Principesa Moștenitoare la Women Leaders Conference

Luni, 23 mai 2011, Principesa Moștenitoare Margareta a participat la Conferința Femeilor Lideri, la care a susținut un discurs despre rolul reginelor în istoria României. Alteța Sa Regală a stat alături de un număr important de femei cu responsabilități în domeniile economic, cultural, politic, mediatic și în societatea civilă. Au fost prezenți ambasadorul Statelor Unite ale Americii și dna Mark Gitenstein, precum și personalități ale vieții publice din România, precum Dana Deac sau Camelia Șucu.

Feminine Royal Leadership

Speech of HRH Crown Princess Margarita of Romania
Women Leaders Conference, Bucharest
23 May 2011

It is with pleasure that I came to the Women Leaders Conference today. Not only because my background in sociology, international relations and political science forged my strong belief that women have a paramount role to play in today’s world, but also because men and women together have always written my family’s history, sometimes in a partnership that remained legendary in time. Despite the men’s overwhelming importance in public life during the 19th and the first half of the 20th century, in the Royal Family of Romania women played a distinct and hugely influential role.

Queen Elisabeth (Carmen Sylva well known as an author) was a leading figure in Romanian Arts, education, and science and in the social field. She published over 53 volumes in 7 European languages, she was the founder of organizations, charities, and cultural foundations, artistic events. A strong “soft power”, as we could call it today. As a consort of the Sovereign, she exercised a major influence over a society at the beginning of modernization. Despite a very “macho” culture and a political life tailored exclusively to men, Elisabeth was a trailblazer for the feminine leadership of today.

Queen Marie, Queen consort of Romania from 1914 to 1927, remains an immensely admired and beloved figure of the Royal House. She steps boldly off the pages of history. Her positive, powerful and practical influence was indisputable.  A multi faceted and fascinating woman, her diaries and letters describe her struggle to gain an independent footing in the male – dominated Royal court of Romania. Showing indomitable courage during the dark days of World War l she emerged as the embattled champion of the Allied cause. Known as Mother of the Wounded because of her work as a Red Cross nurse during the first World War, we find her in the trenches, or visiting the Front – she knew no fear of bullets and bombs. We find her in the hospitals among the wounded and the sick; she knew no fear of dirt and disease. But she did not limit herself to this traditional feminine role. She fulfilled her duty on multiple fronts, above all in encouraging and raising the morale of those living around her, in the dark days of the War and later, at the end of the War as the spokesperson for her country at the Versailles conference, where she turned up in 1919 as Romania’s delegate, informally representing the country’s interests, meeting Clemenceau, Poincare and Hoover. Her presence at the Versailles conference only reinforced the report sent out of Bucharest in 1917 by a French correspondent: “There is only one man in Romania, and that is the queen.”

She was in addition a talented artist, a traveller (Turkey, Egypt), an exceptional “networker” – she had connections to the powerful people of her time (Clemenceau, Tsar Nicholas II, Queen Victoria, Raymond Poincaré, the Presidents of the USA) but also, she was a gifted writer. She won the admiration of Virginia Woolf, who observed that  “Queen Marie can write; …No royal person has ever been able to write before”.

Queen Mother Helen of Romania, my grandmother – a Princess of Greece and Demark, with an illustrious lineage composed from the whole of Europe’s Royal Families, played a luminous, if discreet, role in the dark history of Romania in the twentieth century. Her profound humanity, as well as her affection, education and her spirituality played a key role in the upbringing of her son, Michael, both as a man, and a king, in an age of alienation, irrationality and cruel self-destruction. She was a courageous and strong woman, who kept her courage even after enduring many enforced exiles, events which would have broken a less determined, less spiritual women, she was an unfailing and  strong support for the King and the democratic forces of Romania 1940-1947.  Even during the war when confronted with the tyranny of Nazism, in helping the Jews, she displayed an resolutely strong character, pursuing what she knew to be right and good, while managing always to maintain great dignity. Her involvement in saving the lives of many people of the Jewish Faith during the dictatorship of Marshal Antonescu was formally recognised as the Yad Vashem institute posthumously named her a “Righteous Among the Nations.”   She was subsequently an important figure in the King’s exile and during the years of the Cold War for the Romanians abroad, she possessed great artistic talent and was a friend of the great intellectuals of that time, strong supporter of faith and a model for 2 generations of the family.

Today, the world needs more and strong female leadership. Democracy is more profound and spread in the world more than ever, but politics seems to confiscate the meaning of leadership in public life. Influencing people in the name of ideas that produce progress can be done through a more complex and generous leadership than politics alone.

A real leader is that person who produces development by his or her effort, ideas and action. But this could be done today with great results by the means of thoughtfulness, generosity, dignity and a just instinct, by ethics, by affection and faith, by commitment to one’s ideals and projects.

People need today models and a sense of identity, the comfort of being listened to and of being understood. This is why women’s intelligence and talent are great assets in the new era of communication, the Internet and “trendy” democracy.

Women are in a more and more influential position in the institutional world. Also, in the economic world, and in the mass media. Sometimes, young women lead huge enterprises or huge mass media groups. Prince Radu and I often visited countries, towns, organizations, companies or just families in which women’s achievement and influence was remarkable. Statesmanship is certainly not an exclusively masculine area today!

I can only think of some examples of great, famous feminine figures of Romania in politics, sport, science and art, or in public life. Not only the “classic” ones, such as Queen Marie, Martha Bibescu, Haricleea Darclee or later, Virginia Zeani. But in our days, strong personalities and very dynamic women bring a great contribution to the shaping of a modern, more stable Romania. Businesswomen such as Liliana Solomon, Mariana Gheorghe, Camelia Sucu. Artists such as Angela Gheorghiu, sportswomen like Nadia Comăneci or Gabriela Szabo, Nobel Prize winner Herta Muller, journalists like Dana Deac, so many businesswomen in their 30s who show courage, talent and determination, thousands of young Romanian female scholars with brilliant PhDs at Harvard, Oxford, Cambridge or Sorbonne, let alone very young female officers in the Romanian Armed Forces.

In conclusion, addressing challenges that women face today in their public or professional life is a must. Not only can women do more in leadership, but they can do it in a way men probably cannot.  Women may be naturally more suited to leadership as traditionally feminine talents can perfectly meet the requirements and challenges of this modern world, sometimes better than the typical male ones.  In the last 20 years living in Romania, I have seen and understood the power of the public woman in the society of today. Not necessarily because women are today specialised, run for public positions and do what only men used to do in the past. The power of the woman of today abides in her unique ability to respond to the needs of a paradoxical society: the better off we are, the more we need confidence; the more informed we are, the more we feel insecure; the more we communicate, the more we feel alone.

Women’s more holistic view of life our deeper empathy and sensitivity, our strong sense of duty and a more profound attachment to family values can play an essential a role in resolving these problematic paradoxes we are confronted with.