One of the most interesting efforts I’ve encountered as Ambassador is the Global Partnership Initiative, launched by former Secretary Clinton in 2009 as part of the Department’s commitment to deploying new tools and approaches of 21st Century Statecraft.

The Global Partnership Initiative (GPI) promotes the creation of strategic collaborations among business enterprises, civil society NGOs, and public institutions to solve problems, maximize the impact of development aid, and stimulate innovation in diplomatic engagement through collective action. It creates a platform to include new participants in development and diplomacy activity in highly impactful ways.

Serving as convener, catalyst, and collaborator, the GPI has thus far worked with more than 1,000 partners and bundled approximately US$ 650 million from private and public sources to tackle chronic problems and address challenges that often get overlooked in traditional diplomatic practice. To give you a flavor of the nature of the effort, I summarize below the GPI’s four flagship initiatives and several of its other projects.

Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves

Nearly half of the people in the world rely on open fires and stoves that emit toxic gases to cook their meals each day, resulting in (by some estimates) up to four million deaths annually. Launched in 2010, the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves seeks to address this preventable health risk by creating a cost-effective, clean cookstove market. The Alliance’s interim goal is to help 100 million homes adopt clean cooking solutions by 2020.

In 2012, the Alliance reached several key milestones including doubling its size to more than 500 partners in 38 countries; publishing a groundbreaking strategy for universal adoption of clean cookstoves and fuels; establishing the first-ever set of international cookstove standards; commissioning several cookstove research and testing centers; and catalyzing more than US$ 150 million in investments for clean cooking research.

That’s an extraordinarily powerful set of steps forward on a serious problem that you probably didn’t know existed. To learn more about the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves, including how you can become involved, check out cleancookstoves.org.

Partners For A New Beginning

Launched in April 2010 and chaired by former Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, Partners for a New Beginning (PNB) provides a coordinating platform to address youth unemployment rates in the Middle East and North Africa, which are the highest in the world. The program seeks to create partnerships that will produce 20,000 new jobs initially, job training for 40,000 young people, and an ongoing focus on sustainable job creation.

To date, PNB chapters have been launched in Algeria, Egypt, Indonesia, Morocco, Pakistan, Tunisia, Turkey, Jordan, Mauritania, and the Palestinian Territories. Each local chapter identifies country-specific priorities, develops projects that address employment gaps, and works with local and American partners on implementation. PNB and its partners — including Cisco, Coca-Cola, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the International Youth Foundation, Mastercard Foundation, Souktel, and IBM — have launched more than 120 new projects since September 2010. The Aspen Institute serves as the PNB Secretariat. To learn more about the program and how you might be able to get involved, click here.

International Diaspora Engagement Alliance

“Diaspora,” the Greek word meaning “to scatter,” is used in English  to refer to a community of people who live outside their shared country of origin or ancestry but maintain some sort of link to it. In many respects diaspora is a very American concept because the U.S. is home to more immigrants (including my grandparents) than any other nation, and those immigrants send billions of dollars in remittances each year to their families overseas (as my grandparents did). This America-based, global diaspora community holds great potential to connect the U.S. and the rest of the world in a transformative fashion, as well as to influence the direction of development and diplomacy.

Launched at an inaugural Global Diaspora Forum in May 2011, our International Diaspora Engagement Alliance (IdEA) is structured as a non-partisan, non-profit organization managed via a public-private partnership between the U.S. Department of State, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the Migration Policy Institute. More than 1,500 diaspora communities groups, businesses, and public institutions have already convened on IdEA collaborations including investment, capacity-building, enterprise mentoring, and volunteer projects overseas driven by diaspora communities in the U.S.

 

IdEA has also sponsored four competitions to spur entrepreneurship and business development in target regions. The Caribbean IdEA Marketplace, African Diaspora Marketplace, and Latin American Idea Partnership (La Idea) have all effectively leveraged the strength and expertise of diaspora communities to stimulate economic activity. I was pleased to join Secretary Clinton in the Cook Islands during the Pacific Islands Forum in July 2012 to launch the fourth competition – the Pacific Islands Diaspora Marketplace.

Our intention is to continue to catalyze innovation, engagement, and impactful giving by diaspora communities through an annual Global Diaspora Forum. The 3rd Forum is scheduled for May 14-15, 2013 and will expand to multiple cities instead of just Washington, DC. This year’s focus will include developing a diaspora volunteer corps and creating a more structured platform for diaspora philanthropy.

Accelerating Market-Driven Partnerships

The fourth and newest anchor program of the GPI is called Accelerating Market-Driven Partnerships, or AMP. Announced last April during the Secretary’s Global Impact Economy Forum, AMP is intended to bring together a coalition of government, business, and non-profit entities to develop, seed, and scale innovations that generate revenue opportunities while also strengthening communities and protecting the environment.

The first AMP pilot project is in Brazil, where recent economic growth lifted more than 30 million Brazilians out of poverty but created significant environmental and social challenges. AMP is working to facilitate strategic relationships between the government and potential corporate partners to address those challenges through development of new business models that will attract private enterprise. For example, AMP is working to bring to market new solutions in waste recycling, e-waste, and bio-degradable packaging — a multi-billion dollar potential market opportunity that creates jobs, relieves pressure on the government, and benefits the environment.

Other Projects

In addition to the four large flagship programs described above, the Global Partnership Initiative is working to facilitate a number of other collaborative, enterprise-based, cross-border projects. I will just mention a few of those by way of example.

Liberalizing Innovation Opportunity Nations (LIONS@FRICA). In 2012, the State Department launched the LIONS@FRICA partnership at the World Economic Forum on Africa. Linking key public and private sector partners, the effort is intended to strengthen Africa’s startup and innovation ecosystem, promote and facilitate new investments in Africa’s technology entrepreneurs, and foster innovative business models.

Mekong Technology Innovation Generation and Entrepreneurship Resources (TIGERS@Mekong). This month (February 2013), GPI is launching TIGERS@Mekong, a new public-private platform designed to boost competitiveness and stimulate growth in target Mekong Delta economies by training and supporting young innovators and entrepreneurs.

The Global Equality Fund. Last year GPI launched a new partnership with the mGive Foundation to promote the State Department’s Global Equality Fund by means of a mobile giving campaign. The Global Equality Fund provides support for civil society groups around the world that are working to protect the human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people.

I have occasionally quarreled with diplomacy traditionalists who don’t see the foreign affairs point of any of the above activity. I think that a Metternichian focus is far too narrow and self-defeating in our modern era. Diplomacy has always been about building relationships, finding commonalities, and creating productive networks and partnerships. When practiced wisely, diplomacy uplifts, empowers, and stabilizes. It defuses potential conflict and avoids potential upheaval.

That’s what the Global Partnership Initiative is intended to do. It is impactful, strategic diplomacy at its finest, an inclusive idealism firmly rooted in pragmatic, results-oriented realism. And it saves, enriches, and enhances the lives of millions of people around the world, which elevates all of us. Sounds right to me.

Just before 4:00 p.m. today, Friday, February 1st, Senator John Kerry was sworn in as America’s 68th Secretary of State. The oath was administered by Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan in the hearing room of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, which the Senator had chaired.

Secretary Kerry was born in Aurora, Colorado and educated at Yale University. He served in the United States Navy during the Vietnam War, was decorated several times, and became a prominent anti-war activist upon his return from Vietnam. After graduating from Boston College Law School, he worked as a prosecutor in the Boston area, and then in his own private law practice. He was elected Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts in 1982 and as one of that State’s U.S. Senators in 1984, a position he has held for the past 28 years. In 2004 he was the Democratic nominee for President of the United States.

Secretary Kerry joins a long line of chief American diplomats marked from the iconic Thomas Jefferson, who served as the United States’ first Secretary of State years before becoming President. (John Jay, America’s first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, served as Acting Secretary for several months before Jefferson was sworn.) The esteemed roster of Secretaries of State also includes several other future Presidents including James Madison and James Monroe … legendary orators such as Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, and William Jennings Bryant … five Nobel Peace Prize laureates including Cordell Hull …

… grand strategists such as George Marshall, Dean Acheson, John Foster Dulles, Henry Kissinger, and James Baker … the first female Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright … the first African American Secretary of State, Colin Powell … and of course former First Lady and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Our new Secretary is no stranger to diplomacy. His father was a Foreign Service Officer and held posts abroad. He himself served for years as chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. (I was honored by his presence at my own confirmation hearing 4 years ago, in the room in which he was sworn into office today.)

As Secretary Clinton stated as she left the Department, “John Kerry brings judgment, experience, vision, and a deep understanding of what diplomacy and development require. He’ll be an excellent Secretary of State.”

Secretary Kerry is well-known for his commitment to environmental protection, education, free trade, and expansive international engagement. He worked on acid rain issues as Lieutenant Governor early in his career, and he is committed to addressing the grave risks posed by climate change. He has a firmly held, nuanced vision of America’s place in the world developed over a lifetime of service at home and abroad.

As he left the Capitol after being sworn, the Secretary told the assembled media that he was honored to have been nominated and confirmed, and that he is anxious to get to work. Welcome to Foggy Bottom, Secretary Kerry.

A special highlight of my time as Ambassador has been getting to know and working with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. A tenacious advocate of innovation and inclusion, she has remolded the Department and refocused American policy in powerful ways that harrumphing old-boy insiders in smoke-filled clubrooms may never fully appreciate.

I have been particularly impressed with — and grateful for — her tireless efforts to advance the cause of equality for women and minorities around the world, what she refers to as the “unfinished business of the 21st century.” In her powerful last public speech as Secretary of State, delivered to a distinguished audience at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, she forcefully restated that point:

“The jury is in. The evidence is absolutely indisputable: If women and girls everywhere were treated as equal to men in rights, dignity, and opportunity, we would see political and economic progress everywhere. So this is not only a moral issue. Which of course it is. It’s an economic issue and a security issue … It therefore must be central to U.S. foreign policy.”

She also forcefully and candidly emphasized the importance of maintaining a muscular foreign policy in a “dangerous and complicated world,” of being strategic about all levers of global power, and of embracing creative diplomacy and smart power. The speech was a tour de force review of her four years in Foggy Bottom and her vision for America’s diplomatic future. You can watch for yourself below, or read the full transcript here.

 

Tomorrow will be the Secretary’s last day on the job. At 2:30 p.m. Friday (8:30 a.m. Saturday, New Zealand time), she will take the elevator down from the 7th Floor, address State Department officers and employees in the C Street Lobby, and then leave the building for a final time. Her goodbye remarks will be live streamed on the State Department’s YouTube Channel.

It has been a great privilege to work with Secretary Clinton and to host her landmark visits to New Zealand and the Cook Islands. I have been a more positively impactful Ambassador because of the vision she articulated, the new tools she deployed, the tangible commitment she demonstrated to our Pacific region, and the experiments that she encouraged.

On a personal note, I am deeply grateful for the warm, natural, and inclusive way in which she embraced my spouse and the same-gender spouses of thousands of other LGBT colleagues in the Department. At a time when overt, state-sanctioned discrimination at home and abroad still inflicts very real damage on same-gender couples trying to serve their country, she offered tangible as well as moral support and a refreshing, encouraging glimpse of a better future.

Secretary Clinton, thank you for your service to the United States and the world. Bon voyage.

I always wait until the last moment to complete my year-end lists because in this job the unexpected is to be expected. Who knows what the final days of a year will bring? As it’s now almost 11:00 p.m. on New Year’s Eve, though, I think it’s probably safe to close the books on 2012. So, back to the countdown …

5. Pacific Islands Forum

A clear choice for the Top Ten list again this year was the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), held on Rarotonga in the Cook Islands. Trumping our participation last year, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton led the largest and highest-level U.S. delegation ever to attend the annual event in its 41-year history. For the second year in a row my Embassy hosted the delegation because the Cook Islands is within our area of accreditation.

With the Secretary and me were the Governor of American Samoa Togiola Tulafono, several of my fellow Ambassadors, U.S. Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Locklear, Coast Guard Commander Rear Admiral Charles Ray, and other senior officials from the White House, USAID, Peace Corps, Department of State, Department of the Interior, Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, and several other agencies.

The delegation came to work. As we did last year, my team and I scheduled our various principals for more than 120 separate meetings and public appearances with officials from other nations, NGOs, multilateral institutions, businesses, and citizens groups. It was a punishing but highly productive schedule for the 48 hours or so that most of our visitors were in town, as well as for the week that my team spending preparing for the deluge of arrivals.

The Secretary had perhaps the busiest agenda, packed with individual and group discussions with Pacific heads of government and heads of state, remarks to the Post-Forum Dialogue plenary, a commemoration of America’s historic and ongoing peace and security partnerships in the Pacific, and other events focused on trade promotion, gender equality, and fisheries. And she found time to chat with Cook citizens on the street during a couple of walk-abouts between meetings, which set off an island-wide “Auntie Hillary” frenzy.

In all, over the course of the PIF, Secretary Clinton launched a large number of new initiatives of mutual benefit to the island nations and the United States on issues of regional security, sustainable development, marine protection, climate change, gender equality, education, and economic partnership. Oriented toward capacity building, people-to-people engagement, and entrepreneurial self-reliance, the initiatives provide a recipe for empowerment, not dependency. For a full list of the extensive business accomplished, see my September post about the PIF.

4. Auckland Consulate General Restructuring

As I’ve discussed before, we’ve been engaged in a good bit of internal restructuring at the Mission to bring our programs, staffing, resources, and methods into alignment with current, rather than legacy, circumstances and priorities. That’s all much more difficult than you might imagine, but it’s essential to becoming more effective at our work. Simply put, there wouldn’t be a credible Top Ten list without our restructuring activity. In 2011 we focused on retooling the Embassies in Wellington and Apia (which is why “Embassy Restructuring” was #4 of my 2011 Top Ten). In 2012 we focused intensely on the Consulate General in Auckland.

When I presented my credentials in December 2009, we had a full consular team but just one catch-all program staff position in Auckland despite that city representing more than a third of New Zealand’s population. (The population percentage increases even further if one includes the greater metro area, which I  define as the places within an easy day’s commute of the Auckland CBD.) Such a skeletal deployment makes very little sense and certainly impaired our effectiveness.

Over the past year we’ve corrected the problem by creating new portfolios and moving several existing American-officer and locally-engaged positions from Wellington to Auckland. In doing so we have rebalanced our program staff to achieve a roughly 50/50 split between our two facilities, and have created in Auckland fully functioning economic, political, public diplomacy, and public affairs teams. I am particularly excited about positions we’ve created in Auckland for university outreach, educational advising, and Pacific communities engagement. The changes are already producing results, and will pay dividends far into the future.

3. Secretary Leon Panetta’s Visit to New Zealand

We hosted our third visit of the year by a senior member of the Cabinet when Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta came to Auckland in September. The first American Secretary of Defense to visit New Zealand in more than 30 years, Secretary Panetta engaged in a busy two days of meetings, including with Prime Minister John Key, Minister of Defence Dr. Jonathan Coleman, and Leader of the Opposition David Shearer.

The visit takes a place high on the 2012 Top Ten list because it was emblematic of the tangible revitalization of security relations between the two countries over the past two years.

In June, Secretary Panetta and Minister Coleman signed in DC the Washington Declaration, a short statement that expressed our joint commitment to expand defense cooperation and establish regular senior-level strategic security policy dialogues.

Earlier in the year New Zealand hosted both the first U.S.-N.Z. joint air exercises and the first U.S.-N.Z. joint army/marine exercises in more than a quarter century.

Also this year New Zealand was invited for the first time ever to send a ship to participate in the U.S.-sponsored RIMPAC, the world’s largest international maritime exercise.

Such engagement is of significant benefit to both our societies, as well as to our neighbors. In an unpredictable world, enhanced coordination and interoperability will allow us to respond together more quickly and effectively to natural disasters, humanitarian crises, and other exigencies here in the Pacific. Compelling evidence of what I mean was our joint U.S. Coast Guard / Royal New Zealand Air Force mission a year ago to provide emergency fresh water supplies to Tokelau, thus averting a crisis.

The steps taken this year were wise, long-overdue, and mutually beneficial. Considered together, the Washington Declaration and the Wellington Declaration provide a framework for engagement that both looks confidently forward and reaffirms the deep, vibrant partnership that our two countries have historically maintained.

2. Celebration of Samoa’s 50th Independence Day

On June 1, 2012, the nation formerly known as Western Samoa celebrated its 50th Independence Day. As you may recall from several of my posts that month, our Embassy Apia team put together an impressive schedule of substantive and ceremonial events to mark the august occasion and underscore the long, deep history of U.S.-Samoa friendship. In fact, the United States had the largest, most diverse, and most vibrant international presence at the independence celebrations.

I led an official Presidential Delegation appointed by the White House which included, among others, Admiral Cecil Haney (Commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet), Congressional Delegate Eni Faleomavaega, and my colleague Ambassador Frankie Reed (our current American Ambassador to Suva, and former Chargé d’Affaires at Embassy Apia). We brought with us the U.S. Navy destroyer USS Chafee (with 350 sailors on board), the N.O.A.A. climate research vessel Ka’imimoana, and several Coast Guard and Navy aircraft for ceremonial fly-overs.

Our U.S. Navy 7th Fleet Band paraded and played concerts on Upolu and Savaii. The acclaimed African American step group Step Afrika! performed at schools, in church halls, and on stage at the national variety show. The Navy musicians, steppers, Peace Corps volunteers, my Embassy colleagues, and I all marched together in the official procession on Independence Day. And we hosted several dinners and receptions at our new Chargé Residence, including for the Samoa Chamber of Commerce, the large number of fellow Americans from American Samoa who attended the festivities, and senior government officials.

In terms of substantive activity, we announced our plans to build a new district medical center near the airport. We awarded several economic development grants. And Prime Minister Tuilaepa and I signed a Shiprider Agreement which will allow the Government of Samoa to place Samoan law enforcement officers on American Coast Guard and Navy ships passing through Samoan waters. Those officers will be able to direct the interdiction, arrest, and fining of foreign vessels engaged in illegal commercial fishing, trafficking in persons, or trafficking in prohibited substances, all serious problems in parts of the Pacific.

One of the highlights of our program was a reception aboard the USS Chafee after we signed the Shiprider Agreement on the foredeck. The 7th Fleet Band entertained guests including the Prime Minister, Head of State, King of Tonga, Governor-General of New Zealand, Governor of American Samoa, Deputy Prime Minister, several Cabinet Ministers, senior officials from French Polynesia, and heads of NGOs active in Samoa.

Our commemoration of Samoa’s 50th year of independence was, in my view, the most impressive and successful effort in the history of Embassy Apia. My colleagues underscored meaningful historical linkages and ongoing collaborations, while taking significant steps to deepen and expand relations further. Our Apia team planned for many months and then, along with visiting support from Wellington and Auckland, worked 15-hour days for more than a week to implement the program. It was the kind of effort that puts a big smile on your face, and easily ranks as one of our top two Mission efforts of 2012.

1. Celebration of the 70th Anniversary of US-NZ Bilateral Relations
and the Arrival of American Forces during World War II

In a photo-finish with the Samoa 50th, the top slot on my 2012 list goes to the Mission’s extensive commemorations of two highly significant milestones in shared Kiwi/American history. In February we marked the 70th anniversary of the establishment of formal diplomatic relations between the two countries, and in June we marked the 70th anniversary of the arrival of American military forces in New Zealand at the request of Prime Minister Peter Fraser after the outbreak of World War II in the Pacific.

It’s difficult to talk briefly about the anniversaries because the program spanned virtually the entire year, starting with social media efforts in February and concluding with the Marine Ball in November. I’ve already written more than a dozen blog posts about various elements of the commemorations, so I won’t recount the details again here.

I’ll simply say that, inter alia, we produced stamps, minted coins (at left), sponsored a 1940s video contest for students, held a memorial concert at Old St. Pauls, took the U.S. Marine Forces Pacific Band on a 3-week concert tour of cities and towns that had hosted Americans during the war, and held large 1942-themed Independence Day receptions for almost 1,500 folks in Wellington, Auckland, and Christchurch.

We talked live and online about the importance of shared history … Walter Nash’s arrival in DC to establish New Zealand’s first ever diplomatic mission abroad … the bedrock relationship formed when more than 150,000 American servicemen and women came to New Zealand during the war … and the shared service and sacrifice of our respective forebears during some of the darkest days of the prior century.

The Government of New Zealand held a wreath-laying ceremony at the National War Memorial attended by the Prime Minister, Governor-General, Leader of the Opposition, Minister of Defence, and other dignitaries. There was a moving sunset retreat on the Parliament forecourt with the Prime Minister and Governor-General, followed by a Parliamentary reception. Commemorative statements were read in the House, and New Zealand Post issued a set of anniversary stamps. The Kapiti Council and Kapiti U.S. Marines Trust held a series of additional events.

There was great warmth in the celebration of our shared history, which is the rock-solid foundation on which the relationship between the two nations still stands, whatever the vagaries of the politics of the day. Seventy years on, Kiwis and Americans still stand shoulder to shoulder on the issues that matter the most in the world. We advocate together for universal human rights from a position of deeply held, shared civic values. We still serve and sacrifice together in peacekeeping and reconstruction efforts around the world.

And we work closely together on a wide variety of economic development, climate change, disaster response, gender equality, rule of law, political empowerment, and other projects. In a show-me-the-money era when values are often viewed as quaint inconveniences, it’s important to remind ourselves that first principles rather than pecuniary gain bind our relationship together.

Of course, we don’t always agree on everything. But really, that’s to be expected. If we don’t occasionally squabble, then we aren’t being honest with each other. What matters is not the 5% or so of the time that we disagree, but the 95% of the time that our instincts, interests, and priorities naturally align. And what matters most of all is how we deal with disagreement when it occurs.

By those measures and all accounts, 2012 was a very good year.

*  *  *

That’s it for now. I hope you’ve enjoyed this brief tour through the highlights of another gratifying year at American Missions New Zealand and Samoa. Our 2010 was an excellent year significantly surpassed by 2011, which in turn has been exceeded by 2012. I’m very much looking forward to the pleasures and challenges of maintaining that steep trajectory in 2013.

Next year brings another couple of special anniversaries. October 12, 2013 marks the 175th anniversary of American diplomatic presence in Aotearoa. On that date in 1838, U.S. Secretary of State John Forsyth commissioned John R. Clendon to be the first United States consul in the lands later to be called New Zealand.

In addition, August will mark the 70th anniversary of First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt’s iconic island-hop trip through the South Pacific during the height of the war. From August 27 through September 2, 1943, Mrs. Roosevelt stopped in New Zealand to tour Red Cross facilities, visit marae, raise the profile of women’s contributions to the war effort, and engage with soldiers and civilians in Auckland, Rotorua, and Wellington.

Plans are afoot …

For now, though, Dr McWaine and I, and everyone else at American Missions New Zealand and Samoa, wish you and yours a very happy, healthy, and rewarding New Year … Kia hari te Tau Hou … Ia manuia le Tausaga Fou … Hau’oli Makahiki Hou.