Speakers Leymah Gbowee: Peace activist, Nobelist
Leymah Gbowee is a peace activist in Liberia. She led a women's movement that was pivotal in ending the Second Liberian Civil War in 2003, and now speaks on behalf of women and girls around the world.
Why you should listen to her:
Liberia's second civil war, 1999-2003, brought an unimaginable level of violence to a country still recovering from its first civil war (1989-96). And much of that violence was directed at women: Systematic rape and brutality used women's bodies as fields for war.
Leymah Gbowee, who'd become a social worker during the first war, helped organize an interreligious coalition of Christian and Muslim women called the Women of Liberia Mass Action for Peace movement. Dressed in white, these thousands of women staged pray-ins and nonviolent protests demanding reconciliation and the resuscitation of high-level peace talks. The pressure pushed Charles Taylor into exile, and smoothed the path for the election of Africa’s first female head of state, Leymah's fellow 2011 Nobel Peace laureate Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.
Gbowee is the co-founder of the Women Peace and Security Network Africa (WIPSEN-Africa) to promote cross-national peace-building efforts.
Quotes by Leymah Gbowee
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“‘I wish for a better life. I wish for food for my children. I wish that sexual abuse and exploitation in schools would stop.’ This is the dream of the African girl.”
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“We go into rural communities, and all we do — like has been done in this room [at TED] — is create the space. When these girls sit … you unlock great leaders.”
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“I'm now on a journey to fulfill the wish, in my tiny capacity, of little African girls.”
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Leymah Gbowee: Unlock the intelligence, passion, greatne ...
- 14:39 Posted: Mar 2012
Leymah Gbowee on the Web
Related Speakers
Conferences
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- TED2012