On April 22, 2009, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the Global Philanthropy Forum that “the State Department is opening its doors to a new generation of public-private partnerships.” The launch of Secretary Clinton’s Global Partnership Initiative demonstrates how the Obama Administration is putting partnerships with the private sector, civil society and multilateral organizations at the heart of what Secretary Clinton refers to as “smart power.” This new foreign policy approach seeks to go beyond “soft power” and “hard power” by partnering with non-governmental entities to achieve foreign affairs goals, while integrating the “three D’s” of diplomacy, development and defense throughout the government.

As the Secretary of State recently stated at the Council on Foreign Relations, “we will lead by inducing greater cooperation among a greater number of actors and reducing competition, tilting the balance away from a multi-polar world and toward a multi-partner world.” This new foreign policy strategy responds to an array of interconnected trends that are continuing to redefine international affairs. In recent years, the world has witnessed a host of transnational challenges: 9/11 and the rise of non-state actors, global pandemics, economic crises, climate change and a world that has grown closer and yet even more dangerous. New opportunities have also emerged as a result of paradigm shifts created by globalization. In the 1960s, nearly 70 percent of all money flowing from the United States to the developing world was official development assistance; today, over 80 percent is from private sources.

As a result, harnessing the wealth of capabilities offered by the private sector and civil society has become an opportunity, and a necessity, for the Department of State to achieve its goals. As Secretary Clinton stated in her call for a multi-partner world: “We are both witness to and makers of significant change. We cannot and should not be passive observers. We are determined to channel the currents of change toward a world free of violent extremism, nuclear weapons, global warming, poverty and abuses of human rights, and above all, a world in which more people in more places can live up to their God-given potential.” The Global Partnership Initiative has been created to engage networks of public, private and civic actors to address shared global problems by working together to build and sustain a more democratic, secure and prosperous world. This new office is being led by the Special Representative for Global Partnerships, Ambassador Elizabeth Bagley, and the Deputy Special Representative for Global Partnerships, Kris Balderston, who served as Secretary Clinton’s Deputy Chief of Staff when she represented the State of New York in the U.S. Senate.

“Encouraging collaborative governance and creating systems that empower a more dynamic, more responsive Foreign Service and Civil Service are vital to our success now and in the coming decades,” Secretary Clinton stated at the swearing in ceremony the Special Representative for Global Partnerships. “Ambassador Bagley’s capacity for outreach – for bringing people together in partnership – will be essential as we instill a new culture of inclusiveness and accessibility in our work with businesses, NGOs, foundations, faith communities and universities. With Ambassador Bagley as the champion of this effort, we will make public-private partnerships a core component of diplomacy.”

The Secretary of State’s vision for this new era of partnerships will have the entire State Department, through the Global Partnership Initiative, serving as:

-          A convener, bringing together people from across regions and sectors to work together on issues of common interest.

-          A catalyst, launching new projects, actively seeking new solutions, providing vital training and technical assistance to facilitate additional projects.

-          A collaborator, working closely with our partners to plan and implement projects – avoiding duplication, learning from each other, maximizing our impact by looking for best practices.

On 24 June 2009, the Special Representative for Global Partnerships addressed the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. In her speech, she discussed both the human costs and the business costs of these diseases: “From the business perspective, you know what it means when you invest your time and resources in hard-working, committed employees in Beijing, Nairobi, or Johannesburg, only to learn that your workforce is suffering the worst from these global health crises.”

 “You know what it means to have your products lose market share because whole populations are suffering from debilitating illnesses, when economic empowerment is an impossible goal because your employees are facing the ravaging effects of a disease like HIV/AIDS,” Special Representative Bagley explained. “Yet you also know that in many ways, the future market for your products is not Iowa, it is China. You will no longer grow your consumer base as much in Indiana as you will in Kenya, where untold numbers are suffering from these horrific diseases today but where they will be participating in a robust and vibrant economy if we are successful in our efforts to improve upon these tragic realities together.”

Health partnerships are just one area in which the U.S. Department of State is already engaged with the private sector. For example, the GSM Association Development Fund, Accenture Development Partners, Motorola, MTN and Voxiva have joined in a cutting-edge $10 million public-private partnership with the President’s Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) to leverage technology to connect health systems in ten PEPFAR-supported countries by 2010. This program, Phones-For-Health, supports treatment for two million HIV-infected people, prevention of seven million new infections and care for ten million people infected and affected by HIV/AIDS through an integrated set of standard information solutions – and it does so by leveraging private and public resources and technology around mutual public and private interests.

Phones-for-Health was created based on the fact that in the developing world, fixed-line Internet connections are rare and paper forms are still the primary way of recording the spread of infectious disease; at the same time, more than 60 percent of the population now lives in areas with mobile phone coverage and the GSM Association Development Fund expects that figure to rise to 85 percent by 2010. This makes it feasible to use mobile phones to relay information directly to health authorities’ computer systems, enabling rapid interventions such as distribution of medication and education programs for those at risk.

Here is how this public-private partnership works:

-          The mobile phone system allows health workers to report data from the field using their mobile phones, as well as PCs and PDAs.

-          Once entered, the data is mapped and analyzed by the system and made immediately available to health authorities at multiple levels via the web.

-          The system also supports SMS (text messaging) alerting and notification and tools for communication and coordination with field staff.

Innovative partnerships like these can make for better development, diplomacy and defense – not to mention good business. And while the U.S. Department of State is already engaged in efforts like these across the full range of its activities, the United States will be engaging with new partners on these issues in an increasingly comprehensive way – from local community partners like microfinance entrepreneurs to large-scale multinational institutions, businesses and NGOs alike – through the U.S. Department of State’s Global Partnership Initiative.

In her swearing in remarks, the Special Representative for Global Partnerships summed up the U.S. government’s vision for partnerships with the following words: “In the same way that Secretary Clinton has often said that ‘it takes a village to raise a child,’ we are now realizing that we must apply a similar approach worldwide. It takes a shared, global response to meet the shared, global challenges we face. This is the truth taught to us in an old South African principle, ubuntu, meaning ‘A person is a person through other persons.’ As Archbishop Desmond Tutu describes this perspective, ubuntu ‘is not, “I think therefore I am.” It says rather: “I am a human because I belong. I participate. I share.”’ In essence, I am because you are. We are truly all in this together and we will only succeed by building mutually beneficial partnerships among the public sector, civil society and the private sector. This is Ubuntu Diplomacy: where all sectors belong as partners, where we all participate as stakeholders, and where we all succeed together, not incrementally but exponentially.”

Through the Global Partnership Initiative, the U.S. Department of State is pursuing new partnerships with non-governmental leaders in private businesses, NGOs, foundations, universities, faith-based groups, and Diaspora communities, as well as multilateral entities and other international bodies.

To learn more about the Global Partnership Initiative, visit: www.state.gov/partnerships/. To contact the author, please e-mail LalkaRT@state.gov.