BONUS: Feminist Foreign Policy featuring Anna co-hosting The Great British Foreign Affairs Podcast

[00:00:00] Hello. I hope you are all doing fabulously. I am just dropping in to say that this is

[00:00:08] an episode of the Great British Foreign Affairs podcast, which I had the honor of co-hosting

[00:00:14] alongside the main host, Anna Joy Ricard. It's a wonderful podcast series that features

[00:00:21] conversations with all kinds of people that are shaping the way that Britain interacts

[00:00:25] across the globe. In this episode, we chat feminist foreign policy with the co-founder

[00:00:31] and director of the Center for Feminist Foreign Policy, Christina Lundz. I loved taking on

[00:00:37] this role as a co-host and I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did.

[00:00:44] Welcome to the Great British Foreign Affairs podcast, hosting insightful conversations with

[00:00:50] fascinating people to shape the way that Britain interacts with the world. It's an honor to jointly

[00:00:58] host this episode with The Story of Woman podcast by Anna Stoecklein, which features

[00:01:04] interviews with those who explore our world through the female gaze. And together we're

[00:01:10] delighted to talk about feminist foreign policy with Christina Lundz, the author of The Future

[00:01:17] of Foreign Policy is Feminist and co-founder and director of the Center for Feminist Foreign Policy

[00:01:24] in Berlin. Hi Christina, we're honestly so happy to have you with us and I wanted to

[00:01:33] jump in and start to begin with by asking you to tell us a bit about yourself, your background

[00:01:39] and how you came to be a leading voice on feminist foreign policy.

[00:01:43] Hi, I'm so excited to be here and to be talking to you about the topic feminist foreign policy.

[00:01:51] I mean my favorite topic in the world kind of. So I'm Christina, I'm one of the two co-founders

[00:01:57] of the Center for Feminist Foreign Policy, we're based here in Berlin. I am an author of,

[00:02:04] I've written one book so far it's called The Future of Foreign Policy is Feminist,

[00:02:07] currently writing on my second book and I'm an activist. I've been doing feminist activism for

[00:02:16] the past 10 years roughly. So I come from the countryside in Germany, lovely small village with

[00:02:24] 80 people, working class family and started studying at some point psychology and then

[00:02:33] international politics in the UK because I was lucky enough to get scholarships.

[00:02:40] From then I started kind of getting really fascinated about topics around social justice,

[00:02:47] feminism and human rights. So I got really into very many books and into the lectures

[00:02:59] and then I guess 10 years ago pretty much was when I first got really angry when I learned

[00:03:06] about dynamics such as you know when we know that whenever a group of people is objectified

[00:03:17] and sexualization can be one type of objectifying people, this leads to the dehumanization of

[00:03:25] these people and a dehumanization always leads to an increased level of violence towards that

[00:03:31] group of people. And we have this massive objectification, sexualization with women in

[00:03:36] our society. Women still in lots of media and culture and art and pop culture are

[00:03:47] sexualized, portrayed as objects and that has been the case in Europe's largest newspaper.

[00:03:55] It's a German tabloid and when I back then went home for summer break and I saw the newspaper

[00:04:03] lying in front of me at the gas station when I was paying and it asked its readers to rate

[00:04:08] Germany's most beautiful cleavage and it had the pictures only of really well-known,

[00:04:13] successful, accomplished German famous women. I got extremely furious because I knew that

[00:04:21] in Germany every day a man tries to kill his partner or ex-partner and every third day he

[00:04:25] succeeds and I know that every one in three women also in Germany experiences significant

[00:04:30] forms of male violence and we know all the facts and we know that male violence,

[00:04:36] there's like this huge impunity around male violence in all our societies. So I got really

[00:04:41] angry and started my very first campaign against that big tabloid newspaper.

[00:04:46] And then over the years I was involved in all sorts of feminist activism with regards to

[00:04:52] changing the German law on rape in 2016, no means no and a lot more. And then

[00:05:00] I also continued my studies in diplomacy international politics, started working

[00:05:05] internationally amongst others in Colombia for a feminist organization and then at the UN,

[00:05:11] in UNDP in New York and in Myanmar at the height of the genocide of the Burmese military

[00:05:18] against the Muslim minority of the Rohingya. And I kept wondering about priorities,

[00:05:28] I kept wondering about how money is allocated and I kept wondering about whose voices we're

[00:05:35] not listening to. And I kept wondering about priorities in foreign policy making such as

[00:05:41] kind of militarized security and economic interests when at the same time we know that

[00:05:47] militarized security by no means just keeps everyone safe but we know that it's feminist

[00:05:55] movements and more women's and human rights that will ultimately make the world a safer place and

[00:06:02] will reduce the likelihood of wars and conflicts. But instead worldwide we have seen this

[00:06:08] continuous trend of more money being allocated to militarized spending so that really got me

[00:06:16] more and more curious about this. And when I learned about Margot Wallström back then, the

[00:06:21] former Swedish foreign minister, that she announced a feminist foreign policy in her country,

[00:06:25] the first country in the world in 2014 to do so, I was extremely curious and then four years later

[00:06:33] started the Center for Feminist Foreign Policy with my co-founder Nina here in Berlin.

[00:06:37] Amazing! That is quite the background, really really incredible and we'll get more into

[00:06:44] your work specifically but I think it'd be helpful in the very beginning to kind of set

[00:06:48] the scene and help our listeners understand what even is feminist foreign policy.

[00:06:55] So feminist foreign policy, I'd say it's the attempt to really revolutionize how foreign

[00:07:04] insecurity policy making is being conducted. So a traditional understanding of foreign insecurity

[00:07:12] policy is underpinned by this so-called realist paradigm of international relations

[00:07:19] which tells us that all states are in anarchy towards each other because there's no

[00:07:25] supranational government and when this is the case every country, all leaders in the world

[00:07:33] want to gain more relative power, more power over other countries, more power over other people

[00:07:41] and this is mainly done by militarizing their countries and in the past kind of this thinking

[00:07:48] also justified imperialism and colonialism and so this understanding which also puts

[00:07:59] economic interest above other aspects of foreign policy making such as

[00:08:08] peacemaking or human rights. This is a narrative that so many of us who work in that area

[00:08:18] know that it will not lead to sustainable peace because we know from research that the

[00:08:23] most significant factor towards whether a country is peaceful within its own borders

[00:08:30] or towards other countries is the level of gender equality. So feminist foreign policy then

[00:08:38] is kind of this attempt to put this traditional foreign policy making these ideas about military

[00:08:46] strength and economic interests and the centrality of the state and the state's interest

[00:08:53] on its head and says okay no, no, no, we really need to get this right and put human rights

[00:09:00] the advancement of women's rights, human rights, queer rights and a decolonial foreign policy

[00:09:08] at the center of all foreign policy making globally because according to empirical data

[00:09:14] it's the only way where how we can achieve lasting peace globally. Amazing and digging

[00:09:22] into that a little bit deeper you know on my podcast in every episode we look at some

[00:09:27] part of the world some different system institution through the female gaze you know

[00:09:32] from a woman's perspective so the economy, health care, foreign policy and understanding

[00:09:38] any of it I always love to go back first and kind of figure out how we got here and you

[00:09:43] started to dabble into this a little bit in terms of you know the first time you kind of

[00:09:47] saw it come up you know it's a relatively newer thing that people are talking about but

[00:09:52] I think it'd be helpful to hear a little bit about the history of where feminist foreign policy

[00:09:59] thinking came from and how it's kind of developed since then. Oh I love the question

[00:10:04] because it's such a beautiful history and such a rich history although I guess it's not that

[00:10:11] well known so I'm always happy when I can talk about it. In my book The Future Foreign

[00:10:16] Policy as Feminist I am dedicating a whole chapter to that because it's also to me

[00:10:21] personally it's important to really kind of show the shoulders that we are standing on who

[00:10:28] are working on feminist foreign policy these days. So feminist foreign policy in my book I

[00:10:35] argue that it goes back at least to 1915 maybe even earlier but this is kind of the traces

[00:10:43] that I found. So 1915 during the First World War more than 1,000 women feminists met in the

[00:10:51] Hague in the Netherlands for the very first Women's Peace Congress and at this conference

[00:10:59] they not only demanded an end to the First World War but they also published or announced

[00:11:08] wrote down 20 resolutions which they really saw necessary for a new global order. So what they

[00:11:16] did with those 20 resolutions was nothing short of trying to design a new global order,

[00:11:22] understanding in the midst of a huge war that we cannot continue like this. So in those

[00:11:30] resolutions for example they demanded peace education for everyone, they demanded an

[00:11:36] international organization for a court of arbitration for all kinds of disputes,

[00:11:45] also for economic disputes. They demanded an end to the military industrial complex.

[00:11:51] They had so many fantastic ideas for the international order which at the time back then

[00:11:58] at a time when in almost all countries in the world women were not allowed to vote

[00:12:05] those women were barely listened to even though they met the then US President and the Pope

[00:12:12] and ministers and prime ministers all over Europe. But over the decades we can see that

[00:12:18] with the founding of the League of Nations and then the UN and the establishment of the Court

[00:12:23] of Justice and the World Trade Organization and many other important pillars of the current

[00:12:33] international system their ideas and visions were actually put into reality. So those women

[00:12:41] back then who were also strongly excluded from the Paris Peace Conference then in 1919

[00:12:53] they tried all they can to influence international policy making but it was a time

[00:12:59] when the exclusion of women especially feminist pacifist voices was very, very heavy.

[00:13:06] So over the years and decades they continued being engaged and organized. The 1915 conference

[00:13:15] in The Hague and then the follow-up conference 1919 in Zurich were really also the founding

[00:13:25] blocks of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom one of the most relevant

[00:13:30] organizations on women's rights and international and foreign policy. So this is kind of the

[00:13:40] back history and then over the decades these in the tradition of the women from The Hague

[00:13:46] and the feminists from The Hague important achievements were made internationally during the

[00:13:53] UN decades of the women in the 70s and then the big conferences in Nairobi and

[00:13:59] Copenhagen and Mexico City and then with the ratification of the 1979 UN Convention on

[00:14:10] the CEDAW, the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of discrimination against women.

[00:14:15] Then in 2000 for example I'm just picking out a couple of examples in 2000 something very

[00:14:23] important happened at the UN Security Council. The resolution 1325 which might be one of the

[00:14:31] most well-known resolutions of the UN Security Council was brought into the Security Council

[00:14:43] and it was the very first resolution in the Security Council which acknowledges that the

[00:14:51] situation of women globally might have anything to do with global security and global peace.

[00:14:57] So this resolution in the year 2000 called 1325 formed the start of the Women's Peace and

[00:15:05] Security Agenda. By now in total we have 10 resolutions within the Women's Peace and

[00:15:11] Security Agenda and all these bits and pieces the conventions and resolutions and

[00:15:18] the activism was the theoretical or also practical basis on which for example

[00:15:27] Margot Wallström in 2014 was able to announce a feminist foreign policy for her country

[00:15:33] and when Sweden did so, when they announced the feminist foreign policy

[00:15:38] they said okay our feminist foreign policy means that we focus on three Rs

[00:15:45] that is rights, human rights for everyone, women's like the advancement of women's rights,

[00:15:49] resources so putting money to the advancement of women's rights and topics of justice

[00:15:58] and representation. So fair representation of women in all areas of power and foreign

[00:16:04] policy making in general. Yeah I love that history and I feel like it's so interesting

[00:16:10] because there's this fascinating start to the thinking then there's this real evolution where

[00:16:18] it's taken seriously at a global level and you see the UN Security Council and other forums

[00:16:25] recognising and adopting principles and approaches and then there's something even

[00:16:31] more recently that you've touched on with Sweden right, where a whole set of a growing

[00:16:37] number of countries have adopted feminist foreign policy commitments and approaches

[00:16:42] and I wondered if you could tell us a bit more about that and also what are the principles

[00:16:48] you're seeing through those different countries adopting this approach that other countries

[00:16:55] should be thinking about? So yeah it's actually been a pretty success story over the past couple

[00:17:03] of years since Sweden announced its feminist foreign policy. Other countries were really

[00:17:08] inspired and stepped in the footsteps of Sweden so by now depending on how you count and how

[00:17:20] critical you are there are between 11 and 14 countries that have a feminist foreign policy

[00:17:26] that officially have a feminist foreign policy. There's always a big difference between what they

[00:17:31] announce and what they actually do. So we have for example Canada and France and Luxembourg

[00:17:41] and Germany and Mexico and Colombia and Spain. Many countries over the past years announced

[00:17:48] a feminist foreign policy and many of them actually if not all let me think let's say

[00:17:56] most of them also adopted the Swedish model of the three Rs or somehow. So

[00:18:04] yeah many of them focus on the three Rs some of them at another R or Germany adds a D for

[00:18:11] diversity but the Swedish model really is kind of widespread within the countries that

[00:18:21] officially have a feminist foreign policy and what these countries do so for example let's

[00:18:25] focus on Germany. Germany in end of 2001 in their coalition agreement of the current government

[00:18:33] when the government was formed they announced they would do a feminist foreign policy so

[00:18:37] they took roughly a year for consultations with civil society organizations. We were we the

[00:18:46] center for feminist foreign policy were involved as well to look at economic policies but also

[00:18:54] peace and security, peace building to better understand what they could actually do. When

[00:19:02] Germany on the 1st of March last year in 2023 presented their guidelines their strategy on

[00:19:09] feminist foreign policy it's actually really really good. It also addresses for example

[00:19:16] Germany's colonial past it talks about the need for arms control to advance women's rights and

[00:19:24] I'm mentioning these two topics because it's very often and very easily two topics that are

[00:19:30] kind of brushed under the carpet by feminist foreign policy countries because it's two of the

[00:19:35] tougher ones but topics that are so important for us civil society feminist civil society who

[00:19:41] working on the topic. Germany for example announced it wants to increase within a few years

[00:19:51] the share of their international funding that goes to projects that somehow focus on gender

[00:20:01] women's rights substantially. Germany has a couple of concrete projects which they

[00:20:14] apparently they say they do because of the feminist foreign policy that includes for example

[00:20:18] a financially supporting an organization that works in Iraq with the Yassidi minority

[00:20:33] who suffered from the genocide against the Yassidi. It involves for example supporting

[00:20:38] our organization to do a project on

[00:20:45] how human rights defenders can be supported in authoritarian regimes. Germany also

[00:20:57] built or included a small it's really small new department yeah department is a big word but

[00:21:06] um at least created some positions within the foreign ministry to look at different forms of

[00:21:13] diversity which includes fair representation between men and women but also disability

[00:21:20] rights and the the queer community and so forth. So there's I mean I guess then also

[00:21:30] so Germany currently has the very first female foreign minister in its over 150 years history

[00:21:38] and she's great like she really is a feminist at heart and at the same time of course things

[00:21:44] are being done sometimes with regards to when it comes to selling weapons and other aspects

[00:21:51] where I'm personally wondering where the feminism is in those aspects and it's for us

[00:21:58] sometimes as civil society feminist civil society really it's our task I believe to find the

[00:22:07] balance between supporting governments that are brave enough to do a feminist foreign policy

[00:22:13] because in a world that is becoming more and more authoritarian where 72 percent of the world's

[00:22:18] population live in authoritarian led countries it is brave to do something differently and at

[00:22:24] the same time of course we do not want for governments to do pink washing so we need to

[00:22:32] find the right balance between supporting and criticizing and yeah and just hoping and

[00:22:40] working with everyone possible who's generally interested in making a difference because as

[00:22:46] it stands now with the current trend of more and more wars and conflicts we had a doubling

[00:22:53] of wars and conflicts between 2010 and 2020 we had numbers of refugees worldwide has tripled

[00:23:01] between 2010 and last year we had a doubling of people killed in conflicts and wars and that

[00:23:12] this number that's also between 2010 and 2020 does not include the war in Gaza

[00:23:19] and so the international trend towards more and more authoritarianism towards more and more

[00:23:24] militarization towards more and more attacks of the international human rights system

[00:23:31] and less funding for human rights defenders and civil society this is hugely troubling and

[00:23:39] urgent so yeah we need more and more actors we're implementing feminist values to do

[00:23:46] something different and better and I love how you've just summed that up that there's a bravery

[00:23:53] but there's also challenges around adopting feminist foreign policy and that debate and

[00:23:59] that interaction a government and leaders talking to civil society learning from history

[00:24:06] constantly striving to improve together is so valuable and so important and that's one of

[00:24:14] the reasons why I'm delighted to have you on this podcast because I think in the UK but also

[00:24:20] in many other countries that haven't yet adopted a feminist foreign policy there's a real

[00:24:25] invitation for people across the political spectrum people involved in foreign policy to

[00:24:32] grapple and understand more of the history more of the principles more of the debates

[00:24:38] and more of the opportunity for impact and opportunity for change and opportunity

[00:24:44] for different vision of the future and so you've given us a little taste and I hope that that

[00:24:52] whets some people's appetite that haven't delved much into this topic to look into it

[00:24:58] more Anna do you want to come in just on a last quick question yeah yeah I think it's

[00:25:04] always nice to end with a little bit of hope looking forward into the future so we'd just

[00:25:10] love to know what are your hopes for this year for 2024 for the advances in feminist

[00:25:16] foreign policy and perhaps you could also add we know that you've recently got your English

[00:25:23] translation out of your first book tell people how they can find that that's what your second

[00:25:29] book is on and particularly how they can follow more on this topic and delve into it a bit more

[00:25:36] so my hopes for this year are that with the multiple urgencies that we're seeing in the

[00:25:43] world from wars and conflicts and the climate emergency and as I said before more militarization

[00:25:52] and more authoritarian regimes and it's super election year it's the biggest election year in

[00:25:59] history actually this year so my hopes are that people take away from this urgency that

[00:26:06] we cannot continue with business with politics as usual but that we urgently need to put

[00:26:14] human rights women's rights minority rights at the core of all policymaking and in foreign

[00:26:19] policy this this means it's it must be feminist foreign policy because we have fantastic concepts

[00:26:25] in feminist foreign policy already to achieve all of what I just mentioned before so my hopes

[00:26:30] are that from the urgency people really across the globe wake up and demand better policymaking

[00:26:39] um so and and in my book thank you for mentioning it um yes it was published in german almost two

[00:26:48] years ago actually on the day that putin started his full-scale war against ukraine and then

[00:26:55] later it was updated with new chapters on iran and um in ukraine and this updated version

[00:27:01] was just published in in the uk in the u.s last autumn so the future foreign policy is

[00:27:07] feminist it's available everywhere where books are being sold and i'd be so happy if some of

[00:27:13] the readers of course would get that book lots of my my heart and our work here the center

[00:27:18] for feminist foreign policy is um is in that book amazing and what's your second book on or

[00:27:24] is it a secret yeah no um i mean i have not publicly shared with anyone yet but as you're

[00:27:29] asking it's on empathy and resistance and how i argue that we need both empathy and resistance

[00:27:39] to make the world a better place it's about yes standing your moral ground when the

[00:27:46] when times are tough um yeah this is what's going to be about it will come out later

[00:27:51] this year wow it sounds amazing and can people follow you or your center on social media how

[00:28:00] can people find you thank you for that um yes please do so you can find me on linkedin and

[00:28:08] instagram mainly i'm very lazy on twitter on x and not on tiktok so instagram and linkedin

[00:28:14] christina lundz christina with a k and also the center for feminist foreign policy you'll

[00:28:19] also find on those platforms so yeah please um come follow and send me a message if you do

[00:28:25] that's amazing thank you christina thank you so much what an amazing inspiration for the

[00:28:31] beginning of 2024 and we wish you all the best with your ongoing work to

[00:28:37] achieve those aims in 2024 thanks christina thank you so much thank you so much for having me

[00:28:43] thank you

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