The Power of Women

Only a few days after a woman has been brutally executed in Afghanistan for alleged adultery the last panel at DLDwomen conference addresses issues like gender equality, power and the role of women in the 21^st century.

Today’s women are enjoying rights that only a couple of generations ago were unthinkable. However, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Paley Centre for Media, Pat Mitchell, claims: “the world is changing, but there are still many places where being a woman is dangerous.  When I was born women’s life aspiration in the US  was to marry a man and have 2’5 children. Actually I didn’t care, I had my dreams and I knew I was meant to do something else”

Mitchell made a really touching introduction to Catalina Escobar, founder of Juan Felipe Gómez Escobar Foundation (Cartagena, Colombia). “Catalina is one of a kind, a woman who turned the tragedy of loosing a son into the strongest working passion”.

When her son Juanfe (Juan Felipe) passed away, Catalina realized that children’s mortality was way to high in Colombia. From that moment on her goal in life became to save as many Colombian children as possible from an early death. “Juanfe’s death is the saddest story of my live, but this is also a love story. Now I have many sons. All those under the protection of Juan Felipe Gómez Escobar Foundation are my Juanfes”, confesses Catalina Escobar with glassy eyes. 

Catalina’s commitment with children has become an obsession, “when you work in this field, every single night, before going to sleep, you think: you better come up with something else because these children deserve better”.

Women are extremely involved in humanitarian work today. Catalina is not the only example of a woman whose main target in life is to help others. Edit Schlaffer, founder of Women without Borders, explains how the organisation tries to help women in troubled areas of the word.

“There are no women in top security-political positions, but I can tell you that women have a special skill when it comes to conflict solving. Unlike what we see on the Western press, most Afghan mothers are horrified with the idea of her sons joining terrorist cells, they just need support so they can put an end to this violent situation.

Women without Borders operates in nine countries where they explore the potential of women to reduce violence. “We actually believe that women are security experts”, adds Schlaffer. 

Mitchell, who is moderating the panel, cannot avoid but to intervene and remind the audience that power is still a male concept. “Women stay away from power because it is a male invention. We, women, should change the concept of power; we think that power is ‘a bad-guys-business’, but the reality is that power allows change.

Cairo-based political strategist and CEO of Karama, Hibaaq Oman, stresses that, as far the Arab Spring is concerned, there’s still a lot of hard work to do: “if a government leaves women behind they are not respecting one of the key pillars of the democratic Arab movements”.

But women are not just misrepresented in the Arab world, sexism is very much alive, specially on TV and advertising. Filmmaker, actress, and advocate for women Jennifer Siebel Newsom, who joins the talk via Skype from California, talks about the misrepresentation of females on TV.

“We have an enormous power as media consumers, however we are still often portrayed as objects. My job is to remind everyone our role as citizens and consumers. Bear in mind that, despite accounting for 51% of the US population, only 17% of the Congress are women”.

Newsom’s inspiring movie “MissRepresentation” is already out, you can check out the trailer here.  

Mens Sana in Corpore Sano

Stress is possibly one the most common diseases in the Western world. Stressed individuals go the hospital much more often than healthy ones and according to numerous studies women tend to be more depressed than men.

“Traditionally if you were stressed they ‘d send you to the psychologist to fill questioners for hours. We’re actually starting to use blood tests to measure stress”, claims Hermona Soreq, professor of Molecular Neuroscience at the Hebrew University’s Edmond and Safra Centre for Brain Sciences.

Scientific studies show that women are more depressed than men, however life expectancy is higher when talking about females. “Stress is not necessarily a bad thing, the problem is when you cannot cope with it”, adds professor Soreq.  

“In recent years it has been proven that stress is a direct consequence of inflammation”, she says. But how come inflammation can cause depression? The answer to this question is actually simpler than we may think.

According her “inflammation leads to an over production of blood cells and proteins, and this is what eventually causes stress and depression”,

In fact Soreq and her colleagues have proven that people with chronic pain are more stressed than anybody else. Their innovative study proves again that brain and body are highly interlinked.

Today more than ever: mens sana in corpore sano. 

The Commissioner and the Sate-Lady - A Powerful Friendship

To get things started on Day 2, what could be better than presenting two of our most valued and charismatic friends, Candace Johnson of Europe Online and EU Commissioner Viviane Reding?

The two powerhouse women share a long and warm friendship, and used this connection to set off the morning debate about women empowerment and the breaking up of patterns. 

Breaking down rigid structures may be a special talent for the two women, who have both worked hard to break monopolies to keep Europe open and free.

“Technology means that it could not be a better time for us women to come together and make the changes we need,” said Reding. 

“Women have an amazing talent for putting together bits and bites. This is digital thinking. But we have to break some barriers on our way!” said Johnson.

One of the best examples of how to do this is Reding and Candace’s celebrated work to fight monopolies and and prize cartels. And, as they went on to show, breaking monopolies also change attitudes, often for the better. 

Reding did this by fighting telecom monopolies as an EU Commissioner, and later by going after outrageous roaming prizes across EU borders. Her fight against Deutsche Telekom earned her the title as “Enemy No. 1”, but also made the company introduce quotas “after they lost to a woman in court.”

Johnson - nicknamed “the Sate-Lady” by Reding on stage - did her part by preventing the Murdoch-Berlusconi-Kirsch cartel from taking over the ASTRA satellites in order to “keep Europe’s skies free.”

Parallel efforts to keep markets open and at the same time promote strong female leadership. 

“It always starts with a dream. Maybe it looks impossible, but start going and your chances will grow,” said Reding as the two friends left the stage, arm in arm. 

A powerful and inspiring message that deservedly earned a sound standing ovation from the crowd. 

Creativity and Success, the Perfect Couple?

On a very inspiring panel, Inga Humpe, Desiree Gruber, Leyla Piedayesh, and Ursulla Karven, discuss the relation between success, creativity, and human beings. “What is success? Is it all about becoming famous and rich?” asks actress Ursula Karven to the speakers.

“I think bravery is one of the keys to success.  Fear is common to all of us, we all have fears and coping with them is what makes us strong” claims Desiree Gruber, co-creator and executive producer of award-winning project Runaway. 

German pop singer and songwriter Inga Humpe admits that, at least in the beginning, fame and money were part of her dream to become a musician. “Over the years my understanding of success has changed. Connecting with people is what concerns me the most now. I usually ask to myself: what can I give to people? That’s when the creative process starts for me”.

However we all know that creativity, or talent, doesn’t always lead to success… but are these two the perfect couple anyways?

“I studied business to please my parents, but I was living somebody else’s life”, confesses founder of fashion label Lala Berlin, Iranian Leyla Piedayesh. “I found happiness in knitting, that’s actually what I love to do and that’s how Lala Berlin came up”.

“To me success is doing what you really want to do, it has nothing to do with money or fame. The key to live a successful life is not taking yourself too seriously”, adds Piedayesh.

Creativity is in fact a very broad concept, aren’t we all somehow creative? As for success, only a few are lucky enough to reach it. Yet, as Leyla Piedayesh points out, it may all be about doing what you love to do.

A Ritmo de Colombia

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“It’s hard to live under the shadow of my grandfather, but I can tell you that it hasn’t been easy for me and I need to work very, very hard to be able to make a living out of art”, confesses Andrea Wild Botero, granddaughter of the great Colombian artist Fernando Botero.

On a panel about art in Colombia Gloria Zea, director of the Museum of Modern Art in Bogotá (Mambo), talks about the beautiful moment in Colombian art. “Colombian is now a leading country in the world of arts, I am proud to say we are possibly one of the most creative places in the world”, states Zea.

 “When I told my mum that I was going to marry a painter she fainted. Actually, in the beginning, she thought his profession was painting walls. At that point painting was not even a profession in Colombia. Today the number of Colombian artists is countless”, adds Gloria Zea.

Zea has been the Director of the Museum of Modern Art in Bogotá since 1969, her goal has always been to bring art to the people of Colombia, “I come from a country where only a few people can travel, so the museum is a great opportunity for everybody to get in contact with the best world artists of all time”.

Andrea Wild Botero is now on her way to study a masters in Art Business in Sotheby’s London Institute of Art. 

Africa is on the Right Path

From 2011 to 2015 seven of the ten fastest growing economies will be African countries.  “I get upset when I see the way Africa is portrayed in the West, I can tell you that Africa is full of global citizens, there’s an intellectual elite, like the ones attending this conference. However the press keeps focusing on the negative side of the continent”, says Kah Walla, political leader and entrepreneur from Cameroon.

And Kalla is right; we tend to look at African people – especially women – as victims. “I recommend you guys to talk to the women working in the markets of Douala; you will realise you are talking to real entrepreneurs”, says Walla.

But Africa is in fact a continent of contradictions. In the case of Cameroon, 50% of the people don’t have access to electricity and clean water. “Cameroon is a very rich country in resources. There are nevertheless too many inequalities as plenty of people has never touched a computer and Internet penetration is only at a 10% rate”.

“But the international image of Africa is changing, before it was just about famine and disease”, claims Geraldine de Bastion, moderator of the panel and expert on information and communication technology,  “in fact we can now see that a lot of technological innovation is coming form Africa”.

“Of course, technology is leading change in Africa”, answers Walla. “As a politician I engage with people via Facebook and Twitter, which in an country like Cameroon is a very big thing. Bear in mind that our president only gives three speeches a year and the rest of time he is completely inaccessible”.  

In Africa, where there are still a number of totalitarian governments, the Internet is becoming an alternative source of information for people. “Technology is really affecting politics and people are demanding more transparency and accountability”, points out de Bastion.

We’ve been talking about the rise of Africa for many years. Economic growth is a reality but there’re still many challenges to face. “Africa accounts for 13% of the oil and 9% of the energy production in the world, besides it has 25% of the world’s herbal land. Perhaps, if the African elite I was talking to you about earlier replaces our current politicians we may have a chance to really see this change happening.”, concludes Walla. 

Adaptation is the New Rule

“Competence is higher than even before and if we don’t act quickly we’ll be soon left behind”, claims Ana-Christina Grohnert, managing partner at Ernest & Young and People Leader for Germany, Switzerland and Austria.  As countries like China and India set the pace of the new world economy, Europe needs to find new rules and new values to remain a top world competitor.

“We need change, our ruling class is stuck in the past and they are struggling to find solutions to the new challenges. Everything is happening so quickly that adaptation has become a really difficult task”, adds Gronhert.

Steffi Czerny, the session’s moderator and DLD founder, claims though that those new values and rules haven’t been well defined yet.  “It’s easy to speak about new values and a new kind of leadership”, says Czerny, “but which are the biggest challenges and what kind of new rules are we talking about?”

“It’s about flexibility”, answers Grohnert, “all structures are changing, including the family, which is the base of our society. We need to move quickly so we can adapt before it’s too late. Technology will help us to find those solutions, but it has to be based on leadership”.

The big questions are: how can we compete with countries like China and India without changing the whole core of our society? Will the welfare system survive the fight? According to Grohnert the key issue is to adapt without loosing our identity and without giving up the rights we have been fighting for in the past.