「擁抱人類共通價值：共創二十一世紀的安定與繁榮」
美國前總統柯林頓訪台演講文稿 2005年2月27日
非常感謝！非常感謝主持人對我的介紹，以及現場各位熱情的歡迎。主席，各位貴賓，各位先生女士，我非常高興可以再度回到此地。在1979年到1988年間，當我還是個年輕的州長時，我曾四度拜訪台灣。此後我一直關注這個寶島的變化，關注你們驚人的經濟成長及政治發展，也對你們民主的發展深感欣賞及敬佩。
台灣民主基金會的成立是為了推展民主，不僅限於台灣內部，也廣及世界各地。這是一項重要的工作，也是我在總統任期的最後幾年中極力推動的志業。如果可以，今晚我希望將台灣民主的發展，放到整個21世紀世界局勢的脈絡中來分析，並且提出一些建議，讓貴基金會能夠超越國界，達成推展民主的使命。
眾所皆知，我們在90年代目睹了經濟全球化的驚人成長。我們越來越仰賴國際貿易及投資，在資訊科技產業上也有驚人的發展。人類開始在科學與技術上進行前所未有的合作。由於驚人且前所未有的國際科學合作的成果，在我總統任期的最後一年中，我得以宣布人類基因定序的成功。此外，人類也經由國際合作，在天空中設置了一個太空站。
我還可以舉出許多其他例子，來說明人類的成就。但有兩件發生在90年代的大事，通常受到媒體的忽略，卻對民主發展特別地重要。第一，在九O年代期間，半數的全球人口，得以經由自由選舉，產生他們的政府，這是我們人類歷史上首次出現的現象。第二，經由現在所通稱的NGO(非政府組織)的發展，世界各地公民社會急遽地擴張。不論是在富裕國家或貧困國家，社團組織提供了人們一個機會，使他們做為自由的人，能夠集結人民力量，來改善他們所關切的特定人們的生活。
我相信，二十一世紀可以以一個字眼來做最好的概括；但這個字不是「全球化」（globalization），因為「全球化」對大多數人而言僅止於經濟之涵義。我相信更好的字眼是「互賴」（interdependence）。因為「互賴」可以是正面的，也可以是負面的；甚至也可以同時具有正面和負面的雙重意涵。簡單地說，就是我們不能脫離彼此而生活。在2001年9月11日，美國遭受到一個震撼性的負面「互賴」，當「基地」（Al
Qaeda）恐怖份子利用全球互賴所提供的國界開放，和旅遊、移民、取得資訊及高科技等的便利，殺害了三千名來自七十個國家的美國居民，其中兩百名喪生者也是回教徒。
然而，在911的餘波中，我也看見了正面的全球互賴。我與我太太希拉蕊柯林頓，現任的紐約州參議員，一齊拜訪曼哈頓地區的一所小學。那裡的孩子們因為這次恐怖攻擊，而被迫離開他們原有的教室。這所學校總計有600名孩童，來自80個不同種族在此就學，他們之中許多人有親人罹難。當我在人群行列中，試圖去安慰那些失去親人的人時，我見到一名足足高了我一個頭的高大男人，他的眼裡含著淚光。當我詢問他是否也失去了他的親人時，他回答說沒有，他只是來到這裡表達他的哀慟。而我永遠不會忘記他所說的話–
他說，「我是個埃及人，是個回教徒，也是個美國人。我害怕我的美國同胞們會因為其他人所做的事情而不再相信我。我比你們更加地憎恨恐怖份子。」
他是一個正面國際互賴的例子。在我的總統任內，我們目睹了中東七年的和平進展，然而之後的四年，取代的則是分崩離析的衝突景象。四年的衝突中，被恐怖份子所殺害的以色列人之數目，超過了我八年總統任期內的四倍之多。但在衝突激烈的幾年內，以色列及巴勒斯坦人的互賴並沒有比和平時為低。只不過二者從正面的互賴，轉變成負面的互賴。如您所想像，儘管我已經不再身為總統，我依然密切關注著中國與台灣及其雙邊關係的發展。數週前的英國經濟學人雜誌，有一篇令人驚異的文章，指出了兩岸間經濟往來爆炸性的增加，也提到目前在中國大陸有超過千萬的中國人民，在台灣人所經營的公司上班。我也注意到最近兩岸間有直航客機的往來。因此我觀察到，在政治差異的面向上，台海兩岸有持續性的負面緊張，而在經濟與個人面向上，則有正面的接觸。
這一切告訴了我們什麼？答案是，在這個世界上，我們無法脫離其他人而生存。中國與台灣、以色列人及巴勒斯坦人、北愛爾蘭的天主教徒及新教徒、科索沃及波士尼亞的不同族群、斯里蘭卡的塔米爾族及佛教徒、泰國的伊斯蘭教徒和印尼亞齊省的分離份子，他們與兩國的主要政府的關係。所有我們所目睹的這些在國際間發生的事情，不論是正面或負面，都在在提醒我們：我們無法離開他人而存在。因此我相信，21世紀的重大挑戰在於，從一個互賴但不穩定的世界，進展到一個我們能共同分享的更緊密結合的全球社群。我們分享責任、利益，也共享基本價值觀。每個人都是重要的，也都擁有機會。每個人在社會中都須扮演一個負責任的角色。競爭是好的，但經由合作我們可以做得更好。我們之間的差異是重要的，那會使我們的生活更有趣；然而差異絕對不比人類價值的共同性更為重要。
我們該如何從一個互賴的世界（interdependent world），進展到一個更為整合的世界（integrated
world）？我提出五項建議。首先，我們必須抵抗那些與整合社會為敵的人，我們必須減少恐怖主義、戰爭、以及大規模毀滅武器（WMD）的威脅。第二，我們應該藉由將全球化的利益帶給地球上另一半尚未因全球化而受益的人們，在世界上建立更多的夥伴而非更多的敵人。
當我今晚在台北街道上，驅車前往演講會場的途中，我回想著超過25年前我初次來訪的那些經驗，想著這個城市是如何地改變，想著台灣為數不多的人口，卻創造了高達三千億的外匯存底，以及足以支撐世界經濟的公司，以及充滿活力的政治、教育、及經濟體制。這幾乎讓人難以聯想，此時全世界有超過一半的人民，每天的生活支出不到兩塊美金；有上億人民今晚入睡時是餓著肚子的；地球上有四分之一的人民沒有乾淨的水源，四分之一的人民在今年將死於各種天然及人為的災害，他們會死於愛滋病、肺結核、瘧疾，以及痢疾所引起的感染。這些人大部分都是兒童，而他們終其一生從未喝過一杯乾淨的水。數以千萬的孩童每年死於完全可以避免的兒童疾病。更有一億三千萬的孩子從未上過學。
我們必須將他們帶到這個體系內，這個對你們、對整個亞洲、對美國有如此助益的體系。有許多是我們可以做的。我們知道將全世界的孩童送進學校並不會花費太多錢，而那也可以使他們在未來不需要從事他們的父母輩所曾經從事的苦力工作。我們知道我們可以在對抗全球暖化的同時加速許多貧窮國家的經濟發展，我們可以發展出一套奠基於太陽能、風力、能源保存技術，及其他我們目前已知能源選擇的全新能源經濟。有高達一兆的乾淨能源及能源保存技術的市場等待開發，這將可以使那些極度貧窮的國家，在經濟上的發展更為快速。
第三件我們該做的事情，是在各個層級建立分享及合作的機構。全球性的國際機構，如聯合國、世界銀行，以及國際貨幣基金（IMF）等，可以透過如歐洲聯盟（EU）、亞太經濟合作會（APEC）、東南亞國協（ASEAN）或其他正在全球形成的區域性組織，將其力量用來支持區域的合作；也可經由幫助新興民主國家不只進行誠實的選舉，且要有誠實且具有治理能力的政府，來支持國家間的合作。以下是我認為台灣民主基金會可以有重大貢獻的地方。
至今我已花了許多時間關注前蘇維埃聯邦的共和國，我將至其中兩個國家推展我的第八個計畫。還有加勒比海國家，他們在地理上就在美國的後門，但相對上仍非常貧窮，也有嚴重的愛滋病問題。我常前往拉丁美洲，那裡的每人國民所得驚人地低。我也關注非洲，那裡大部分的國家有嚴重的愛滋病問題，且他們每天的平均收入不到一塊美金。
在這些我前往的國家裡，總是會有一個贏得了公平選舉的民選總統。但常常發生的情況是，這些贏得公平選舉的總統，可以坐在辦公室裡發號施令，卻沒有任何事情會真的實現。經常會有剛剛通過改選的國會，通過了新的法律但卻沒有任何事情實現。因為他們缺乏有組織的機構來貫徹這些法律及總統與首相的命令。他們的行政體系沒有制度性的能力，來把那些表現在選舉中的人類自由的益處，轉化到那些投下選票的人民身上。這是其中一個在21世紀被嚴重忽略的問題，因此我決定在我未來的人生中，花大量的時間來努力思考如何解決這個問題。這個問題從未成為頭條新聞，它也不如解決如何通過透明立法、財產權法案，或為某個部門建立行政組織來得有趣，但除非你擁有一個能運作的政府，否則人民會對民主失去信心。
我隸屬一個由國家前首領及現任首領所共同組成的「馬德里社」（Club of
Madrid），幾年前，我們舉辦一個會議時，當時並不確定有多少人會參加，基本上，這個會議是有關建立民主政府的效率。這並不是一個煽動性的題目，也不是一個爭議性的題目，我們被一大群新興民主國家的政府領導人包圍，他們誠摯地向我們表示仍有人經歷過長期迫害，所以這些人渴望能有選舉，然而他們無法做到什麼，因為他們沒有這種機制來推展公共利益之議題。所以這是一件我認為貴基金會或許應該重視的事情，因為你們的組織所擁有的實踐力是令人稱道的。
最後，我想我們必須強化全球非政府組織運動的力量。主持人提到我現在從事海嘯災區的工作，一件有關我的工作之最有趣的事是我必須統籌所有由災區政府、國際組織、國家援助機構如美國國際發展援助總署（USAID），以及數以百計來自全球的非政府組織等機構，所正在進行的救援工作。當然，有這麼多的機構在從事救援，是一件好事。我們必須減低國際互賴所帶來的威脅，讓這個世界有更多夥伴、更少敵人，增加各機構彼此之間的合作。
第四件我們需要做的事是，尋找合作的具體方法。在剛剛對我的介紹中，主持人提到我曾經提醒大家，我希望看到一個能夠處理中國及台灣之間歧異的和平解決方案，一個台灣海峽兩岸人民都能夠同意的方案。每當一個新的工廠開張，一項新的投資開始，一個人得到新的工作，這些以往沒有工作，或自己不曾開業的人，他們的人生就迸發出一些新的希望。當人們有希望的時候，你就離和平解決方案越來越近，而離武力衝突越來越遠。
我在從事海嘯救災想做的事情之一，是讓人們持續以正面的態度從事其工作。在災情最嚴重的印尼蘇門達臘北部，已經埋葬了十萬名受害者，同時還有十四萬名的失蹤人口。這些地區曾經有過慘烈的分離主義運動。在此次亞奇省首府和所有這些漁村的慘重災情後，我去一個曾經有六千五百名居民的漁村，現在只剩下一千名生還者。經歷這次的災難後，人們將他們的政治歧見擱置一邊，開始著手重建家園。印尼總統設立了一個包括要求獨立的反對人士的委員會，一起決定重建的需要花費，一起決定重建事項的優先順序。他們有一個共同的嚮往，有一些建設性的工作要做。我相信如果我們能這樣的合作程序，在重建工作所需要的未來三至五年裡持續運作，將來政府與分離主義人士可能會找出一個能夠解決過去政治歧見的方案。
類似的事情，也發生在印度沿海的斯里蘭卡島。斯里蘭卡的首府可倫坡，大致上是在島的西南部。海嘯的災難最主要開始於南部一個稱為迦爾的地方，我們許多人透過電視畫面，目睹一整列載滿人的火車被海浪掃進海裡又擲回陸地上，少數的生還者，爬出列車車廂的破口並抓住建築物屋頂才倖免於難。災害沿著斯里蘭卡東部的海岸直到北部區域。在斯里蘭卡的北邊，大約百分之二十的區域是由印度塔米爾族所控制，而塔米爾族與斯里蘭卡之間，曾有極為嚴重的對立。數以千計的人民在內戰中喪生。他們已有三年的停火，殺戮也漸漸地減少，但過去幾年間沒有真正嚴肅的對談展開。然而現在他們攜手合作重建這個區域，他們一同作出決定：關於如何使用援助的金額、援助品該如何處理、什麼該做以及做的順序如何？如果我們可以使他們在未來三年，甚至更長的時間裡，都持續這樣合作下去，那麼該區域的重建必然可以完成，甚至他們可以找到對於長期對立的解決之道。
在中東地區，我們有對於和平的新希望。以色列選出了一個聯合政府、巴勒斯坦區域也展開了新的選舉；但比起十二年前我開始處理以巴問題時，現在巴勒斯坦的人口更多、更貧窮、問題更多，人口也更年輕化。這些年輕人需要一些事情可做，當他們處理政治議題時也需要處理跟以色列人的關係。布希總統已向國會提出三億五千萬的援助提案，但我認為大概十億元左右會是一個好的第一步，畢竟那並不是很大的一筆錢。我們可以重新建立巴勒斯坦的經濟，使之達到其領土被封鎖而無法進入以色列謀生之前的水準。
相對地，美國已經在伊拉克投入兩千億美元，因此只要花百分之一的經費，我們所推動的各項計畫就更有可能成功，因為人們就可以從事許多正面的事物，這些事物都是在座各位已經享有的，包括穩定的工作、創業機會、投資等。巴勒斯坦人失去得太多太多了，但是身居海外的巴勒斯坦人處境並非和留在祖國境內的一樣楚楚可憐，他們控制了智利的花卉貿易，而且是厄瓜多個人所得最高的族群，甚至在我還在白宮時，還有一位巴勒斯坦人擔任總統，而美國境內的巴勒斯坦人也相當多，他們要不是百萬富翁就是大學教授，只有留在巴勒斯坦境內的巴勒斯坦人才面臨到貧窮，如果這些巴勒斯坦人也都有機會接觸到以上這些正面的事物，他們的生活將會大有不同，誠如我之前提到的，我參與的海嘯賑災就是從事這方面的工作。
最後一點。人類自從五千萬至一億年前於非洲大陸崛起以來，整個發展的歷史都在決定，到底應該為共通的人類價值而努力，抑或為歧見、差異而浴血奮戰。原始的人類剛離開山洞，形成各自的家族、進而彼此接觸時，到底會彼此爭鬥還是合作呢？一般來說，他們除非找到合作的基礎，要不然就是不斷地交戰。人類的歷史不斷展開層面更寬廣的合作，但是也製造出愈來愈危險的武器。在二十世紀，人類進行前所未見的合作，也擁有前所未見的屠殺工具。二十世紀發生兩次世界大戰，也使用了原子彈。在許多國家境內還發生種族屠殺。雖然人類在二十世紀比以前更了解合作所能帶來的利益，但也僅是僥倖的逃過滅種的命運。
現在，儘管面臨恐怖威脅、儘管面對大規模毀滅性武器，整體而言，我們的世界比以前更美好。冷戰己經結束。沒有任何國家認為某個國家會以核武攻擊另一個國家，並發動足以造成毀滅世界的戰爭。這是人類有史以來第一次，我們能運用智慧去打造一個整合社群的全球體系（a
global system of integrated
communities）。我們不假裝人和人之間沒有相異之處。如果我們假裝每個人都是一樣的，所有的進步都將停滯，因為再也不需要辯論。民主政體之所以是生存力最強的政體，就是因為民主鼓勵辯論。身處政府體系中的我們不見得喜歡辯論。尤其如果我們辯輸了，就更不喜歡辯論。辯論時，我贏過也輸過。我喜歡贏的滋味遠勝過輸的感受。但我非常相信，辯論可以讓我們更接近真理，更接近解決問題的方案或向前進步的較好方法。我們現在就擁有這樣的機會，所以我相信我們應該要把握這個機會。
但是，在我們相信民主的同時，也必須相信雖然我們的相異之處非常重要，我們共通的人性價值更為重要。然而，要人們達成這個認知，是非常非常困難的。現代印度之父甘地，在七十八歲時遭到謀殺。謀殺他的人不是爭取喀什米爾自印度獨立的回教徒，而是他的印度教徒。謀殺他的印度教徒認為甘地不是一個好的印度教徒，因為甘地希望締造一個融合了回教、錫克教、耆那教、猶太教、基督教及各個宗教的印度。我總統任內最黑暗的一天，就是我的摯友拉賓總理遭刺殺的那天。這位前以色列總理終身為以色列奉獻，刺殺他的不是巴勒斯坦恐怖份子，而是一位年輕的猶太人，該名刺客認為拉賓既對不起以色列也對不起猶太教，因為拉賓希望巴勒斯坦可以重建祖國，在和平、安定、繁榮的環境下，養育下一代並和以色列合作。但這麼一來，以免列人就必須放棄約旦河西岸並在未來讓出部份土地。我另外一位好友，黎巴嫩前總理哈里里，幾天前於貝魯特的炸彈攻擊中喪生，讓人聯想起七十年代可怕的內戰。才不過一個禮拜前，我們暢談了一個半小時，提到了他的夢想，希望為黎巴嫩及中東帶來和平。殺害他的並不是以色列人，而是阿拉伯人。這群人要的是分裂、對抗、死亡及破壞。
當然，知易行難。不過，我相當確信一點，這一點在台灣身上可以獲得佐證：人民可以從事的正面事務愈多，起床時有愈多值得期待的事物，他們就愈不可能進行破壞，而且更有可能帶著自己的族群、國家，甚至全世界，創造更美好的明天。我在此重申，我非常高興再度拜訪台灣，在此恭賀台灣民主基金會的所有成就，也希望透過基金會的努力，各位也能夠協助其他國家追求自由及民主。這些國家雖然熱愛民主及自由，但卻沒有各位所享有的繁榮經濟以及完善的制度可以圓夢。台灣要幫助他們，因為我們必須要維護共通的人性價值，才能夠從目前僅止於「互賴」的全球體系，邁向一個真正的全球社群。
謝謝大家。
Embracing Our Common Humanity:
Security and Prosperity in the 21st Century
H.E. William Jefferson Clinton
February 27, 2005, Taipei
Thank you very much. Thanks for the introduction. Thank you for the
warm welcome.
Mr. Chairman, dignitaries, ladies and gentlemen.
I’m glad to be back here. When I was a young governor, I came to
Taiwan for four times between 1979 and 1988. I watched all the changes
on this island. I watched your remarkable economic growth and your
political growth. And I have watched the development of your democracy
with great appreciation and admiration.
This foundation was formed to support and promote democracy, not only
in Taiwan, but also around the world. That is important work, work
that I try to advance in the late years I served as president. If I
might, tonight I would like to put the growth of democracy within
Taiwan in the larger context of what is going on in the 21st century
world and suggest some things that I think this Foundation could do
beyond your borders to fulfil its mission.
In the 1990s, everyone knows we saw a remarkable growth in the
globalization of the economy. We became more dependent on
international trade and investment. There was an explosion in
information technology. We began to cooperate in other ways, in
unprecedented ways, in science and technology. In my last years of
presidency, I was able to announce the sequencing of human genome, a
project that succeeded because of amazing and unprecedented
international scientific cooperation. We put a space station into the
skies through international cooperation.
I can give many other examples but there were two other things that
happened in the 1990s, particularly important to democracy which were
often not noted in the press. First of all, in the decade of the
1990s, for the first time in all our human history, more than half of
the people in this world were governed by those who they had voted for
in free elections. And secondly, there was an explosion of civil
society across the globe through non-governmental organizations now
known everywhere as simply NGOs. Organizations which give people in
rich countries poor countries alike a chance to pool their efforts as
free people to change the lives of those within their concerns.
The 21st century, I believe, can be best summed up in a word, that is
not globalization, because globalization has for most people been an
economic meaning. I believe a better word is interdependence. For
interdependence can be good or bad; or it can be good and bad. It
simply means we can not escape each other. On September 11th 2001, the
United States got a big shock of negative interdependence when the Al
Qaeda terrorists killed three thousand people from 70 countries in the
United States by using the forces of global interdependence open
borders, easy travel, easy immigration, easy access to information and
technology. Two hundred of those who died were also Muslims.
In the aftermath of the 9-11, I saw the forces of positive
interdependence. My wife, who is now a US senator of New York, and I
visited an elementary school in Manhattan where children have been
forced out of their buildings by the damage of planes. There were 600
children there from over 80 different ethnic groups in one school.
When I stood in line trying to console the family members of those who
have been killed, I saw a man, a very large man about a head taller
than me, with tears in his eyes, and I asked him if he has lost a
family member. He said no. He had only come to offer his grief. I
would never forget what he said. He said, “I’m an Egyptian and I’m a
Muslim and I’m an American. And I’m afraid my fellow Americans will
not trust me anymore because of what other people did. I hate them,
more than you do.”
He was an example of positive interdependence. In the Middle East, I
have watched, when I was a president, as we had seven years of
progress for peace. Then I watched four years of disintegration. In
the four years of conflict, more than four times as many Israelis were
killed by terrorists in the entire eight years I was president. But in
the bad years, the Israelis and Palestinians were no less
interdependent than they were in the good years. It just shifted from
positive interdependence to negative interdependence. As you might
imagine, even though I’m not president any more, I watched the events
in China and in Taiwan and the relationship between the two very
closely. There was an amazing article in the British magazine, the
Economist, a couple of weeks ago pointing out the explosively
increasing economic ties between the two, saying that more than ten
million people on mainland China now work for companies owned by
Taiwanese people. I noted that there have been some direct air flights
recently. So I see continuing negative tension over political
differences and positive economic and personal contact.
What does all this tell us about the world we are living in? We can
not escape each other. China and Taiwan, the Israelis and
Palestinians, the Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland, the
different ethnic groups in Bosnia, in Kosovo, the Tamils and the
Buddhists in Sri Lanka, the Muslims, the Acheh separatists, and the
main government in Thailand and in Indonesia. All these things we are
seeing, positive or negative, going on in the world remind us we can
not escape each other. Therefore I believe that the great challenge
of the 21st century is to move from an interdependent but unstable
world to more integrated communities in which we share. We share
responsibilities. We share benefits and we share basic values. Every
person matters and there is a chance. Every person has a responsible
role to fill in this society. Competition is good but we all do
better when we work together. Our differences are important. They
make life interesting and they matter but our common humanity matters
more.
How can we move from an interdependent to an integrated world? I will
suggest five things. First of all, we must fight the enemies of
integrated communities. We must reduce terror and war and the threat
of weapons of mass destruction. Second, we must build the world with
more partners and fewer enemies by bringing the benefits of
globalization to the fifty percent of human beings on the earth who
have not received them.
I was driving through the streets of Taipei on the way to the speech
tonight, thinking about the very first time that I came here more than
twenty-five years ago; thinking about how the city had changed;
thinking about how a small number of people have built almost three
hundred billion dollars in cash reserves and companies that sustained
the globe and a vibrant, political and educational as well as economic
system. And it was almost impossible to remember that tonight, half
the world’s people live on two dollars a day or less. A billion people
live on less than a dollar a day. A billion people would go to bed
hungry tonight. One in four people have no access to clean water. One
in 4 people who die on earth all over the world this year from all
causes natural and manmade will die of Aids, TB, malaria and
infections related to diarrhea. Most of them are little children who
never got a clean glass of water. Ten million children die every year
of completely preventable childhood diseases. 130 million children on
earth never go to school a single day.
We must bring them into the system that has been so good for you, for
all of Asia, for the United States. There are lots of things we can
do. We know it wouldn’t cost much money to put all the children in the
world in school and would have the benefit of taking them out of the
jobs that their parents could then fill. We know we could speed
economic development of many poor nations if we also combat the
challenge of global warming and develop a whole new energy economy
based on solar energy, wind energy, energy conservation technologies
and other energy options that are out there now. There is a
one-trillion-dollar untapped market in clean energy and energy
conservation technologies waiting to be born that would have the
corollary benefits of making it easier for very poor countries to
develop economically much more quickly.
The third thing we have to do is to build institutions of sharing and
cooperation at every level. The strength in the global ones like the
United Nations, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, is to
support regional cooperation through things like the European Union or
APEC or ASEAN or any number of other regional groups that are forming
around the world, and to support national cooperation by helping the
new democracies, not simply to have honest elections but to have
honest governments that are also capable governments, and here is what
I think your foundation could make a big difference.
I spent a lot of time to date working in the former Soviet Union. I’m
going in the two countries with my eighth project or the Caribbean,
which is relatively poor, which has a big Aids problem right on the
America’s backdoor. I go to Latin America a lot where the per capita
income is very dramatically low, and I work in Africa where most of
the countries with big Aids problems also have income of less than a
dollar a day.
In the places where I go, there is always an elected president who won
a fair election but very often these presidents who won fair elections
can sit in their offices and issue orders and nothing happens. Very
often newly elected parliaments like you, Mr. Speaker, they pass laws
but nothing happens because they don’t have the organized institutions
that carry out the laws are the executive officers, orders of the
President or the Prime Minister. They do not have the institutional
capacity to translate the benefits of human freedom expressed in
elections into the lives of the people who are voted and this is one
of the most ignored problem in the twenty-first century world and so I
have decided to spend quite a bit of the rest of my life, trying to
figure out how to do this work. It never grabs the headlines. It’s not
so interesting figuring out how to pass transparent legislation or a
property right legislation or build the bureaucracy for this or that
or the other department. But unless you have a government that
functions, people lose faith in democracy.
I belong to a group of former heads of government and heads of state
called the Club of Madrid. And a couple of years ago, we had a meeting
and we weren’t sure many people would come and basically it was about
building the effectiveness of democratic government. It wasn’t an
inflammatory topic. It wasn’t a controversial topic. We were mobbed by
leaders of governments of these new democracies who came to us
honestly saying that there were people who have lived under repression
for so long, so these people want an election and they couldn’t get
anything done for them because they had no institutional capacity to
advance the public interest. So it’s something that I think maybe you
should look at because your powers of organization in delivery are
legendary as you know.
Finally, I think we have to strengthen the strength of this
nongovernmental organization movement around the world. You mentioned
that I was working in Tsunami-affected areas. One of the most
interesting things about my new job is that I have to coordinate all
the work being done by the home governments, the international
organizations, the national agencies that are helping like USAID and
hundreds of NGOs, literally hundreds of them from all over the world.
But this is a good thing. So we have to reduce the threats to
interdependence, make the world with more partners and fewer enemies,
increase institutional cooperation.
The fourth thing that we need to do is to look for concrete ways to
cooperate. In your introduction to me, you mentioned that I had
reminded every one that I wanted a peaceful resolution to the
differences between China and Taiwan agreed to by the people on both
sides of the strait. Every time a new factory opens, a new investment
is made, a new person gets a job, some new hope is bound in the life
of some person who didn’t have a job or didn’t own the business
before. You move closer to a peaceful resolution and further from
conflicts.
One of the things I’m trying to do with Tsunami relief is to keep
people working in a positive way. In Indonesia and northern Sumatra,
which had the greatest loss of lives, a staggering one hundred
thousand people have been buried and about one hundred and forty
thousand are still missing. They have had a violent separatist
movement, but in the aftermath of all this human loss and the
devastation of the capital of Acheh and the devastation of all these
fishing villages, I went to a village where six thousand and five
hundred people lived and only a thousand survived. In the aftermath of
this, people put their political differences aside to work on
rebuilding the communities, and the president of Indonesia has set up
a committee in which his adversaries, the people who wanted to
separate from the country, are part of the committee. They are making
decisions together about how much would be spent, together about what
would be done first, second, and third. They have something to look
forward to, positive things to work on. I believe if we can keep this
going for the three to five years that it will take to rebuild these
areas, they may find a way to resolve their differences.
The same thing is true on the island of Sri Lanka, off the coast of
India; if those of you who know it, Colombo is basically in the
southwest part of Sri Lanka. The tsunami damage mostly started in the
southern part at a place called Gal. Many of us saw on television a
train, an entire train loaded with people, swept away in the water and
thrown up on the land. The only survivors were people who crawled
through the top of the opening of a train car and clung to the roof of
a building. But the damage then goes on around the eastern coast of
Sri Lanka up to the northern part, and the north of Sri Lanka, twenty
percent or less is controlled by the Hindu Tamils and they have had
differences there that were quite bitter. Thousands and thousands of
people have been killed in their civil strife. For three years they’ve
had the ceasefire and the killing is on the way down. But no serious
talks have taken place in the last couple of years. Now they are
working together to rebuild the area, making decisions together. How
would the money be spent? How would the aid be handled? What would be
done and in what order? If we can keep that going over the next three
years or so that it will take to rebuild the area perhaps they’ll find
a long-term solution to their differences.
In the Middle East, we have a new hope for peace. A coalition
government have been elected in Israel, new elections have been held
in the Palestinian territories, but the Palestinians have grown larger
and poorer, more numerous and younger in the last twelve years since I
began working on this problem. They need something to do and something
to do with Israelis while they work through political issues.
President Bush has proposed to Congress to give them three hundred and
fifty million dollars in aid. I think it’s a good first step for
approximately a billion dollars, which is not a lot of money. We can
restore Palestinian economic growth to where it was before all the
territories were closed and Palestinians couldn’t go into Israel to
make a living any more.
The fourth thing that we need to do is to look for concrete ways to
cooperate. In your introduction to me, you mentioned that I had
reminded every one that I wanted a peaceful resolution to the
differences between China and Taiwan agreed to by the people on both
sides of the strait. Every time a new factory opens, a new investment
is made, a new person gets a job, some new hope is bound in the life
of some person who didn’t have a job or didn’t own the business
before. You move closer to a peaceful resolution and further from
conflicts.
One of the things I’m trying to do with Tsunami relief is to keep
people working in a positive way. In Indonesia and northern Sumatra,
which had the greatest loss of lives, a staggering one hundred
thousand people have been buried and about one hundred and forty
thousand are still missing. They have had a violent separatist
movement, but in the aftermath of all this human loss and the
devastation of the capital of Acheh and the devastation of all these
fishing villages, I went to a village where six thousand and five
hundred people lived and only a thousand survived. In the aftermath of
this, people put their political differences aside to work on
rebuilding the communities, and the president of Indonesia has set up
a committee in which his adversaries, the people who wanted to
separate from the country, are part of the committee. They are making
decisions together about how much would be spent, together about what
would be done first, second, and third. They have something to look
forward to, positive things to work on. I believe if we can keep this
going for the three to five years that it will take to rebuild these
areas, they may find a way to resolve their differences.
The same thing is true on the island of Sri Lanka, off the coast of
India; if those of you who know it, Colombo is basically in the
southwest part of Sri Lanka. The tsunami damage mostly started in the
southern part at a place called Gal. Many of us saw on television a
train, an entire train loaded with people, swept away in the water and
thrown up on the land. The only survivors were people who crawled
through the top of the opening of a train car and clung to the roof of
a building. But the damage then goes on around the eastern coast of
Sri Lanka up to the northern part, and the north of Sri Lanka, twenty
percent or less is controlled by the Hindu Tamils and they have had
differences there that were quite bitter. Thousands and thousands of
people have been killed in their civil strife. For three years they’ve
had the ceasefire and the killing is on the way down. But no serious
talks have taken place in the last couple of years. Now they are
working together to rebuild the area, making decisions together. How
would the money be spent? How would the aid be handled? What would be
done and in what order? If we can keep that going over the next three
years or so that it will take to rebuild the area perhaps they’ll find
a long-term solution to their differences.
In the Middle East, we have a new hope for peace. A coalition
government have been elected in Israel, new elections have been held
in the Palestinian territories, but the Palestinians have grown larger
and poorer, more numerous and younger in the last twelve years since I
began working on this problem. They need something to do and something
to do with Israelis while they work through political issues.
President Bush has proposed to Congress to give them three hundred and
fifty million dollars in aid. I think it’s a good first step for
approximately a billion dollars, which is not a lot of money. We can
restore Palestinian economic growth to where it was before all the
territories were closed and Palestinians couldn’t go into Israel to
make a living any more.
By contrast, the United States has spent two hundred billion dollars
in Iraq. So for basically half or one percent of that, we can
dramatically increase the chances that the peace initiatives would be
successful by giving people something positive to do, something you
take for granted now that people can have a job, start a business,
make an investment. All those things that have been taken from the
Palestinians, and yet there are no poor Palestinians anywhere in the
world outside their homeland. They control the flower trade in Chile;
they have the highest per capita income in the country of Ecuador,
which had a Palestinian president in my time; and there are lots of
Palestinians in America. They are all either millionaires or college
professors; they are only poor in their homeland. It would make a big
difference if they had something positive to do. As I said, that’s
what I’m going to be trying to do in working for Tsunami relief.
Let me make one last point. The entire history of humankind since
people first rose up on the African Savannah, somewhere between one
and one hundred and fifty million years ago can be seen in part as a
struggle to define life in terms of our differences or our common
humanity. When families first came out of caves and formed clans, and
then came in contact with other clans, should they fight or cooperate?
Usually, they fought until they found some bases to cooperate on, and
this pattern repeated itself all through human history with wider and
wider and wider circles of cooperation, but also with more, and more
and more dangerous weapons until the twentieth century, when we had
unprecedented cooperation but unprecedented power to kill. We have had
two world wars and atomic bomb was dropped, manslaughters in the
largest countries of the world. We narrowly escaped our own extinction
in the twentieth century even though we knew then far better than in
past centuries we had an interest in cooperating.
Now in spite of the threat of terror, in spite of the threat of
weapons of mass destruction, on the whole the world is in a better
place. The cold war is over. No country expects one country to drop a
nuclear weapon on another and start a war that will lead to the
extinction of the planet, and for the first time in all human history,
we have the ability if we can master the wisdom to build a global
system of integrated communities. We don’t pretend we don’t have
differences. If we did that, all progress would stop because there
will be no debate. The reason democracy has been the most enduring
form of government is that it fosters debate. Those of us who are in
it don’t always like it especially when we lose. I have won and lost.
I like winning a lot better than losing. But I’m quite sure that the
debates move us closer to the truth, to a just resolution of a problem
or to a good way of moving forward. Now we have that chance and I
think that’s what we ought to do.
But it requires those of us who believe in democracy also to believe
that while our differences are important, our common humanity matters
more and this is very, very hard to do. Gandhi, father of modern
India, was murdered in his 78th year not by a muslim fighting for
Kashmiri separation from India. He was murdered by a fellow Hindu who
thought Gandhi was not a good Hindu because he wanted India for the
Muslims, and the Sikhs, and the Jains, and the Jews and the Christians
and everybody else. On perhaps the darkest personal day of my
presidency, my friend Yitzhak Rabin, the prime minister of Israel, who
had given his entire life defending his native land, was murdered not
by a Palestinian terrorist but by a young Israeli Jew who thought he
was neither a good Israeli nor a good Jew because he wanted the
Palestinian to have the home land where they could raise their
children in peace and security and prosperity and cooperation with
Israel, but it required them to give up the West Bank and share the
land in the future. My friend, the former prime minister of Lebanon,
Mr. Hariri, was murdered a few days ago in a horrible bombing in
Beirut that brought back the dark memories of the civil war of the
seventies. Only about a week to ten days ago, we spent an hour and a
half together talking about his dreams for Lebanon and for a peaceful
Middle East. He was not killed by an Israeli. He was killed certainly
by some group of his fellow Arabs who preferred division and discord
and death and destruction.
So it is easy to say but hard to do. One thing I’m sure of and the
progress of Taiwan since I first came here so long ago proves it: the
more people have positive things to do, the more they have something
good to look forward to when they get up in the morning; the less
likely they are to fall in destructive patterns and the more likely
they are to lead their communities, their nations, and the world to a
better place. So I say again I’m glad to be here. I congratulate you
on the work of your Foundation, and I hope through this Foundation
you’ll find a way to help people in other countries who love freedom
and democracy, but don’t have your prosperity or organizational
capacity to get it because we have to preserve humanity gains until we
can move from interdependence to a truly global community.
Thank you very much.
