Thank you good afternoon everyone for joining us for this book talk brick by brick building hopes and opportunity what a powerful title. Each word of the title has power within its own self and you will see that illuminated during the conversation today that karen will have with barbara. I am the managing director at the Aspen Institute its my pleasure to step in for my boss for the executive director and also Vice President at the Aspen Institute. And fortunately she had a family emergency today and is not able to make it. But she was heavily involved in the planning of which we are honored to host this book talk because she knows karen has a very close friend for many many years. And if you know and you know their commitments are important to her. Only an emergency would have kept her from this. So thank you for being here i will not spend a lot of time on introductions because you have the bio in front of you its important to get you into the conversation but i am honored to introduce both because i have known karens work for a number of years i have deep respect for her and im excited to hear the conversation. As a policy program at the institute we work to make certain families can move up the economic ladder. Our approach to doing this work is called to generation or whole family approach to make certain their opportunities and their goals and their needs are addressed first and foremost both in policy and program. Being around for about two years with the Leadership Program and also network of organizations and associations across the country. About 380 of them that take a whole family approach moving families of the economic ladder. Also with policy programs and policy makers at the state and federal level that structural barriers and also make certain we take that lens to our work. And that is a gender lens but also through the work that and has done over her career. So in the work that she has done have flourished in their relationship over the years. One of the things that and is doing now is the aspen forum on women and girls which is relevant to this conversation it is a Program Initiative and the executive director as well as the Vice President at the Aspen Institute she runs the program called the aspen innovator group. So with that i want to introduce Barbara Klein who will be leading the conversation with karen and there will be time for q a but we would like to make certain you are fully aware that we are honored to hav barbara and our conversation today to make certain she is really talented but has an amazing career not only as an actor and a newscaster for a long time including here in washington dc. And karen thank you for being here im looking forward to the conversation now i will turn it over to you. Thank you. Its so great to be here is an honor to talk to karen about her book. As some of you probably know karens background has taken her all over the world to work with women in crisis from the former soviet union, afghanistan, bosnia. All very courageous and commendable. But then we get to this book of the broad outline that she decides to go to rwanda for a year for work with her three sons and leave her husband in bethesda and decides to do this for work and to work on what she reveals in the book is trouble in her marriage. She is brutally honest about all of these aspects in this book. I guaranteed when you read it therell be times that you are not able to breathe. And those descriptions of women that you are working with and then descriptions of your own life so with that summary what the book is about. [laughter] first of all thank you for being here also thank you to marjorie for the warm introduction. I appreciate it and all of the wonderful work you are doing kudos to you. I really felt it is a story i have wanted to tell even before i went to rwanda with the three kids but to be a person who travels in the developing world for most of my professional career im in bethesda then im in afghanistan then south sudan then congos a really just looking at the way women live and are forced to live in a lot of these societies contrasting that with the lives that we have here. Not just a privilege question but how women lack of voice and choice in so many countries. And not just in the developing world so to tell those stories alongside my own it was an honor for me to do that. Why did you write it all down . Why did you want to share this publicly quick. I spent ten years working with a group called women for Women International but the conflict zones all around the world. Afghanistan south sudan congo nigeria rwanda and bosnia. And it just struck me that my job was to take down women stories and i had notebooks full of them over ten years and that was for purposes of writing Success Stories and also of how you do your work. So you live with them they dont go away. They stay with you and i have all of these stories but then there was my story i had not told and it felt disingenuous to write a book of other women stories and not putting my own alongside that page. So tell us a little bit of your story personally that you felt that you had to work through as you are working with women in crisis. I grew up in Portland Oregon a pretty typical childhood but my father was abusive to my mother and to the children. Its interesting growing up i identified with my father versus my mother and i carried that with me for a long time. I could not understand the mothers relationship in the family and her missing voice. Why she would stay in a marriage that was abusive. And it really wasnt when i rise in rwanda and started to connect the dots between how i grew up in my mother. And our family and how so many women around the world live including rwanda. Its a story over and over but i did not personalize it. First of all i do want to know how did you connect the dots . But also one of the things is how honest you are yes he is abusive but you get into it. He hit you. Yes. Yes. Tell us how that affected you and again it is in the book but then how you came as an adult. We all have stories from childhood and the stories that we live with and for me the way i dealt with this growing up was the idea of being above reproach i will just be super confident and a superwoman to go out there and get straight as and get the great job and have three kids and do everything right. But there is no such thing as staying above reproach. The catalyst really even for me moved to rwanda i applied for this position at women for women and i did not get it and i was devastated but in some ways unnaturally devastated i dont want to say it was a house of cards but the story that i told myself about everything of how it was working in the things that i needed to do it started to unravel. Everything that i had done to prop myself up with the family and the kids and all of that was quite raw and to unpack all of that. How. It was more getting perspective sitting down to talk to a number of women survivors. I had taken down their stories but it was a job. This was me looking at those stories in a different way. Not just for work but woman to woman how they literally build their lives one brick at a time and one thing i was doing is building the first of its online women opportunity center. The women brick makers handmade each of the 500,000 bricks to construct the womens opportunity center. Of how women would build their life a brick at a time so i was deconstructing that and un building it to build it up agai again. You have stories of women individuals. How did you connect the dots quick. One of the most challenging stories in the book losing her husband and all six of her children in the genocide not to be so graphic including the baby she was carrying on her back had the neck cut and watched all of her children die and her husband die in the water she laid floating on the water just until the killings stopped essentially and ran around for two weeks at basically the close on her back and in hiding with no food or water. She went back to her neighborhood and there was nothing left. This is like somebody who had truly lost everything. Husband, childrehusband, childr. And we are having this conversation in her house. She went to the women for Women Program and actually got trained and got a knitting machine sent to her by a relative living in europe and she started to make knitted sweaters and then she made money and bought several more machines and then she had a retail shop and making thousands of dollars. And how she built her business and god a bank loan and a house. Basically how she rebuilt her life one brick at a time and in her case they were sweaters and it made me realize if she could do that than on mine anybody could if you thank you cant survive anything but yet you are still able to live and smile and dance is just the ultimate sense of perspective. So there is a huge leap from floating in the water pretending she is dead from someone being trained to knit and get the funds. She wanted to live. She didnt lose faith in life. How . I cannot answer that. I cannot tell you what it is inside of her that kept her going but i can say that having spent ten years working with women everywhere, there is something inside women in particular that keeps them going and striving. A lot of it has to do with basic instincts for survival but for many other women it was keeping their families going. But yet there was a deep sense of responsibility to keep going for others. I will give you one other story not trying to be gruesome but to contextualize there was a woman in bosnia and where she was living sidebyside with her neighbors basically they turned vigilante. Her husband was taken away and forced into hard labor. She was taken to an empty house by her once friendly need neighbors raped and tortured repeatedly and then said to her we should kill her another said she will kill herself. So what she said is she had a new baby boy and i needed to live for him. That these are all about crisis. But some of these women are incredible from the genocide. The war in bosnia and kos of oh but it is every day for many of the women who stories that you tell them the book and i think number one about marriage that many are not married. And number two that were parceled out having to do with how much value he thought he brought to the family. This is an everyday story. Its just the story but and it had come up a couple of times not only in rwanda but that the husbands were basically parceling out food depending on the perceived women. She said my husband said i should be fed like a bird because im not contributing financially. So the control of food comes up multiple times if you think about a place like south sudan where women are valued as animals and not just about food but all lovers of control of education being able to leave the home how women are perceived in so many cultures i dont want people to think this is just about africa or war torn countries. But i see this marginalization and other places also. Its just less noticeable. But this was in your own home growing up. Thats right. But its in a lot of peoples home. How many stories are we hearing about the Metoo Movement that they are sitting inside themselves every single day . Everybody has a story even if its just what we tell ourselves to get through the day. Thats true for a lot of people and a lot of women. They are not able to share those stories. Think about this. The statistic kills me one out of 16 women in the United States experiences rape as their first sexual encounter. One out of 16 that is an astounding statistic. Whether it is south sudanese or rwanda or afghan it is all of us. What struck me as i was taking notes is that you word site one out of 15. And it is in our lives. Not that it gets played out necessarily. Often it doesnt but in other countries where the culture. You would be surprised how many countries have laws on the books. You would be surprised. It is a reporting issue. And its in this country also. Women dont talk about it. They dont have a place to go and a lot of it has to do with they dont have their own income to make different choices. So i say in the book having to stay in choose to stay my mother couldnt stay and i talked about how to deal with this i always let my own income i dont ever want to feel like i have to stay. If i choose to stay that is up to me. And that something you take into your work. Tell us the conclusion that you reached for all of the stories in different parts of the world and what conclusion that you came to. What i have seen in every single country including here in the United States what gives women voice and choices are education and the ability to earn an income. Education without income is to change that for women and girls. Education may give you voice but it does not give you choice. So i think women need to have their own income to have that ability to make different choices. Choices around sending or keeping children. Children suffering from abuse or violence in the family. Okay. So with your work, how did you see what was possible to start with their girls and women get those things going . With business skills looking at different markets for women to earn an income. It could be as simple as selling bananas. But do have some income i remember when they first joined the program they would buy the bananas and bring them home to the family to show there was a value that they had something to offer. When i was living in rwanda we ran in entrepreneurship competition and some of the women that started the tiny micro businesses years ago had 25 employees and partners in uganda and kenya. You would be surprised how little it takes to make a difference in somebodys life. And thats the brick by brick. But now i working with a group thats also about voice and choice talking about Economic Opportunity for young women. Started ten years ago and its all about a Diploma Program to the fastestgrowing sectors in the economy giving in education and the ability to earn an income and 86 percent are in the workforce right now earning 11 times the National Median income. Mentioning three sectors that you focus on. To study Political Science or psychology. We are Hospitality Management and tourism Information System in Small Business management entrepreneurship. The thinking was we started with the private sector and worked backwards to make sure that the skills the young women were developing had relevance of the marketplace. We didnt start with the supply but with the demand. When i think of the young women who graduated. These are not the elite of society but 70 percent are the first in the family. This is a lifechanging education for these young women. And the daughters of the women for women. I can tell their mothers gave up everything so their daughters could have a College Education. Tell us the story of vanessa. That is also an amazing story. So this is one of the most Amazing Stories i have heard of. And a young woman who is ten years old and walking with her family she is a child. They are leaving rwanda in the middle of the genocide shes with her grandmother. So she walks past the family shes lying there with the woman laying there with a baby on top of her and the woman motions to her. The grandmother says dont go over there. We are leaving and getting out of here. She walks over and picks up the baby and the grandmother said leave the baby it will be dangerous for us. You cannot take the baby. She picks up the baby. She is ten years old and puts the baby on her back and they continue walking to the refugee camp where they live. If you think about that choice as a ten yearold girl making the choice to pick up the baby. That is the part of the story. To come back to rwanda and she is raising this baby has her ow own. The babys name is vanessa. She finally tells vanessa the truth when she is 13 years old and says i am your mother but im your sister and your auntie and if you can understand that we can live together for a very long time. Then vanessa goes to school. I actually just saw them both on my last trip. Its an Amazing Stories. So it also illustrates the obstacles that women confront that when women are working the land so he is a high level official. He is a jerk. With the congo tell us about the women and working the land that wasnt easy to get permission. We set up a commercial farm in congo and women were going back and forth. Its her Traditional Land ownership he sought over saw that and made a concessionary gift of this land except he wanted us to buy him a new car he wanted a land rover. And we were having these negotiations. And then the women farming the land to have multiple negotiations and said how can i seal my property if i dont have a car . So we were going through this process through officials to deal with the Land Ownership question so we had to look for a new piece of land. And he kept bringing this up. That is hysterical. On one level. I also want to get back to your personal story because in many ways men and women who are married recognize when we read about the three signs that you took to rwanda. And you write about the problems in your marriage. You talk about questions that you have if you want to stay married. But then you talk more about your work and then you come back and you are on the same wheel again. And the guilt about your kids. They all had the flu at one point and you had to go to congo. How did you feel or justify to yourself leaving the four kids . It is the same struggle personally of any woman. I dont think that is so particularly unique i could overlay the context of the cut conflict of the countries not just as a working mom and a traveling mom a bunch of my career has been spent working overseas prickle a lot of gratitude to my husband who was also in the audience who was watching the kids all the times and i was traveling to those places. But it is hard. It is messy. I dont know any woman in my personal network that will tell you otherwise that marriage can be hard. And marriage could be messy and all the difficult choices and tradeoffs we have to make is women. I just felt like i wasnt willing to gloss over those pieces of the story because they are a part of the story as a woman and mother and wife and professional. I have been asked so many times by young women what does it look like . And can you have kids . I would tell you you could have no problems but a lot of times it was very ugly to be honest. And knowing that is part of the package. What i make different choices . Thats the question. No. What do you want people to carry away . As this person who has traveled, choice is a gift that many women around the world dont share and for people to realize it is a luxury to be able to choose to have choices. So if you are stuck and you find it debilitating to make those choices, these women in every single country make the most difficult choices. To me i find that inspiring. I can make those two rather about my marriage, the kind of mother i wanted to be, the work that i was doing. And i found that gift of understanding and the inspiration of it helped me to move on to a better place. I thought that might be helpful for other people. What should we carry away the way we deal with our world . What do we put into the world . I firmly believe once you know you cannot un know. There has to be an awareness to looking at different ways of thinking and being. Quite easily as americans make it think that isnt me. I dont have to Pay Attention to that. I feel guilty of that myself on multiple occasions and to say thats not me. But that openness and awareness that are in there is more that connects us up as human beings that appear on the surface. And i really wanted to be able to connect the dots. Lets talk about your mother and what she thought about the book because thats an important part of connecting the dots. You will read the book but i didnt share the book with my parents until the last minute because if its not going to be published i dont need to go there. [laughter] but i went there. It is interesting. I thought it could go one of two ways that they would either be very upset to tell the story or they could embrace it. Actually the latter happened for both my father and my mother i got the nicest note from my mother about the book and her pride in the story and in me. So there is a healing aspect for all of us to tell your story out loud in the same way that so many me too survivors want to tell their story out loud. When you sit on your story and keep it inside it can be very hurtful to share that out loud breaking the silence and connecting with other people who have stories. It may not be the same story but a story nonetheless. To do that in the place is a good thing and a healing thing. The ceo of women for Women International is a great group they are organized for 25 women to gather. But more than that the women to come to gather talking for the very first time in their lives. I remember being in congo. One of my first trips ther there, these women are so traumatized they cannot even say their names out loud. Think about that. They cannot even say their name out loud. To be in the environment to actually talk and speak to tell your truth and your story okay we have two minutes. So i will ask a simple question. So you say in here that clearly this is important for to enhance our understanding of the world. But also you say in the book crucial to development and stability in a country to have women, have a voice and choice. There is a lot of data that shows countries that have greater adjudication where women are engaged in those that more gender equality or sustainable so that when women are working it is more positive and that Economic Growth that women that are educated to earn an income is better for climate change. There are positive effects that come with women being educated and to earn an income. Its not just good for women or even good for the family. There is a lot of data that shows its good for society. Heading up the 25th anniversary of beijing this year. If you look at 130 Million Girls are still out of school. 40million young women are still married in africa before their 15th birthday. Four out of five victims are girls. One out of three william are victims of violence virchow one out of three. So theres a lot of unfinished business. I just want to say you mentioned a lot of data but the best part of reading brick by brick for me was this disease that make it very real and you will hold your breath for some of it but then dealing with marriage and the issues left over from the abusive household. So thank you very much for the honesty of this book. It is fascinating. [applause] i think we will take questions . Did you find resistance from women that you ended up doing their stories but how did you get them to open up to you the way they did to share the way they did . Also being a white woman of privilege going into these countries, what was the dynamic there . Did it just go heart to heart . Thats a very good question. First of all the stories that people share are completely voluntary. Its up to women if they want to share their story absolutely and im very conscious to be the white woman that this is not in africa thing for me. Ive been working in the developing world for about 30 years now. And certainly multiple countries beyond africa. And then to come into somebody elses environment. I am a guest thats how i felt and relined. I am there to listen. Im there to have a conversation. Not judge or impose. So within the confines of that dynamic, people will be comfortable to share their stories. You have to be a deep listener but thats the other reason i chose to share my story. Because i wont just tell other peoples stories i will put my other one my own story on the line also. Hello. You have tackled the part of education separate which is post education investments go to Tertiary Education and for the rest of the population. And for those adolescent girls. And you know that. The countries know that. You have broken boundaries but what is your position . We have to continue to push the envelope to keep girls in school longer. But thats not enough. The education they receive matter im not one of those people who believe education for education sake. It is about having the right skills and attitudes to transition to the workforce even if you will not go on to Tertiary Education and potentially a crisis point in the way it is evolving in the terms of new technology and future economies. We are already seeing gaps of skills and access to technology. This has the potential to exacerbate the gap for the girls getting an education. And she is working with adolescent girls in malawi. And then to put a better Bridge Program and to embed as early as primary. And those taking the off ramps to education the thing with the right and then having nothing they can go they have nowhere to go. No way to earn an income. Their life is essentially done in that respect. So that Education Needs to be finetuned for the economy. I believe that it does. Thank you very much for sharing your story bringing them to dc. You spoke a little bit about the importance of womens space is an education is important so could you possibly share more stories about that and who is creating those spaces . International organizations with bad idea or what works best. Women spaces could take all shapes and sizes the program is structured around the training groups of 25 and was done very intentionally and then to star as a witness only in college so women could have a safe space to learn. Not physically but even though rwanda is a great country with the highest percentage of women in parliament all over the world that you have entrenched patriarchy and the situation where there is one computer and women are not comfortable putting up their hands. So this is a safe place for women to lead a guild to have this all womens debate team. That is a safe space. Now we have these womens working spaces where they can come together a network. Many shapes and sizes. I also see the value so that actually there was a coed opportunity for women to learn alongside men and there is a lot of research that says that gender equality is a good thing. And i talk about that in my book. Im really interested in your book. I use to run a National Advocacy organization for survivors of sexual assault. But then was so wet is striking to me about my time in rwanda the role that justice played to heal from the genocide particularly women and the capacity for forgiveness. Thats a conversation happening a lot more in the United States. Talk about law and order and majority of survivors say they dont feel that is working for them and people are working on looking for other options. Do you have any thoughts for the Restorative Justice process what that is for women and healing in particular . Actually the founder for women for Women International wrote an interesting article about what we can learn from rolando or south africa or other countries where they have use the Restorative Justice process to bring society back together again. So what comes after metoo . You will not lock them all up. And even if you did, what next . So what could Restorative Justice look like in this context . But then at least be able to talk about their story and even with the harvey weinstein. Very few women would get their day in court and everybody else was on the outside saying i want to tell my story. Even if its not in court and there is no and after that so the ability to share your story has huge value. Good to see you. My question is in those societies that are pulling their act together. How does that relate to the mail counterpart . So any insight in the kind of family that deals from a study standpoint . And how do you deal with stronger people like your mom. Left laugh it is interesting. What we do know that they are actually reinvesting in their own families. That 81 percent for healthcare to other family members. But in terms of future marriage they change after they come to a program like ours. Men think i am a little intimidating and then to say then you cant put the genie back in the box its a good thing but in terms of my son the my job was working with women all day then three sons. That was my life and a running family joke. But for me it was important to show my sons the idea of a woman in the world doing good work. As a role model, i really wanted them to be good men and good global citizens. I have to say all three are exceptional. [applause] i am the guy left behind in washington dc while my wife is out. Now she is working on gender equality. She started in the program that is most amazing. And those who are getting a College Education and for those of entrepreneurship and really 20 years later the women that are out there still doing Amazing Things and not going anywhere. So what i ask you what it is the interim between tragedy and Higher Education what takes women to the point they can get to that point and get to a higher level . With those micro enterprises . And those two micro finance something it is now generally agreed micro credit does not work anymore. And micro finance does work. It is the same thing. Is not a magic bullet but. It with the access to resources it doesnt have to look the same it doesnt have to be terse or rare Tertiary Education it could give women access and at the same time ability to earn money so what you are saying is they probably have savings education but they dont know how to be responsible to make Strategic Investments for them to invest their families i dont think its a magic bullet. Those women that we were talking about they were earning 30 cents a day. And these women are earning in the context but thats a difference between sending to school and virtually having nothing. And that means you are electrifying your house and all of your kids are in school in terms of health education. So on any level anyway you want to start talk step by step brick by brick that is where you go. There is a picture in the book of a Woman Holding up her account and i have no much idea of the value of it but she has such pride how to organize and keep track how to reinvest in her business. Orld . Announcer washington journal continues. Host doug wead joins us on his book inside Trumps White House the real story of his presidency. You have been described as the only authorized biographer of president trump. What is it mean to be an authorized biographer . Isst i dont think that accurate. I hear it but it is not the authorized history. A biography would tell about his birth, and it doesnt do that. It is just the white house and his Election Campaign and the