The Foreign Service Journal, October 2008

program with a people-to-people component, as many critics suggest it should be, but a people-to-people pro- gram with a development component. Kennedy’s Challenge On the campaign trail in 1960, speaking at the University of Michigan, candidate John F. Kennedy said, “We need young men and women to spend two or three years abroad spreading the cause of freedom.” This gen- erated an enthusiastic response. Then, in his inaugural address, Pres. Kennedy said: “To those peoples in the huts and villages of half the globe struggling to break the bonds of mass misery, we pledge our best efforts to help them help themselves, for whatever period is required — not because the commu- nists may be doing it, not because we seek their votes, but because it is right. … Now the trumpet summons us again — not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need — not a call to battle, though embattled we are — but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle year in and year out. … And so, my fellow Americans: Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.” It is only in that spirit that the Peace Corps can thrive today. While communism is no longer the principal enemy, we remain deeply engaged in a “long twilight struggle” against malignant forces that have a concept of human society profoundly different from ours, as well as against mankind’s perpetual enemies, such as disease and ignorance. That said, the Peace Corps should never be consid- ered an instrument of day-to-day U.S. foreign policy. Nonetheless, it has been from its beginning, and remains today, a significant element of American soft power. It is an important expression of our values, what Abraham Lincoln called the “better angels of our nature” as Americans. It embodies and projects abroad our ideal- ism, enthusiasm, generosity, compassion, optimism, and support for human freedom and individual dignity. It puts a positive face on America for millions of people whose only other images of Americans are formed by Hollywood and hostile propaganda. It’s easy to hate an “ugly American” stereotype acquired from these images; but it’s difficult to hate the young woman who lives in your village, speaks your language and helps get a new school established, or the young man who lives down the street and teaches English to your kids. Many critics argue that because the world has changed dramatically since the 1960s, the Peace Corps needs to change as well. This is certainly true in the sense of changing tactics and harnessing modern tech- nology when possible. But the organization’s bedrock F O C U S O C T O B E R 2 0 0 8 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 31 Left: Virginia Emmons at the village school she started. Right: Leah Smith at her house.