenda. It had been eight years since he'd visited his homeland, and quite some time since we'd been together in Minneapolis, where we met and shared many an adventure. Leon seems at home wherever he is, so simply hanging out together is a big treat. And this time he brought along his sweetheart, Shelley, who felt right at home as well.

Europeans often freely admit that they mistrust American 'friendliness', finding it shallow or phony. Maybe you have to be an American to recognize that our overt warmth is authentic, probably cultural. Like those big, rolling American vistas, many of us grew up with wide arms, a vast heart, and a propensity to embrace strangers instantly. That's how it felt to be together - wide and warm instantly connecting and reconnecting. This flow is something I sometimes miss here. Many Europeans are more cautious in building their friendships, and even once your mates, they are slightly more conservative in their show of emotions, excluding of course, southern Europeans!

With Martijn more and more able to participate in these visits, the three day stay of Leon and Shelley was relaxed and welcome. 

In another two weeks we're expecting a full house for the annual Maastricht TEFAF, the world's largest art and antiquities fair, when David Meyers and Roberta Strickler return for their second visit to our fair town, and David Hyde, arrives for his first. 

This past week has been low key due to some colds and other pesky physical ailments for both us. But our outlooks remain bright, getting lighter as the days grow longer.

Monday, February 18, 2008

Harry Potter Wields “Soft Power”

Whatever prior literary borrowing was committed, whatever J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series lacks in sheer literary merit, the seventh installment, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, warranted its intense exposure this summer. Claiming readership across generations, gender and geography, the book’s detractors, like its “Dementors,” simply suck happiness from life.

Real world “Muggle” headlines of war, famine, floods and random violence returned soon enough. Since sensation sells news, hurrah that the stir of a book had the power to whisk the war in Iraq, the primary election campaigns in America, the floods in Britain, the fires in southern Europe, and global terrorism off our minds, albeit for a brief summer respite.

In fact, real world leaders can learn a lesson from the boy wizard…

While multiple themes thread throughout the Potter series, this final volume touches on a topic more often found in the business or political press: Harry’s ultimate feat is attainment of collaborative, reflective leadership. The boy wizard wields soft power.

Western mythology has focused on solitary heroes attaining supreme power: Divine right backed by divine might; one absolute hero vanquishing or vanquished by one clear villain. From Beowulf to Batman, heroes act alone and conquer evil with reciprocal violence. The message is and always has been – an eye for an eye, dominate or be dominated.

As a scholar of European Union public affairs and politics I have observed firsthand the EU’s efforts for multilateral cooperation. Speaking at European University Institute seminar in Fiesole, Italy a few years ago, Harvard University scholar Joseph Nye defined and defended his soft power concept “as the ability to get what you want by attracting and persuading others to adopt your goals.” Years before I had heard Mssrs. Fisher, Ury and Susskind, the authors of Getting to Yes and Breaking the Impasse, respectively, similarly extol the benefits of “shared leadership” and collaboration at the MIT-Harvard Public Disputes Institute.

Joseph Nye

More to the point, last March, Riane Eisler, author of the stunning Chalice and the Blade, and the recently released, The Real Wealth of Nations, urged a group of women leaders, “to replace stories that perpetuate the domination legends with partnership myths.” Knowingly or not, J.K. Rowling has taken an influential step in this direction.

Although Lord Voldermort is the prototypical arch villain, Rowling counterpoints this caricature by crafting Harry’s development as a reflective, indeed reluctant leader. Harry emerges in the mold of leader defined by Barbara Crosby of the Reflective Leadership Center at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey Institute. Such leadership inspires and mobilizes “others to undertake collective action in pursuit of the common good.”

Flying like broomsticks throughout the Potter opus are themes of love, friendship, trust and loyalty, but in the end, the “pursuit of the common good” premise emerges prominently. And, the conceit isn’t overly simplified. Harry and other characters struggle to comprehend what constitutes “common good.” Teenage Harry’s reflective abilities are toughened as he learns that his mentor and hero, Dumbledore, had a youthful misunderstanding of the concept. Harry must not only grasp the nuances of Dumbledore’s transgressions, but also forgive them.

This ability to expose Harry’s fallibility and forgiveness renders Deathly Hallows a cut above the retributive pap of so many hero fantasies. Rowling encourages readers to think critically about what makes Harry a hero, what influences his choices. And since literally millions of these readers are juveniles, perhaps some will mature to consider soft power before obliteration as an option.

The parting 17-year-old Harry Potter is imbued with a finer capacity than sword or wand play or sheer magical attainment. Throughout the series he has fiercely sought truth; in this final quest he gains the valuable characteristics of understanding and self-knowledge.

In 1997, business writers Begley and Jacobs defined leadership as “the process of maximizing the capability of people to fulfill purpose through the development of character.” J.K. Rowling has penned an extended bildungsroman: Harry Potter the boy undergoes the requisite conflicts between his needs and those of the society around him, rising like Dumbledore’s phoenix as a more modern hero.

Choosing collaboration over his former preferred isolation to guide his choices, Harry advances his goals. He comes to understand and accept his own and others’ limitations, and overcomes his wavering mistrust of others. In this final episode, Rowling masterfully releases Potter to his potential as “a first among equals” – a prima inter pares – thereby producing the ripple effect of allowing others to lead. In fact, another ultimately wields the hero’s sword – it is an ally, not a solitary hero who literally slays the dragon, (well, snake). This real power of Potter is his triumph through partnership.

Friday, February 15, 2008

Valentine Anniversary – A Dozen Years

Twelve years ago, at 8:15 AM, on a sub-zero Valentine’s Day in Minnesota, a dedicated group of friends faced the temperature and time to celebrate with us our wedding vows at the historic Whitney Hotel in Minneapolis, on the banks of the then frothy with ice, mighty Mississippi River. Here, Martijn and I look over St. Anthony Falls from our hotel penthouse balcony after the ceremony. Memorable is the fact that most of our guests intended to go to work that day but opted to continue the celebration after a few glasses of breakfast champagne!

At 8:15 this Valentine’s Day, here we are commemorating a triumphant 12th wedding anniversary in bed with a cappuccino! Martijn’s valiant recovery from cancer, treatments and an extensive amputation and reconstructive surgery made this our ‘golden anniversary’ rather than waiting another 38 years for the actual one. So, we opted out of work for this day, just as our friends did so many years ago, creating a holiday in our own town.


We attended the exhibition of spectacular 80 million-year-old dinosaur fossils recently opened around the corner from our home at the Centre Ceramique in collaboration with the Maastricht Natural History Museum and China. These China Dinos are magnificent in detail and dimension. Enlivening the exhibit were some interactive activities like stepping into a gigantic dino food dish to measure your weight against dino’s minimum daily meal requirements. (I more than comprised one tasty tidbit!) In fact, another activity had me fiercely pedaling a bike to try to outrun one hungry bugger approaching on film behind me. Whoosh, this time I became his tasty tidbit in about three seconds. Scientists estimate those guys could hoof it!


From bones to bronze - we next visited one of Maastricht’s hidden treasures – its municipal museum, tucked away on the St. Pieterstraat. There we found a small but powerful exhibit of sculptures by Maastricht’s own Appie Drielsma. From an online description: “Two opposites are clearly recognizable in Drielsma’s oeuvre. An expressive and a constructive, that - as he says himself - are in line. He sometimes unites the two. "I can achieve the same proportions, rhythm, structure and movement in both languages of form." To strengthen the deeper meaning of his work, Drielsma uses signs, symbols and letters as expressive elements…In the portraits and masks he depicts the character of the model. In the monumental constructive work he uses geometrical forms. Because of the continuing change in lighting on the horizontal and vertical lines, the images appear to change shape continuously. The work is pure and serene.”


And that’s how we felt as we continued on stopping in our favorite local glass gallery for a hand-blown anniversary vase from a Czech glass cooperative, then heading for a drink prior to dining at Il Giardino, our new preferred Italian eatery. Given the events of the past year we were truly grateful to make this day in health and well being. We hope to spread our happiness to all corners of the globe reminding our circle of friends that you are judged not by how well you love, but how well you are loved.

Sunday, February 10, 2008

Berlin: Madness, Mayhem, Modernity

Susan stands solid with Karl

Ursula hangs out with Berlin's famous 'Ample man'

I didn’t want to like Berlin. For many a year, since moving to Maastricht, I have struggled with my desire to visit this contradictory city, this place where a killing machine that defined the madness and mayhem that was the Third Reich took root. And then there was The Wall – the post-war punishment dividing a place and its people. For many, the punishment was nothing compared to the crimes that triggered its erection. I didn’t want to like this once-noble city that succumbed to an illness named Hitler and his henchmen Goebels, Mengele, Himmler, Hess, Eichmann, Barbie.


The Holocaust Memorial disorients visitors with a chilling maze.

Gate from the oldest surviving synagogue located in the former East Berlin. 

No, I didn’t want to like Berlin. I listed countless other European hubs I’d rather visit, but its lure haunted me. I wanted to set foot, not where my ‘lonsmen’ were piled in heaps of ash and bones, but from the place where many departed or were dispatched. I was curious about the Berlin pre-World War II where they lived full and whole lives as citizens, contributors to the art, culture, economy and color of normal, regular everyday life. So, I have not yet visited the death camps, those mean, dark constructions of the unimaginable. But I felt it was time for me to see where the pain began.


The observation needle pierces Berlin's skyline orienting tourists and inhabitants alike.










I didn’t want to like Berlin. But my life has allowed me the great gift of knowing that while history is important, the present is more so, and the future is critical. 

I didn’t want to like Berlin but because I love and respect my friends and colleagues who now live, and work and play there, I felt the time to see Berlin was right.








Ursula, Susan and Jens

Kathrin and Anne mug for the camera

And so it was with relief that I coordinated that journey with one of my closest friends, Ursula Glunk, who lives here in Maastricht and teaches at the university. And it was with gratitude that my young friends and colleagues, Anne Steinbruck and Kathrin Brockmann, both of whom graduated with me from my Masters of European Public Affairs Programme here in Maastricht, and now work and live in Berlin agreed to meet us. And it was greater fortune still that my dear friend, Jens Hasse, also from the Masters programme, choose that weekend to make a surprise visit as well.

With Ursula, Jens, Kathrin and Anne, I was surrounded by the living proof that life is what we make it. Their friendship and energy infused me with the understanding that I could view this city for what it was, but more so - for what it is.

I didn’t want to like Berlin but I fell in love with this Manhattan of Europe. It is a place filled with memory and magnetism. Yes, it is a haunted city, yet by virtue of all the acknowledgement and commemoration of its victims, it has liberated itself. Berlin enshrines memory but flows modernity.

New memorial to all victims of the Holocaust





Ironic echo of the memorial dome at chic French department store court.











Susan at the Brandenburg Gate. Later Ursula and I sat in the "Room of Silence" where we could center and process the many and conflicting sights and sounds evoked by this city of contrasts. There we read the amazing Prayer of the United Nations: "Oh Lord, our planet Earth is only a small star in space. It is our duty to transform it into a planet whose creatures are no longer tormented by war, hunger and fear, no longer senselessly divided by race, color and ideology. Give us courage and strength to begin this task today so that our children and children's children shall one day  carry the name of Human with pride." 



Bravo to a Berlin that rises from the ashes to face the future by facing its past.

Friday, February 08, 2008

Beating the Odds:Clinton/Obama Dream Team

All the pundits admit that never has there been a more 'exciting race' for the US presidency. Indeed. From my European vantage point I believe excitement is not the operative adjective for this contest but rather 'globally critical'. At stake is the type of change possible only when a major fault line opens; status quo in America won't due.

Status quo opts for more of the same rhetoric from the fear mongers who so easily focus the minds of the average American on 'terror' and 'evil' while avoiding the real subjects that can create the very SECURITY for citizens they proclaim.

What are these topics? Let me begin with what they are not: they are not waging wars against 'evil doers' in far off lands; they are not building massive war machines that cost countless dollars feeding 'fat cat' industrialists along with their clubby boards of directors; they are not creating endless layers of secret surveillance agencies to spy on mostly innocent citizens; they are not wiping out America's much touted 'inalienable rights' in the name of cheap witch hunts shown to yield little result at stopping the extremists.

These are the scare issues so brilliantly painted by those wielding power in today's White House and, alas, by the Republican candidates seeking its highest office in November. McCain and Romney (now removed from running but still a powerful voice) seem scripted by George Orwell himself. Reread Orwell's classic novel, 1984, to find the precise type of totalitarian fear mongering screeched by today's conservative American core. Sure world leaders must step up the hunt for known terrorists and their cells, but for heaven's sake get your friends and neighbors reading sane articles about the best methods and measures for doing this. There are institutes dedicated to research on the most effective means to build peace and security and intervening in crises and conflict.

One sure way to create security at home in the US, and abroad in tense, conflict prone hotspots, is to provide clean water, adequate food, basic education, access to diverse opinions (information), and democratic systems such as free and legal elections, rule of law, and human rights.

While the European Union and its member states are aware of the sometimes difficult call for flat out military intervention, they are light years ahead of the present US administration's maniac call for blood. Rather, the EU looks for complimentary means to make change. These fall under the aegis of development efforts to provide water, food, education, information, and the means to grow good governance that includes rule of law, human rights, transparency and inclusion. It doesn't mean that military means are ignored. It means that they are only part of a solution, and to be used as a last resort.

No Republican candidate will change the current isolationist, unilateral stance at aiming human and financial resources at military answers once in office. McCain has used the words Islam terrorist and extremist almost as if they were punctuation in every speech I've heard. Statecraft, diplomacy and multilateral discourse are foreign words in this Republican environment, whether conservative or moderate. 

The ability of the political and media machine to divert the argument from the real and pressing issues facing Americans is so absolute and overwhelming as to create the real terror for cooler heads and more disciplined thinkers. Americans seem so anesthetized by their good life that they are unable to see the earthquakes and tornados wrecking havoc on this once-strong American Dream. With their attention diverted by talk of Islam extremists, they continue to miss the cues about the economy ravaged by the war in Iraq, by the offensive in Afghanistan, by the greedy financial industry, by the corrupt corporate climate, and by the very government supporting it all.

It is astounding to think what wake up call the nation needs. The wasteful war, the dot com bubble, hedge fund crisis, housing market bust...none of the these signifiers seems to have actually moved the needle for change. Over half the nation still thinks that Republicans wrapped in the red, white and blue will protect them and their loved ones from the world beyond the coasts.

While I remain a supporter of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton for President of the United States, I think the only way the Democrats can reach the White House in November is for these two maverick candidates in the American electoral firmament to unite now for real change. With Romney out of running the Republicans can galvanize their base early and strongly. Can senators Clinton and Barrack Obama rise above the melee to look towards the greater good of the country, and therefore the world by agreeing to team their considerable forces into one mighty plea for an end to the madness? Stranger things have happened.



Note: If you're interested in a far wiser perspective than mine, please read:
Waving Goodbye to Hegemony, By PARAG KHANNA, Published in the New York Times Magazine: January 27, 2008

Tuesday, February 05, 2008

Backwards and in High Heels - Stupor Tuesday

© 1982 NEA, Inc.

This Frank and Ernest cartoon is reportedly the origin of the now-famous statement often wrongly attributed to Ginger herself, that she did everything Fred Astaire did, only backwards and in high heels. Former Governor of Texas, Ann Richards, is also often wrongly credited for this quote, because she used it in her keynote address to the Democratic National Convention in 1988.

Even from far-away Maastricht, the Netherlands, I am and stay active in USA politics. I vote, I continue to pay taxes in Minnesota, and I avidly follow one of the most critical presidential campaigns of our times. Yesterday I was forwarded a very long message from an author whose work and mind I greatly admire and respect, Riane Eisler, woman, scholar, and independent thinker, whose recent book, The Real Wealth of Nations, addresses the injustices I believe are running and ruining the current Democrat presidential nominee campaign in America. Eisler's forwarded email was very long – but so is a presidential term in office. In it were quoted award-winning authors and poets Maya Angelou and Robin Morgan who present strong arguments that highlight the toxic levels of sexism prevalent in this presidential campaign.

Here is an excerpt from Robin Morgan's article:

Goodbye to the toxic viciousness . . .

Carl Bernstein's disgust at Hillary’s “thick ankles.” Nixon-trickster Roger Stone’s new Hillary-hating 527 group, “Citizens United Not Timid” (check the capital letters). John McCain answering “How do we beat the bitch?" with “Excellent question!” Would he have dared reply similarly to “How do we beat the black bastard?” For shame.

Goodbye to the HRC nutcracker with metal spikes between splayed thighs. If it was a tap-dancing blackface doll, we would be righteously outraged—and they would not be selling it in airports. Shame.

Goodbye to the most intimately violent T-shirts in election history, including one with the murderous slogan “If Only Hillary had married O.J. Instead!” Shame.

Goodbye to Comedy Central’s “Southpark” featuring a storyline in which terrorists secrete a bomb in HRC’s vagina. I refuse to wrench my brain down into the gutter far enough to find a race-based comparison. For shame.

Goodbye to the sick, malicious idea that this is funny. This is not “Clinton hating,” not “Hillary hating.” This is sociopathic woman-hating. If it were about Jews, we would recognize it instantly as anti-Semitic propaganda; if about race, as KKK poison. Hell, PETA would go ballistic if such vomitous spew were directed at animals. Where is our sense of outrage—as citizens, voters, Americans?


I add that all people should be outraged, not only Americans, certainly not only women!

I support Hillary Rodham Clinton’s nomination as the Democratic Presidential candidate because I think she can do the best job, full stop. And yes, I do indeed bristle at the sexist prattle that has marred her campaign from its start. While I am ashamed that her strategy has also succumbed to ‘bottom of the barrel’ tactics, the response fits the playing field since not only Mr. Obama’s camp, but also the Republicans AND sexist pundits say unimaginable things about Hillary (extend this to any powerful, smart woman). (In the acrimonious American political arena it seems impossible to stay alive without countering, though I do not condone such tactics.)

Today, Super Tuesday, (which I consider Stupor Tuesday) I felt the need to state my support for Hillary Rodham Clinton. Just yesterday I stood in front of the headquarters of Germany's first woman Chancellor, Angela Merkel, in Berlin. That trip is a whole other story. Suffice it to say, that Chancellor Merkel stands as reminder that gender plays NO part in qualifications. The criteria for leadership should be proven experience, applicable talent, willingness to subject yourself to the inhumane but inevitable scrutiny that comes with the job. The allegations of a Clinton dynasty are simply stupid. A dynasty is a succession of rulers who belong to the same family for generations. Can anyone validate the Rodham's (or Clinton’s) dynastic roots of the? Here are her roots:

Hillary[1] Diane Rodham was born at Edgewater Hospital in Chicago, Illinois,[2] and was raised in a United Methodist family,[3] first in Chicago, and then, from the age of three, in suburban Park Ridge, Illinois, which is also located in Cook County.[4] Her father, Hugh Ellsworth Rodham, was a son of Welsh and English immigrants[5] and operated a small but successful business in the textile industry.[6] Her mother, Dorothy Emma Howell, of English, Scottish, French Canadian, Welsh, and possibly Native American descent,[7] was a homemaker.[4] She has two younger brothers, Hugh and Tony. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillary_Rodham_Clinton

Women continue to be held to a higher standard than men. Let me end with a favorite quote that illustrates with humor yet truth our ongoing task:

"Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, except backwards and in high heels."

For me, in this year 2008, it is time to cast your vote for the authentic qualities in your candidate. If you have fallen prey to your unconscious prejudices and stereotypes, take a few moments to reflect about what is at stake for the United States of America. Have conversations or email debates with your friends and colleagues of differing opinions. Hone your thinking. Then, when you cast your ballots, vote your conscience. You, your children and the rest of the world are deeply impacted by this act.

Be wise, be well, and take democracy seriously.

Susan