CAIRO, June 10, 2017 — I am here today with one particular purpose above all others: to congratulate the enterprising, determined, successful graduating class of 2017. A graduating class of students who were already graduates when they came here, but who knew the power of learning and wanted more, and who were determined to improve themselves. You have my admiration and my good wishes. And I know you are a graduating class who were supported by parents and family members who are represented here today. I offer my thanks to them too.
I come here out of respect, and not just for you, the graduates, and your achievements.
Also respect for your President, Ambassador Ricciardone, whom I had occasion to meet when I was in office, and whom I know to be a man of high seriousness, strong values and deep understanding of public service.
Respect for your country. Egypt is a civilization not just a nation. It carries the burden of high expectations. Sometimes they are met, sometimes not, but if you, the graduates of 2017, are the future of Egypt then I know the future can be bright.
And respect for AUC, its remarkable history and distinguished faculty. This institution embodies the best aspirations of higher learning; the ability to break down barriers between people, to respect different opinions, to advance the frontiers of knowledge, and to pass on that knowledge to the next generation. We need more of that spirit today, and not just in universities.
The world has never had greater access to knowledge and understanding; but it is full of disinformation; misinformation is more ubiquitous than ever; and misunderstanding, lack of understanding, even a war on understanding, more tolerated than ever before. The lie truly is half way round the world before the truth gets its boots on.
This institution stands against that. It stands for consideration, research, analysis rather than grandstanding, hectoring and blaggarding. And by virtue of graduating from this university so do you. As a famous New York Senator, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, once remarked, you are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts.
There are and should be alternative opinions. There cannot be alternative facts.
My theme today builds on that: the world is more inter-connected than ever before, but the great danger is that we are consumed by the divisions between us. That is the danger that I fight every day in my work. That is the threat that I see in this region. That is the meme of social and traditional media. And that is what I would ask you, using the knowledge and skills you have developed here, to fight against.
Them and us is the oldest story in politics. The oldest story in religion too. And the most dangerous.
Today, our job, all of us, with the benefits and resources and networks that bind us together, is to make this age of connection an age of cooperation and unity.
Nowhere is there need for more cooperation, more unity, across divides of religion, region and race than in respect of the refugee crisis. Refugees are caught between the forces of global interconnectedness and political retrenchment.
When you look at the conflicts in Syria or Afghanistan or Congo or Yemen or Somalia, you see war without end and war without law. And when you look at some of the reaction to the refugee crisis in the US or Kenya or Pakistan or parts of Europe you see refugees targeted as a nuisance not a cause.
I run an international NGO founded by Albert Einstein to rescue Jews from Europe. Today more than half the world’s refugees are Muslim. For us the refugees are a cause, whatever their religion.
When I first took the job at the IRC, three years ago, 50 million people were displaced around the world. Today there are more than 65 million. We work in 30 countries around the world helping refugees and displaced people of all kinds survive, recover and rebuild their lives from the trauma of war and persecution. We have over 25,000 staff and volunteers. Last year we helped 26 million people, about a quarter of whom live in the Middle East.
In Egypt you know firsthand the meaning of the African proverb, “if your neighbor’s house is on fire, your house is on fire”. Egypt too has a rich history of hosting refugees and today, over 250,000 refugees live here. Instead of shirking away from responsibility, Egypt signed the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, as well as the 1969 Organization of African Unity Convention. These international, binding laws are the cornerstone of refugee protection.
We need more countries to uphold high standards for treatment of refugees. They need the chance to work; their children need education; and the most vulnerable need to be offered the chance to restart their lives in a new country.
That takes unity and cooperation and financing across international boundaries. What we are seeing too often is division and blame, sometimes with an intellectual justification. A book called the “The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order” by Samuel Huntington, is worryingly fashionable. The book projected a dystopia, one where the East and West, and more specifically the Muslim world and the Judeo-Christian west, are doomed to clash.
I never bought that argument and I still don’t. The divisions within East and West are bigger than the divisions between them. And we are too interdependent. If the Middle East fails, we all fail.
But every act of terrorism, every act of hate, promotes division.
There are plenty of people in the West who will say this region only brings trouble, and we should stay as far away as possible. And there are plenty of people in this region who will say that the West only brings lectures, hypocrisy and even apostasy.
This institution stands in proud defiance of both claims. And the insight of your founders is needed more than ever.
We don’t just need to stand against them. We need to act against them.
Not just talking together but acting together to build a shared community of values. That is the significance of places like the AUC. A university that espouses pluralism, critical inquiry, and mutual respect located in the crossroads between North and South, East and West.
It is indicative that the word Cairo and American are bound together in your name. We need more institutions like the AUC, building the links that are vital in an interdependent world.
We need them in politics, in civil society, in the media. And we need young people to lead them. This region rightly reveres older generations. And the older I get the more I appreciate young people’s willingness to listen. But in a region where sixty per cent of the population is under the age of 29, and where according to the UN Arab Development Report tens of millions of young people feel disempowered and disenfranchised, there needs to be leadership from young people too. You need to be engaged and respected and likewise to engage and to respect.
I know there are graduates here destined for careers in the private and public sector. Hopefully some of you will join me in the NGO sector. Because I truly believe that the leaders of tomorrow will be fluent in the language, hierarchies, culture and values of all three sectors. Few problems will be solved by one sector alone; few leaders will succeed if they only understand one sector.
As you embark on that journey I make three pleas to you.
First, please use the remarkable network of which you are a part to reach outwards and not look inwards and to represent and benefit from different points of view.
Second, please carry on learning. I have been doing that every day since I left graduate school, even though I have never signed up for another university course. The best way to learn something is to do it. You learn to be a good speaker by practicing; to be a good leader by trying; and by practicing and trying in a spirit that encourages debate and discussion.
Third, please recognize your place in the world. You have graduated from an American University in a Middle East that is changing quickly. The Middle East is seeing a new generation of leaders come through, in politics, in business, in the media. The relationship of political reform and economic modernization is in question. The balance between rights of individuals and minority groups, and the stability of the wider society is contested. You need to be part of the global conversation, forging national and regional paths forward.
This city, this country, this region knows the toll of terrorism. You are not alone. My home city, was subject to a brutal attack this time last week. It is hard to get out of your mind the grief of friends and family of those that lost their lives or are injured. The only way to do so, is to put into your mind the extraordinary heroism, determination and humanity of not just the emergency services but the ordinary men and women from around the world who rushed to help each other at a moment of danger and fear. One phrase caught my eye, “We’ve got to keep together…the world is falling apart.”
Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who grew up in apartheid South Africa and has forgotten more about what it means to overcome hatred than most of us will ever know, summed up his life’s credo as follows: “My humanity is bound up in yours, for only we can be human together. We are different precisely in order to realize our need of one another.”
Our job, together, whatever our field, public, private or non-profit sector, is to stand against division and embrace a world of connections, diversity, and compassion. It is the best of humanity, which we must defend together. I look forward to doing so with you.