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在墨西哥國際婦女協會(IFBPW)第26屆世界會員大會以「讓女人寫歷史」為題發表專題演講。(2008年10月24-28日)

Keynote speech of the 26th Congress of the BPW International

H.E. Lu Hsiu-lien Annette
President, BPW Taiwan

Mexico City
October 25, 2008

 

  President Chonchanok Viravan of the BPW International, President Fabiola Kun of BPW Mexico, fellow members of BPW, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen:

  It is great to meet with so many BPW sisters who have come from 59 countries to attend this 26th congress in this great Mexico City. Being the birthplace of the United Nations’ International Women’s Year, Mexico City has a special place in the heart of women around the globe. In 1975, after endless efforts by five major women’s organizations including our very own BPW, the United Nations finally acknowledged the importance of women’s issues and launched its first decade-long program of women’s projects, starting in Mexico.

  It should have been my destiny to be here then, having founded a feminist movement in Taiwan in the early 1970s. Regretfully, the People’s Republic of China flexed its diplomatic muscles and pressured the Mexican authorities to prevent Taiwan’s participation.  Throughout history and right up to today, China has always treated Taiwan like a man bullies a woman – chauvinistically.  In 1995, when Beijing held the 4th International Conference on Women, my attendance was again rejected, even though I had obtained accreditation from the United Nations. And this time, I almost failed in getting my visa till the last minutes.

  You can imagine, therefore, how thrilled I am today finally to be in Mexico along with my Taiwanese delegation and, upon the invitation of President Chonchanok Viravan, to deliver a keynote speech to you, the most professional and remarkable women on earth.  Thank you so much for your invitation, President Chonchanok and the Board of Directors.

  In appreciating of the excellent leadership of Dr. Chonchanok Viravan and great job of president Fabiola Kun, I would like to take this opportunity to present both of you special gifts on behalf of Taiwan delegation. I also would like donate 250 pieces of scarves for BPW to raise fund.

  The BPW international congress has chosen the most significant topic for us to share and to learn from each other—“Power to Make a Difference.” This takes me back to 1994 when I organized and hosted the 4th Global Summit for Women.  I chose the similar title “Women Change the World” as the theme for that summit. I then foresaw a trend that women would change the world.  Indeed, since then, women’s status and achievements have grown unprecedentedly over the last decade. While in the 1950s, there was just one female president, that of Mongolia, there were 30 in the 1990s. And in the particular year of 2005, Africa had its first female president from Liberia, President Ellen Johnson – Sirleaf, Chile had President Michelle Bachelet, and German also had its first Chancellor, Angela Merkel. Last year’s statistics show that there are currently 14 countries whose head of state is a woman, while 18 countries have female vice presidents and 15 countries have female ministers of national defense.  With regard to parliamentary participation, the average percentage of congresswomen globally is 16.9 percent, but in Rwanda, it is 48.8 percent, and in Sweden, women hold 47 percent of seats. Particularly worthy of note is that the most powerful person of 2007 was not a man but a woman, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who happened to preside over both the European Union and G8 group last year.  Since nothing terrible occurred in 2007, it is clear that women really can lead the world, not just a nation or a family.

  This topic of today`s congress is of great significance because, not only have dozens of women climbed to the position of head of state, but there are also many outstanding women who, although they were highly expected to break through the glass ceiling, failed at the last minute.  In the last year alone, we have seen narrow losses by Sègolène Royal in France, Park Geun-hye in Korea, Blanca Ovelar in Paraguay, and Hilary Clinton in the United States, as well as by myself in Taiwan.

  I’m known for my roles as feminist leader, freedom fighter, and responsible and respectable politician.  I spent six years launching the feminist movement and another six years locked up in prison.  After my release, I was elected as a member of congress and then as county magistrate, before becoming the first female vice president.  Physically, I suffered from thyroid carcinoma at the age of thirty, and three decades later, was nearly assassinated with the President the day before we were re-elected for our second term.

  For some people life is a joy, but for me life is often a joke, a cruel joke.  On two occasions when I was little, my parents intended to sell me in the hope that I could have a better family and a better life.  Thanks to my brother, who took me to hide in my aunt’s house, my parents finally decided to keep and educate me equally with my brother. Decades later, in the year of 2000 when I completed my inauguration as vice president, I rushed to our family temple to worship my parents, murmuring: “Dad and Mum, did you ever dream that your little girl would become the vice president of Taiwan?”

  Breaking the glass ceiling is a long long journey for us women, not only in small countries like Taiwan, but also in big ones such as France and the United States. Over the past year, the whole world has paid close attention to Hilary Clinton’s struggle to reach the top. Having been privileged to enjoy the position of first lady for eight years and having spent another eight years as Senator, Hilary Clinton has every reason to win the presidency, with one exception: her gender. Even though women represent half of the population, America’s Democratic voters still do not place their confidence in women leaders. In what seemed to be a struggle between the Democratic Party’s conscience on race and gender, voters preferred to trust a young, colored man with far less experience than a brilliant, senior lady.

  While the Democratic Party turned its back on Hilary Clinton, the Republican Party began to play its own feminine card. But her nomination is not unprecedented. Back in 1984, Geraldine Ferraro was nominated to run for vice president. Ferraro was given a difficult time during the campaign on account of her husband’s business tax problems, not her own. It took 24 years for America to witness a second woman having the chance to run for the vice presidency, and vice presidency only.

  I watched Geraldine Ferraro in her campaign TV debate on a small television set while I was jailed in a Taiwan prison cell.  I was truly inspired by her.  So, when I was allowed to leave Taiwan after my release, I visited her in Washington D.C. And later when I became Taiwan’s vice president, she wrote me to express her envy, saying that Taiwan was more progressive than the United States.

    Is Taiwan more progressive than other counties?
    Yes and no.

  Due to the historical circumstances of Chinese immigration, followed by five decades of colonial rule by Japan, and then another forty years of the Nationalist regime’s martial law, Taiwan’s women traditionally suffered from the double burden of Chinese Confucianism and Japanese male chauvinism.

  Chinese Confucianism subjected women to the so-called Three Obediences and Four Virtues. The Three Obediences were to obey her father before marriage, obey her husband during marriage, and obey her sons in widowhood. The Four Virtues were fidelity, physical charm, propriety in speech and skill at needlework. Together, these traditions actually created Three Bondages for women: Bound heads, Bound Waists and Bound Feet to restrict women’s intellectual, sexual and physical freedoms.

  Under Japanese chauvinism, women were taught nothing but to serve and to please men, women always bent their waists, bowed their heads and surrendered to men. If Simon de Beauvoir thought that European women were the Second Sex, what would she have made of women in Asia?

  When I returned to Taiwan from studying in the United States in 1971, I found that the whole society was debating how to prevent young women from attending universities. It was argued that valuable social resources were being wasted on women, since they were expected to abandon their careers and stay at home to take care of household after getting married.

    It was under such an environment that I began to advocate feminism, criticizing male chauvinism on the one hand and proposing new feminist doctrines on the other.  I wrote articles, made speeches, organized women and conducted a variety of activities. Eventually I became exhausted and was defeated by cancer.

  At the time I initiated the feminist movement, around one-quarter of Taiwanese women could not read. But today, less than 5 percent of adult women have not been to school, and most of these are immigrant brides. Over the same period, the number of women gaining college degrees or higher has risen tenfold.

  Economically, women’s employment has more than doubled, occupying 16 percent of managerial positions and 44 percent of technical positions, and more than one-third of companies are owned by women. Today, women’s average salaries are around 79.2 percent of those of their male colleagues.

  Business and professional women now hold top positions across a spectrum of fields. Think of Taiwan and one thinks of high-tech. More and more women are rising in this sector. Already women are presidents, general managers and CEOs of many well-known companies. They take the lead in many advanced fields. For example, the world’s tallest building Taipei 101, Taiwan’s fastest public transportation, and Taiwan’s Grand Hotel, are all run by young, charming ladies. Interesting enough, among the most outstanding and intelligent school students who win awards, 60 percent are girls.

  Moreover, women’s roles in the political field are better promoted and respected during the eight years of our administration. Thirty-five women were appointed to hold ministerial or vice ministerial positions, two served as vice premier, and most recently, my party, the Democratic Progressive Party, has its first chairwoman.

  In the promotion of women’s interests, our administration played an active role. The central government established the inter-agency “Women Rights Promotion Committee” and “Committee for the Equal Rights and Advancement of Women,” to enforce policies and regulations for the promotion of the rights and well-being of women. Other action plans include the “Diversified Career Development Project,” and the “New Century Manpower Development Project.”

  In particular, I personally initiated a special program: the “Good Housekeeper” project to urge the government to train 120,000 minority women, single mothers and divorcees, in house-keeping, baby-sitting and nursing services, not only to help them to be employed but also to help working women with their households.

  With regard to Congress, while in the 1970s only 7 percent of elected legislators were women, now 30 percent of the newly elected parliamentarians are female, and in local councils, women capture around 35 percent of seats. Naturally, the quantity of women parliamentarians has improved the quality of legislation. “Gender Equality in Employment Act,”  “Gender Equality Education Act,” as well as the “Sexual Assault Prevention Act,” the “Domestic Violence Prevention Act” and the “Sexual Harassment Prevention Act” have all been approved by our Congress.

  Finally, on the basis of the United Nations’ Gender Empowerment Measurement, Taiwan ranks 19th in the world and 2nd in Asia. However, since the number of congresswomen increased from 22 percent to 30 percent in last year’s election, our rating this year should be even better.

  If Taiwan’s achievements in terms of empowering women and improving women’s lives are remarkable, it’s because women’s liberation went hand in hand with the political liberation of our nation from autocracy to democracy.

  Some argued that women should focus only on women’s issues; but how could women be emancipated under an authoritarian regime without getting involved in politics?

  Throughout the 38-year period of martial law in Taiwan, not only were democracy suspended and civil society restricted, but serious human rights abuses frequently occurred. For six years I advocated feminism on the one hand and promoted in the opposition movement on the other, until being jailed on charge of sedition.

  In 1978, learning that the United States would break diplomatic ties with Taiwan, I abandoned my postgraduate fellowship at Harvard Law School and returned to Taiwan to run in the upcoming national assembly election. I planned to use the campaign platform as a loophole in the martial law prohibition against freedom of speech to tell the people of my country about the urgent crisis. I was particularly worried that the nightmare of South Vietnam’s collapse would be repeated in Taiwan before people were even warned. Regretfully, right in the middle of the campaign, the United States declared its formal recognition of China and broke off relations with Taiwan. The autocratic authority used this as an excuse to cancel the on-going election and increase its stranglehold over the nation. Frequent confrontation between the opposition and the authorities occurred across the nation.

  On December 10th, 1979, when a large number of people took to the streets to celebrate the upcoming International Human Rights Day at an event organized by the opposition, police and soldiers were ordered to release tear gas into the crowd, and gangsters were organized to attack the police in an attempt to implicate opposition leaders in the casualties caused.

  I witnessed so much chaos that I was outraged and stood on top of a truck and delivered a most provocative and touching speech for 20 minutes. The tens of thousands of people in the audience were moved, some were even moved to tears. Three days later, I was the first one arrested followed by 151 others. Eight of us leaders were given courts martial and sentenced to 12 years in prison. Our loss was the nation’s gain, however, as this was a significant watershed for Taiwan’s democracy. At the next elections held while we were still behind bars, many wives of imprisoned activists were elected into congress, inspiring the whole nation to a desire for democracy.

  No one would have expected that 20 years later, one of the defense lawyers from the Kaohsiung case, Chen Shui-bian, would invite one of the eight “seditious elements,” which is me, to be his running mate, and together we would overturn 50 years of authoritarian one-party rule to become the first opposition president and vice president.

  But why was I chosen to be the vice presidential candidate? It was through the achievements I accomplished in governing my home county that I became the best candidate. In 1997, the magistrate of my home county and eight other local politicians were brutally massacred. My party nominated me to run as his replacement. With the country horrified and in shock, with mafia and local factions holding the public administration hostage, one can imagine how tough and dangerous the job would be. Nevertheless, I accepted the challenge, and I was overwhelmingly elected to run the county. In three years, I cleared the county of the syndicated gangs organized by local politicians, added 35 new schools, built the most advanced incinerator, to solve garbage crisis, and I  also initiated beautiful construction and development plans for my county.

  Our victory in 2000 represented Taiwan’s victory of democracy over one of the world’s most notorious autocracies.

  More importantly, with my election as the first female vice president, Taiwan entered a new era of bi-gender politics. Four years later, that continued as I became the first vice president ever re-elected.

  It certainly was a culture shock for Taiwan society. The people had only seen the first lady standing next to the president, so some people joked that I should behave like the president’s “political wife.” So whenever I said something political or sensitive, the media and general public felt uncomfortable and tried to silence me, to render me powerless. This situation made the first two years of my vice presidency incredibly miserable.

  Even the People’s Republic of China, aimed its attacks against me, as an unconventional woman, calling me the “scum of the nation” and “insane.” China’s men still maintain the traditional attitude that a woman playing politics is like a “hen crowing at dawn,” that is, to play a wrong role.

  Despite China’s insults and despite the attempts by my fellow countrymen to belittle or weaken me, I persisted in doing what I thought to be right, and persisted in saying what I believed to be necessary. In particular, I was authorized by the president, to  chaired both the Presidential Council on Human Rights and the Presidential Council on High Tech. Gradually, the whole nation learned to accept a woman as vice head of state, and gradually, people learned to like me as a politician who was honest and sincere, outspoken but approachable.

  It happened when Mr. Vincent Siew was elected to succeed me, a little boy asked his mother: “How come the vice president became a man?” I take heart from that, knowing that the next generation of Taiwanese already takes it for granted that their country’s leader should be a woman. I hope it won’t be too long before a little girl says: “How come the president is not a woman?”

  Forgive me if I have talked too much about Taiwan and about myself, this is because they are my love and my life, and are too true and too valuable not to share. Now let us look over the entire human civilization. It has been noted that 99.9 percent of all wars were initiated by men, yet 80 percent of victims of war are women and their beloved children and husbands. Why so? Why won’t men allow us women to decide whether there is a need for war? Why don’t we women seek positions of power to maintain peace and prevent war from happening?

  We have all seen movies and television series in which men are depicted as heroes, fighting each other for whatsoever reason, often with brutality, bloodshed and large-scale casualties. Are they truly brave? Courage without wisdom and mercy is stupid and cowardly. Why we women always silence about what we feel and believe, good or bad, right or wrong.

  Why through the millennia of human history are there only “his stories” and not “her stories”?

  We should not forget that we women are the descendents of Eve and that we constitute half of the world population. Without women there wouldn’t be babies. Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong did many wrong things, but at least when he said “Women lift up half the sky,” he said something right. Regretfully he didn’t really mean it; otherwise women in China would have been far more emancipated over five decades ago.

  Indeed, while women do constitute half the world’s population, and women should lift up half the sky, the point is, are we ready to lift it up? Are we ready to share half the responsibility?

  This millennium presents human beings with lots of challenges: the deterioration of our eco-system, global warming, and the recent global financial tsunami. It is foreseeable that there will be years full of difficulties ahead. As always, women suffer more in difficulty times. But unlike before, we women should take these matters seriously this time and determine to help solve the problems and save the earth before too late.

  In my feminist doctrine, I stress “three selfs” for women. These are self dependence, self confidence and self contentment. What I mean by this is that to be feminists, we have to be independent physically, intellectually and financially. We have to build up confidence in whatever we think and whatever we do, instead of merely following others. And once we have made up our minds, we must go ahead and do it and enjoy it, which is to say, we should find self contentment. There will be difficulties, there will be criticism, and there will be joy and pride when we achieve our goals.

  On this path to success we need vision and wisdom, determination and devotion. The path is long and filled with obstacles, we walk with sweat and tears, with determination and expectation, we do not rely on others, we are on our own, and thus we make ourselves the masters of our own destinies.

  To be a master of oneself is one thing, but to be a leader requires something more. Leadership is partly a natural gift but mainly a fruit growing up from endless learning and trying. We should never be afraid of learning and never be afraid of trying. Knowledge is power, and failure is a mother to success. It is only when we overcome the obstacles, only when we conquer the challenges, that we distinguish ourselves from others and others respect us to be their leaders. In order to demonstrate our leadership we need power, the power to make a difference. Women should be empowered to make things better and higher.

  Let us learn from yesterday’s mistakes, let us learn from today’s wisdom, so that tomorrow we together will correct mistakes and rewrite “his stories” and “her stories” into “human stories.”

    If we cannot do everything, let us do something higher and something better.

  Thank you and God bless all of us!


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