Opening the Establishment’s Doors to Women Might Yield a More Peaceful World

With few exceptions, foreign-policy making has been the exclusive privilege of men throughout U.S. history. Women have not been the only group excluded from this elite fraternity, but, as more than half the U.S. population, they are certainly the largest.

As the first female to serve as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Jeane Kirkpatrick is arguably the most influential woman in the history of the U.S. foreign-policy Establishment. But, like Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, Kirkpatrick has been a very visible exception to the Reagan Administration’s otherwise dismal record with respect to women appointees.

President Jimmy Carter appointed a substantial number of women and minorities to the State Department. But the Reagan Administration has recruited few women--and no minority women--to senior decision-making positions in the foreign-policy apparatus; President Reagan has appointed no women to the governing board of the U.S. Peace Institute, which was established by Congress. And, while women hold 27.5% of the career Foreign Service positions, of senior-level Foreign Service officers only 4.8% are women, says Rep. Patricia Schroeder (D-Colo.).

There is an appalling lack of women in Congress--only 25 out of 535 members (2 senators and 23 representatives). Systemic sexism prevents many women from seeking elective office, and there is a certain amount of built-in sex discrimination arising out of the fact that 98% of incumbent candidates are returned to Congress in every election.

But it can’t be denied that women themselves must take more responsibility for correcting this imbalance. As Rep. Claudine Schneider (R-R.I.) said, “When we talk about international politics, the reluctance of women to participate, to me, is awesome and irresponsible.”

In November there will be 10 million more eligible women voters than men. “If we don’t take advantage of that opportunity,” Schneider said, “we will have blown one of our best shots.”

Apart from simple justice and the need to make American democracy more pluralistic, there is another good reason for increasing the number of women decision-makers in U.S. foreign policy. It is the need to bring more of the special wisdom and compassion of the nurturing sex into international relations.

This is not to say that women as political and international leaders always will be more humane and less inclined to violent retaliation. Margaret Thatcher, Indira Gandhi and Golda Meir, for example, all demonstrated a willingness to use military force. Nor has Kirkpatrick been reluctant to suggest armed intervention by the United States in other nations.

Certainly there is no reason to suppose that the hawks in Congress and the White House would not be able to find a few women to do their bidding. As Anne Cahn, director of the Committee for National Security, put it, “If all of the Joint Chiefs of Staff had been women, we would have had a day-care center in the Pentagon and we still would have invaded Grenada.”

Yet there is no reason to deny that an influx of women in politics would bring a greater emphasis on peaceful resolution of conflicts and international cooperation. Katherine M. L. Camp, a former U.N. representative and past president of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, agrees: “Though women can be brainwashed, too, they generally value human relationships and care deeply about the well-being of others; they can make excellent ambassadors, foreign-policy decision-makers, conflict mediators, negotiators for disarmament and planners for peace.”

Virginia R. Allan, deputy assistant secretary of state for public affairs in the Nixon Administration, has endorsed this view: “We’re brought up differently; we’re not called upon to show our strength through missiles or guns and war and conflict; we’re prepared to consider peaceful resolutions . . . . I think that if we had a critical mass of women (in foreign-policy decision-making positions), which is more than an occasional woman, that difference would show itself.”

As Sen. Claiborne Pell (D-R.I.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has put it, “A few more women in the Dome would probably result in fewer wars.”

The reality of increasing global interdependence, along with the growing number of women who have expertise in the conduct of international relations, makes it clear that we can no longer afford to deprive the U.S. government of half of “the best and the brightest” thinkers. The full representation of women not only is needed to rectify two centuries of discrimination, it also has become an imperative for the survival of America in this nuclear age.