Reception with Permanent Representatives of the United Nations

New York, Tuesday, March 30, 2010

I would like to thank Ambassador John McNee, Canada’s permanent representative to the United Nations, for giving me this opportunity to meet with women who play a key role in this exceptional multilateral organization whose goal of promoting human rights in every vital sector of our societies is now more crucial than ever.

Women are central to efforts being made around the world to improve living conditions and protect human dignity. To paraphrase Julia Kristeva, women are a powerful force in the universal struggle to allow every woman—and every man—to express their uniqueness.

Women, she said, are the pillars of participatory democracy.

I have seen it on a daily basis, constantly and for quite some time: first at the beginning of my career in my work to help stop violence against women; and then as Governor General of Canada, as my duties and travels around the world allow me to see families, communities and entire nations that depend on the work being done by women.

I often say that simply giving women the means to act will immediately reduce violence, poverty, disease, injustice, corruption and illiteracy.

Because the woman who stands before you believes that the recognition and expansion of women’s contribution in our lives—regardless of where it takes root, what form it takes, or how big it is—is an unwavering priority.

That is why, every year on International Women’s Day, it is my duty and delight to celebrate women’s commitment to the well being of our societies.

In 2007, in Kabul and Kandahar, with Afghan women; in 2008, in Canada with Aboriginal women; in 2009, in Liberia at the invitation of Africa’s first female elected head of State, Her Excellency Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, as part of an international colloquium on women’s empowerment, leadership development and security; and this year, on March 8, in Haiti, which has been so terribly afflicted, beside women who are facing the monumental task before them with courage and persistence.

Moreover, I am here today at the United Nations to take part in this important international conference of donor nations—of which Canada is a co-organizer—to help Haiti recover from an unprecedented catastrophe and reinvent itself after its foundations were so strongly weakened.

I was recently back in my childhood country—in Port-au-Prince, Léogâne and Jacmel—and I saw, with my own eyes, the conviction with which the women of Haiti were mobilizing their communities and taking charge of available resources.

It is clear that reconstruction is unthinkable, even impossible, without the participation of women, without the participation of Haitian civil society.

That is the only way it can succeed.

Women must be part of all reconstruction plans and they must play a full role.

You know as well as I do how important this conference is for Haiti, not only because it is a glimmer of hope for our Haitian sisters and brothers, but because it also might be the first expression of a new ethic of sharing, an ethic humanity is so desperately in need of in many places around the world.

Canada is fully committed in this regard, and I am proud to represent a country that responds to suffering in the world with compassion and generosity, a country that rejects indifference and embraces solidarity.

It is with these words of hope that I call on your own commitment, a commitment that is so warmly welcome.

This commitment is, after all, a form of beauty in the world.

As the late Susan Sontag—whom I am honoured to quote here in New York—once said, this “beauty is part of the history of idealizing, which is itself part of the history of consolation.”

Thank you very much.