The Foreign Service Journal, December 2020

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | DECEMBER 2020 29 EJP: As part of my strategy in South Africa, I needed to get to know Afrikaners and visit the communities where they lived. I traveled to a couple of towns, but the one that affected me most was an Afrikaner village three miles from Pretoria whose popula- tion ranged from the very poor to the well off. We parked the car on the outskirts of town, and I walked up and down the streets and observed people of various ages; they also looked at me carefully, wondering what I was doing there. Finally, someone came up and asked who I was; they couldn’t believe I was the U.S. ambassador. I talked to three Afrikaner women; it was my way of letting them know that I represented the United States in South Africa, and I was not going to become a myth by keeping myself apart from the people. FSJ: You served as ambassador to the United Nations from 1992 to 1993. What was your impression of the United Nations then? How do you think that role and standing have changed? EJP: The role as I understood it, especially after my conver- sation with President George H.W. Bush, was that the United Nations existed to make a difference. With that in mind, my approach was to cultivate relationships with all members of the U.N. Security Council and as many members of the General Assembly as I could. In my view, the U.N. still exists to make a difference, but the U.S. view of the U.N.’s role is always influenced by the view of the current U.S. president. When I was there, I had the support of President Bush, who wanted to effectively use the U.N. to make changes. He had an open line and made it possible for me to call him whenever there was a resolution that needed his guidance. I was able to work closely with the president and Secretary of State Larry Eagleburger on sensitive issues. President Bush respected the U.N. and its mandate, and understood how it could support and advance U.S. interests. WASHINGTON ASSIGNMENTS FSJ: You spent time in Washington working on personnel issues and rose to the top job of Director General in 1989. What was the priority issue for you as Director General? EJP: The first priority issue was remaking the Foreign Service to better support U.S. economic prosperity. At the time, U.S. foreign economic policy was going through a rebirth, which meant that officers in the economic cone needed to be pushed in new directions, while all other officers in other cones had to be reminded of the importance of economic issues. We worked closely with the Department of Commerce on this initiative because they had been encouraged by Congress to play a more active role overseas supporting U.S. companies and investments. The second priority was giving full attention to two important personnel issues: getting more minorities and more women into the Foreign Service. To do that, we had to mobilize support in the building and on Capitol Hill. Groups like the Congressional Black Caucus played a major role in helping to get authorization for these initiatives in the State Department’s budget. Shortly after I became Director General, I recognized that the department needed to improve its outreach to communities outside Washington, D.C., such as the Appalachian region. State did not recognize the value of recruiting officers from regions such as this one. As part of the outreach strategy, I organized visits by Department of State personnel to state governors. I, myself, visited Governor Douglas Wilder of Virginia. I told him that we needed assistance from governors to recruit from their communities that may not have exposure to foreign policy or international issues. FSJ: Can you tell us about the Thursday Luncheon Group? EJP: Several of us founded theThursday Luncheon Group with only a few members, including officers from what was then U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Edward J. Perkins and, at right, U.S. Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger at the United Nations General Assembly in 1992.