Teach a Woman to Fish…and She Might Run for Office,
if Barbara Ferris Has Anything to Do With It
Barbara Ferris grew up on the west side of Cleveland, where
she says her first exposure to other cultures came from "going
to everybody's church festivals."
Since then she's experienced many cultures firsthand, first
as a legislative aide, then with the Peace Corps, and then
as founder and president of the International Women's Democracy
Center in Washington, D.C. Ferris started the organization
to help women worldwide increase their participation in government.
"Today's women are finding innovative ways to make a
living while making a difference in the world," said
New York congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy, an IWDC mentor. "Barbara
Ferris is the perfect example."
After graduating from Ohio State in 1975, Ferris worked as
an aide in Ohio congresswoman Mary Rose Oakar's office, where
she was a member of a fact finding mission to Syria, Lebanon,
and Israel.
Ferris' service in Morocco as a Peace Corps volunteer in
the early 1980s was the transforming experience that eventually
led to the founding of the IWDC. After earning a master's
degree in public administration from the American University,
Ferris became director of Women in Development for the Peace
Corps. Traveling the world, she discovered that women wanted
the tools and skills that could help them run for office,
along with opportunities to learn about policy development
and how to become leaders and decision makers.
Ferris left the Peace Corps after five years and spent the
next year doing research, she said, "to see who was training
women in these technical skills" and what resources existed.
When she found there weren't many, the IWDC was born.
Maureen Orth, special correspondent for Vanity Fair and an
IWDC board member, said Ferris is one of those "people
who take charge, get it done, and deliver the goods."
A former Peace Corps volunteer herself, Orth said Ferris "was
really able to see firsthand all the places where women are
the breadwinners, but have no rights."
Ferris' first opportunity to gauge if she was on the right
track came in 1995 in Beijing at the U.N.'s Fourth World Conference
on Women. She was thrilled when several hundred people from
39 countries jammed into a room for her workshop titled "How
to Make a Decision to Run."
Paula Slimak, director of marketing for the United Way in
Cleveland and a longtime friend, said Ferris "recognizes
the common denominators in the many women she's seen in her
travels: lionesslike mothering skills, a mastery of money
management, expertise in finding peaceful alternatives, and
an innate capability to make lives better for their families.
Then she figures out a way to teach them the skills to ensure
their success."
IWDC focuses on training, not issues. "We don't work
with political parties and only partner with nongovernmental
organizations," Ferris explained. "Our purpose is
to help build the capacities of our partners. It's about teaching
people to fish."
IWDC is run with a staff of five and low overhead. Most funding
is directed to the partner organizations, which hire IWDC
to do the specified training. I never presume I know what
anybody needs," Ferris said. "Our partners do the
needs assessment, and we figure out where realistically women
can run."
The organization's flagship program is the Community Advocate
Mentor Program, developed in partnership with Ulster Peoples
College in Belfast. The program brings some 20 women leaders
at a time from Northern Ireland to Washington for two weeks
of training in the lobbying process.
As Orth noted, "It's an unprecedented coming together
of Protestants and Catholics." Participants get an overview
of the American system of government and attend workshops
such as "How to Prepare for Floor Debate" and "How
to Use Technology to Lobby."
IWDC recruited a diverse group of lobbyists from corporations,
unions, and trade associations, as well as members of Congress
from both sides of the aisle, who are happy to show the Irish
women how they do their jobs. "I am thrilled to be a
part of Barbara's vision," said McCarthy, who finished
her second session as a mentor in March. "As an Irish
American, I love meeting and working with the women of Northern
Ireland while they learn how to influence their government."
Ferris said she is inspired by "the women who are fighting
for democracy, whose lives are 25 to 100 times more difficult
than ours are in America, and who suffer at the hands of corrupt
leaders, yet somehow find the courage to forge ahead."
In particular, she noted the work of Maria Elena Moyano, a
Peruvian activist who was assassinated by the Communist Party
for "trying to ensure that every child got one cup of
milk a day."
Ferris' next project hits closer to home. IWDC expects to
open a Cleveland branch this fall to concentrate on helping
young American women learn how to run for office, "I
was certain that both political parties were training young
women here, but they're not," said Ferris.
An article about Ferris and the latest IWDC project appeared
in Cleveland's Plain Dealer in January. She was unprepared
for the response. "We've been inundated by more than
100 calls and e mails from longtime political activists to
20 year olds to union organizers to corporate types so I guess
it hit a nerve," she said.
Ferris also is focused on increasing the organization's donor
base. "Since Sept. 11, requests for our services are
up by 80 percent," she said.
Developing nations are "desperate for strong, honest,
incorruptible leadership that focuses on nation building,
longterm economic security, and sustainable peace," said
Ferris. One way of getting there is to provide women with
the means to bring about changes in leadership especially,"
Ferris added, "since what we've done for the last 2,000
years doesn't seem to have been working."
-- Lori Robishaw, Ohio State Alumni Magazine, May
2002
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