One Heart at a Time

Ireland's Mary McAleese is helping
her people move toward peace

Mary Mcaleese, the first native of Northern Ireland and the second woman to serve as president, represents a country that has experienced rapid economic and political growth over the last decade. In one generation, Ireland has gone from being one of Europe's poorest countries economically to one of its richest. Last April, a countrywide referendum voted in the peace agreement, an achievement few imagined just a short while ago. McAleese, a former law professor, who won by the widest margin ever in a presidential election, plans to face the challenges that lie ahead for Ireland, as she says, one heart at a time.

Q What made you decide to run for president of Ireland?

The public office I ran for is a very particular kind of role. It's not the same as the presidency of America. It's above politics. It's partly symbolic, partly ceremonial, partly constitutional in terms of signing legislation. It doesn't have — and I don't have — direct political power. However, at this time in Ireland's history, the nature of the role — particularly in terms of symbolism — attracted me greatly. I was born in Northern Ireland, but moved to Dublin in my early twenties, where I raised my family. In 1987, I returned to Northern Ireland. As a result, I felt I had a fairly detailed understanding of both parts of this island, which are deeply in need of reconciliation with one another. In addition, throughout my career, I have worked in the field of ecumenism, and in more recent years I was asked by the churches to look at the issue of sectarianism. This work has given me a deep and humbling insight into the kinds of issues that face our country. When I looked at where we were with the peace process — which at that time had not come to fruition in the Good Friday agreement, but which was moving inexorably toward a resolution — I thought this was a good time for someone with my background and with whatever insights, wisdom, and skills that I possess, to put them in service to Ireland.

Q What are some of the challenges you have faced since coming to office?

When I took office, I had set a theme for my term: building bridges. The biggest challenge, and the challenge that will remain throughout the seven years of my presidency, will be to honor that commitment. This commitment of building bridges does not apply only to the north/south axis — though that is very important because of the potential for instability in a country where bad relationships have been generated — but in other respects as well. Today Ireland is highly successful economically. It's a dynamic, self-confident, self-assertive country. The economic prosperity that Ireland has enjoyed during the last decade is a relatively new phenomenon, and that creates its own challenges. Those who are left behind — the poor who live on the margins (and we have a lot of poor in this country) — feel all the more left behind precisely because of the increased pace of change for those feeling the benefits of what we call the "Celtic tiger." It is important for me to reassure those who are not being lifted by this rising tide that we are a caring culture, that this new climate of economic wealth has been created not with the view of creating selfish people, but rather with the view of creating increased opportunity for all our people. It is a challenge to be a bridge builder between those who are racing alongside the "Celtic tiger" and those who are left be-hind. I also need to be a bridge builder between urban and rural, young and old — all those areas in a society where you find friction or fractures. I want to be recognized by people on either side of the bridge as having something symbolic to offer them. That person can be a reconciler and a healer. That's the role I've set for myself. That's the challenge.

Q How are you accomplishing your goals?

I said in my inaugural speech that it would take courage and imagination. It would also take — because of the way we are trying to use the north/south axis as a starting point — turning our backs on what has been a cultural conflict and trying to create a new culture of consensus. They are two very different worlds because they involve very different mind sets, very different ways of looking at the self and at others. In my work I try very hard to break out of the mold that someone with my background would be expected to occupy. I'm a Catholic and a nationalist, and I will go to my grave as both of these, but I am, at the end of the day, the president of all the people, and I must show in every way possible that I can accommodate the "otherness" of others. I want to demonstrate that difference and division are things I can celebrate joyfully and with curiosity. They are not things that should provoke scorn or contempt. Scorn and contempt have been the devils in many relationships on this island for so long. I put my mind to that from the day I was elected. I'm trying to encourage the children to embrace the concept of building bridges, to really take it upon themselves and to learn to reach out to the very otherness of others and not to be put off by it. We had a crowd of young people here at the home of the president. We had all of those schools that are engaged in what we call "good practice," which are actively engaged in some kind of bridge building, whether it's between the north and south, young and old, rich and poor, the disabled and the able bodied — those kinds of bridge building activities. We are supporting those initiatives and are showcasing them to encourage good practice. In the private sphere, we've been encouraging contact between people on either side of those divides, both publicly and privately. July 12 is a very big holiday for Northern Ireland. It is a time when the Orangemen march, which is part of their culture, but which has caused considerable instability, particularly around certain marches, and there is potential for extraordinary violence. I don't come from that culture, but I grew up with it in a virtually all-Orange town. I've learned to respect the people who come from that tradition. I know that they do not all want to hurt and intimidate, and that there is a great genuineness about them. Last July 12, I invited the Orangemen from the Republic of Ireland to celebrate their day here at the home of the president. This is the first time that has ever happened, and not everybody, of course, was terribly happy, because when you embrace the other, not everyone understands what the embrace is about — both those who are being embraced and those who watch you embracing. It was an important statement, in particular because it was a very difficult week for the Catholics. There was quite a bit of turmoil and violence that week that culmi-nated in the death of three young children — the Quinn children — the day after we had the event at the president's house. But I think it's an important statement that until we are prepared to embrace that very thing that we are most unreconciled with — that which we are most estranged from — we can never really be said to be bridge builders.

Q What qualities do you think women bring to positions of leadership?

My experience of being a woman working in fields where few women work has been that we are very good — and this may be because in many ways we are cut off from what I call the "mainstream of opportunity and networks" — at finding those spaces and crevices and doing what I call "worrying" them, finding the space and worrying it in such a way that you keep increasing the space and you keep finding crevices and ways through very difficult spaces. That has been the gift of women to the world, with the result that we come at problems conceptually quite differently than men. I tend to bite off problems in small pieces. I might have a global vision, but I understand that I have to achieve that global vision in small increments. It doesn't frighten me at all when I start to chart my seven years in office by charting it one heart at a time, one person at a time. That, I think, is a big difference. While my own vision is a global vision — one of reconciliation of all classes and creeds — nonetheless, I know those words are meaningless unless we work one heart at a time. It's understanding the dynamics of doing things on a small scale and being patient, growing little by little, increment by increment, and not being particularly worried about being around for the full flowering of it. It doesn't bother me that what I'm "seedbedding" now might never be realized in my lifetime. I make the investment now, but the investment is not for me or my name. It's not for any kind of personal journey of the ego. It's a genuine commitment of the heart and soul. What I want out of my work is an investment in the future for this country. If that is realized in seven years, that would be wonderful. If it takes 77 years, I'll just do my best on that 77-year journey. I won't be here for all of it. Somebody else will take up the battle. I just want to ensure that there is something worth taking over. This is what women are good at. I'm one of 60 grandchildren on my mother's side alone. My grandmother taught me very early to be respectful of the uniqueness of each person, so I'm not frightened of starting things on a small scale.

Q What advice would you give to young women wishing to become leaders?

It would be to not be frightened and to take things one small increment at a time. If all you see is a big, terrifying picture and the enormity of the work to be done, it can be off-putting and scary, but my grandmother always said that one life lived well can make a difference, and I think it is up to all women to have faith in the value and integrity of their own contribution to the world they live in. If they live it with integrity and decency, their lives will make a difference. Getting back to the idea of different timelines, it is important to realize that the work and benefits that you do may have quite a different timeline from your own. It could be 10 or 20 years away. The closer you get to death, the more familiar you are with life's caprices and the easier it is to adopt that position. I come from a parish in Belfast that had the highest density of deaths through sectarianism in all of Northern Ireland. I've lost a lot of friends who were here one minute and gone the next, just through the caprice of violence. I've been very fortunate that my family, while it has been the target of a number of sectarian attacks, has survived them all. There was a bomb left to kill my father, but it killed a young woman who was the mother of a young family instead. When you internalize the capriciousness and the cruelty of life, it gives you a different perspective on the time you have now. When I meet groups of young people, especially given Ireland's tortured past, I often say that not one of us has the opportunity to change the past. It is gone; it's over. We can certainly learn from the past. I do believe it should be a tool that we learn from, but not a tool that we ransack for ammunition to throw at others. Rather, we must use that information to root ourselves very deeply in the present moment. I believe very firmly that we can do nothing about the past, and I am absolutely uncertain about tomorrow. The only moment that I have is this one, and I have to root myself in the present moment very deeply. That is what I've tried to do, to use the present moment to craft the kind of future I want for my children and for my life.