November 1, 2024 • 24 mins
Learn more about the The Carter Center through the lens of CEO Paige Alexander. President Jimmy Carter and Rosalynn Carter established The Carter Center in 1982. The Center seeks to prevent and resolve conflicts, enhance freedom and democracy, and improve health.
In this episode, Bishop Wright has a conversation with Paige about the orgs transformative journey. They discuss faith, leadership, and The Carter's legacy. Paige also shares her own personal story of growing up in a politically active home and how that led her to nonprofit work. Listen in for the full conversation.
Paige Alexander is the CEO of The Carter Center, a nonprofit founded by Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter to promote global peace and health. She joined in 2020, guiding the organization through the COVID-19 pandemic and enhancing core programs while introducing new initiatives on mental health, political polarization, and climate change.
With over 20 years in global development, Alexander previously held senior roles at USAID, focusing on post-conflict reconstruction and leading the MENA Bureau. She has also worked with IREX and EUCORD. A recognized thought leader, she has published essays in major outlets and delivered a TEDWomen talk on human rights. Alexander serves on several boards dedicated to human rights and international development.
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Episode Transcript
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Paige Alexander (00:00):
President Carter has a wonderful statement
that he makes that he says I dowhatever I can, wherever I can,
whenever I can, for as long asI can, with whatever I have to
try to make a difference, and Ithink that's a motto that people
should live by.
What keeps me going is the factthat this is the right thing to
(00:20):
do at the right time,regardless of it's you know one
side or the other, but you haveto have the facts to do it.
Bishop Wright (00:40):
Good morning everyone.
This is For People with BishopRob Wright, and today's special
guest extra special guest isPaige Alexander, ceo, chief
Executive Officer of the CarterCenter since 2020.
Paige welcome.
Paige Alexander (00:56):
Thank you, it's a pleasure to be here.
I'm looking forward to ourconversation.
Bishop Wright (01:01):
Awfully glad to have you here.
We were together not long agowith a bunch of faith leaders
from across lots of differentdenominations and faiths, to
both to talk about invitingpeople to vote, to making their
voices known, but also about notbeing disagreeable, even as we
(01:24):
have legitimate disagreements.
So a great extension of thework of the Carter Center.
You've got a distinguishedhistory in this kind of
wonderful work, and so tell us alittle bit about what prepares
you to do this work.
Paige Alexander (01:42):
Well, you know, I grew up in Atlanta and I grew
up in a very politically andcivic active family Miles and
Elaine Alexander.
My parents moved here in thelate 50s and my mom came from
Boston and was sort of anindependent and one of the
things they wanted to see whenthey moved to the New South was
(02:03):
the changes that they hoped for,and so they got very active in
political campaigns.
My mom ran Maynard Jackson'scampaign, my dad was an all-case
lawyer.
They just got very active and Igrew up with that.
I grew up with John Lewis at mytable and Andy Young, and these
were my parents' friends, andso it's not a surprise that this
(02:26):
draw back to Atlanta after 35years of working around the
world in public service andnonprofit brought me back to
Atlanta to head up the CarterCenter.
It just seemed like a perfectbookend to my career.
Bishop Wright (02:41):
Sure.
So we know Jimmy Carter, welove Jimmy Carter and Rosalind
Carter.
I mean my gosh from the WhiteHouse to pictures with a hammer
in overalls, you know, showingus about how to live a life of
moral leadership Just had his100th birthday.
(03:05):
I think people know that andwe're grateful for his example.
And though he's lived a goodlong life, we know that at some
point he will go.
We won't have him for a lotlonger and that makes us sad and
yet it leaves behind anincredible legacy.
I wonder for people listening,refresh for us.
(03:29):
What is the mission of theCarter Center?
What gets you up every day?
Paige Alexander (03:37):
What are you delivering?
Sure?
Well, when President andRosalind Carter started the
Carter Center in 1982, it wasbecause they had seen the world
and they wanted to continueparticipating in it, and some of
what they saw at the WhiteHouse was when they went to the
end of the road in Africa orAsia.
They saw people who were verysimilar to the people that they
(03:59):
grew up with in a town of 600people in Plains, georgia.
It was the same village, andwhat they started seeing were
that people were lacking basichuman rights the ability to vote
, and then it became a healthissue.
They saw people with guineaworm, with blinding eye diseases
, and so the Carter Center wasfounded as a place that could be
(04:22):
like Camp David and bringpeople together to resolve
conflict, to talk about humanrights, to work on democracy.
But health also became a basichuman right, and so now our two
North Stars are global healthand ending neglected tropical
diseases.
As President Carter says, thereare no neglected diseases,
there are only neglected peopleand human rights and conflict
(04:45):
resolution.
And so we do that for 40 yearsabroad.
We've always workedinternationally.
Then, when I came in in 2020,I'd been living in Europe, and
when I landed here on June 1st2020, we were in the middle of a
global pandemic.
It was the weekend after themurder of George Floyd, and we
had a president of the UnitedStates who was tear gassing
(05:07):
Lafayette Square on TV when Igot to my parents' house and I
thought how can we do this workabroad if we're not willing to
look in our own backyard?
And that's now led to a set ofdomestic programs, democracy
programs so when we're inVenezuela doing election
monitoring, we're now in FultonCounty doing election monitoring
(05:27):
, and the conflict resolutionwork we do in Sudan and Mali, we
now do in Arizona and NorthCarolina, and so it's been this
growth because President Carterwanted to be flexible.
He wanted to go where the needwas, and he made a lot of
principled but unpopulardecisions during his term as
(05:48):
president, and so sometimes weget involved in places that are
questionable but nobody else isworking in them, and we want to
bring that type of conversationto the table.
Bishop Wright (06:01):
You know, I love this sentence the Carter Center,
as it is transitioned from anorganization that was founder
led to one that is guided by itsfounders principles, right, so
so if you had to distill thosejust sort of concisely, what are
the?
What are the foundingprinciples here?
And founders principles?
Paige Alexander (06:21):
Well, the tagline that we have which I
think is really sums it upnicely we wage peace, we fight
disease and we build hope.
And so those three elements ofwhat the founders wanted to what
(06:42):
we're doing as we grow, youknow, those are the walls that
we wage peace, fight disease andbuild hope.
And so we don't go off and doeducation programs, we don't do
humanitarian you know programs.
We work in the areas that weknow how to work on with the
people that we've been workingwith for decades now.
Bishop Wright (07:04):
So let me have you put your CEO hat on and sort
of administrative hat on.
So how many boots on the grounddo we have at the Carter Center
?
What's the annual budget?
How's all that?
Look, take us down to the room.
Paige Alexander (07:16):
Sure Down to the nuts and bolts.
So we have almost 300 staffhere in Atlanta and we have
3,500 staff overseas.
So those are boots on theground.
They are villagers at the endof the road.
That are Guinea wormambassadors that work with the
village leaders, the villageelders, to make sure that the
(07:40):
educational piece of fortrachoma, blinding eye disease,
for example, we have somethingcalled the safe strategy, that
we do surgery, we giveantibiotics, we have facial
cleanliness and we haveenvironmental concerns like
having the latrine built and sothose type of programs that we
(08:00):
run, all to make sure people donot end up with a blinding eye
disease.
It takes a lot of people and99.99% of them are non-American
and are not third countrynationals.
They are all local.
So when COVID shut manynonprofits down, it didn't shut
us down because everybody wasalready in the field, they were
(08:21):
living in their villages and sothat was a big change.
Our budget is about $180million a year.
That does not include thewonderful gifts that we get from
Merck and Pfizer for some ofthese antibiotics that are
needed for river blindness,lymphatic filariasis and
(08:42):
trachoma, and that's another 300million a year.
But those are gifted and we'revery appreciative to the
public-private partnership wehave with the pharmaceutical
companies for those.
Bishop Wright (08:55):
Absolutely.
I mean that's formidable.
What you've outlined isformidable.
I mean that's getting the workdone.
And yet one piece of work ismaking peace or trying to
facilitate peace, trying to bepeace workers.
So talk a little bit about that.
What's the peace work?
(09:15):
Particularly in our own countryhere, because I imagine lots of
countries around the world arepointing to us right now and
saying, well, you're talking agood game abroad, but your
nation is divided, volatile inmany ways in terms of the
inflammatory conversation andcomments that we're having back
(09:36):
and forth in this politicallydivided season.
So tell me about the peace work.
Paige Alexander (09:41):
Well, so President Carter and the Carter
Center has always looked topursue peace rather than issuing
a moral judgment.
So when we're havingconversations in Sudan, trying
to broker an agreement to allowhealth workers to get into an
endemic area, sitting down withwarlords on both sides, is
(10:05):
important that we've not calledone group of terrorists because
they're not going to sit downwith us.
So sometimes you have to haveconversations with difficult
players, but it is part of ourraison d'etre is to get people
to the table together to havethe conversations.
So, doing that overseas is thesame thing as dealing with the
(10:26):
polarization we have here now inthe US.
Bringing people togetherbecause we have more in common
than we realize and finding thatcommonality will eventually get
us to conversations that canhopefully open the door that we
can respect each other in waysthat we've always been able to
(10:48):
have political differences.
It's just gotten so fraught nowthat how do you find that
commonality, and I think that'swhat we are doing here in the
States now?
Bishop Wright (11:01):
Even if the challenges are a bit different.
At least they seem moreinflamed than any time that I
can remember in my 60 years.
Are there new tactics thatyou're employing?
Are there new ways in, or arewe just staying steady with the
things we know that work?
Paige Alexander (11:20):
Well, I think it's become very difficult with
social media because people endup in their own echo chambers
and what attracts people is themost exciting thing that they
see on social media and thenthat goes viral.
Important part of what we try todo we do this overseas with
(11:48):
election integrity.
People walk into elections hey,it's going to be stolen.
I know it's going to be stolen,but if you have an international
observer in there who says weobserved X number of polls, y
number of places and we didn'tfind any difficulty, or you do a
hand recount after, these arethings that should build on the
(12:10):
integrity of an election, and soa lot of those issues in
particular are being done herein Georgia as we speak with.
You know, one of the things thatwas put into place in 2020 was
a risk-limiting audit to allow ahand recount and invite people
in, invite partisan observers in, invite the public in to watch
(12:32):
the ballots be counted again,and it's supposed to give people
the sense of security that,okay, the election happened,
they're not little men in themachine changing the vote and
there is going to be a handrecount, and so announcing the
hand recount before the electionwas very important in 2020.
And now it's written intoGeorgia law and a lot of states
(12:54):
do this, and I think that it'shard to disprove a negative is
the biggest problem we'refinding.
So the only way to fight thatis by truth and visuals of
reality, and so I think that'sthe biggest key that we have now
.
Social media is a negative, butit can be a positive if it is
(13:15):
putting out accurate information.
(13:46):
people say is that we live in abeyond fact world now, and
because the echo chambers havebecome so airtight, um, there's
a real resistance to any newfactoids, um, and it really
makes, uh, people like your workreally, really difficult.
So so here's the question Ilove to ask when I meet people
like you and I'm fortunateenough to meet people like you,
so you've got big work and along road right to make progress
(14:10):
.
So how do you keep yourselfgoing?
Because what happens to somepeople when these are the giants
that they choose to fight, soto speak you know inequity in
health, you know peacemaking inthe world is that they succumb
to despair or cynicism.
(14:31):
And you know my experience ofyou are not those two things
right?
I mean, folks can't see youright now, but you've got a
bright smile on an early morning.
You seem like you're ready togo, and that's been my
experience of you when I was atthe Carter Center.
So how are you sustainingyourself with this difficult
(14:53):
work?
Well, I certainly picked a field that
I'm not going to work myself outof a job in my lifetime.
But I'll tell you PresidentCarter has a wonderful statement
that he makes that he says I dowhatever I can wherever I can,
whenever I can, for as long as Ican, with whatever I have to
(15:14):
try to make a difference, and Ithink that's a motto that people
should live by.
I'm privileged to live in acountry that gives me all of
this freedom to have a job thatallows me to share my
experiences, and I realize thatevery day.
And so what keeps me going isthe fact that this is the right
(15:36):
thing to do at the right time,and making those decisions to be
involved is a decision.
I mean, I could bury my head inthe sand, anyone could bury
their head in the sand, anyonecould bury their head in the
sand, and during a politicalseason, sometimes that feels
like the right thing to do.
Yeah, sure, it's too much comingat you, but you know people
have to stay and I don't want touse, you know, words that
(15:58):
indicate negativity, but peoplehave to stay and fight.
You have to believe in whatyou're doing is going to make a
difference, regardless of it's.
You know one side or the other,but you have to have the facts
to do it, and so I feel likemaking sure people are
knowledgeable about what thefacts are and knowledgeable
(16:19):
about their ability to accesseverything from health to
education to a ballot box arepart of what I have and I've
been blessed to have, and it'swhat I want others in the world
to have.
Bishop Wright (16:32):
Yeah, listening to you, I'm reminded of a couple
of things I've been thinkingabout quite a bit lately, and
that is how to hold boldness andgentleness together, right?
And that aggression is not thesame thing as strength.
Paige Alexander (16:49):
Very, very true .
There's a nuance that peoplesometimes lose because we've
become very binary you pick oneside and you go with it, and if
it's aggressiveness, you go withit, as opposed to recognizing
there's a nuance there that it'sstrength to show, and part of
being strong is knowing whatsize weight you're picking up.
(17:10):
It's not just you know carryingyour message forward, it's
understanding and knowing whatthe message is.
Bishop Wright (17:17):
Jimmy Carter has been and is a pretty outspoken
Christian, someone for whomfaith has mattered an awful lot,
you know, impressivelycontinued to teach Bible study,
you know, for many, many yearsin his church church I think,
that he grew up in.
(17:38):
You know, what's interestingabout watching him and the work
of the Carter Center is that,even though it has this founding
DNA, so to speak, it findsitself alongside of lots of
kinds of people who believe inparticular ways or no way, in
particular, and so say a word ortwo about that, about how you
(18:11):
embody this kind of broad anddeep Christian faith in the work
of the center.
Paige Alexander (18:15):
Well, you know, president Carter was the most
religious president in mylifetime, certainly and he was
guided by faith but neverprojected that upon others.
And I think that that is one ofthe other guiding North Star
spaces, uh, spaces that I I tryto occupy.
And I'll be our firstconversation.
Well, our last face-to-faceconversation.
He said to me it was his 98thbirthday and he said, uh, you're
(18:38):
going to church.
I was down in Plains.
He said you're going to churchtoday, right, that's like you
remember, I'm Jewish, right?
And he goes, we're going tochurch today, right.
And I thought, wow, hishearing's really going.
So I said it again and he saidI said, you're going to church
today.
I was like, oh yes, I'm goingto church today.
I mean, he wanted me toappreciate Maranatha Baptist
(19:01):
Church the way he appreciated itand he wanted to make sure that
, you know, everybody has thisopportunity, which is why he
taught Sunday school and did thesermons for so long down there
and people would line up at sixo'clock in the morning to be
able to get in, because hiswords were valuable, regardless
of whether it wasJudeo-Christian, muslim.
It was a sense of a grounding,guiding light for him.
(19:26):
And again, didn't project it offinto other people.
He just wanted people to feelgrounded in some faith, and so
that's where we are.
We're not a faith-basedorganization, but we don't run
away from those conversationswith religious leaders.
We want and need to have them,because in many cases they do
run a village, sometimes theyrun an entire government, and
(19:50):
those are, you know, people offaith, are people of faith, and
it doesn't matter what faith.
Bishop Wright (19:56):
I work with Jonathan Reckford, who is the
executive director of Habitatfor Humanity International, as
you well know, and of course itwas President Carter who really
helped us to get to know Habitatin really wonderful ways.
And at Habitat's founding,jonathan tells me they have this
wonderful phrase that they useto try to articulate what you
(20:18):
just have articulated, and thatis our Christian faith is our
center, but it's not our border.
Faith is our center but it'snot our border.
And for me that is the measureof a deep and abiding faith,
whether it's Muslim or Jewish orChristian or Baha'i or Sikh or
whatever it is.
And that is does your life withthe divine.
(20:45):
Surprised that a man and a wifewe shouldn't forget Rosalyn and
her significant contribution toall of it, to everything that
kind of a faith where it may betheir personal center, but it's
not a border and it doesn'tblock relationships.
In fact it enhances it.
And we saw that on the ground.
(21:07):
They talk about the theology ofthe hammer at Habitat for
Humanity, which is how about webuild something together and
then let's have a chat.
I think that's the way to go.
Paige Alexander (21:21):
And that's absolutely the way to go.
I mean the Jewish faith.
We have something called TikkunOlam, which is repair the world
, and every faith has that, asyou know, has something like
that as a guiding principle, andwith Habitat, the concept that
people get together to build ahouse for somebody else.
That is a lot of what we do inour conflict resolution programs
(21:42):
at the Carter Center.
We bring people together tohave conversations that are not
necessarily political.
They are something about thecommunity.
I mean, you don't need someonefrom Atlanta trying to tell
someone in rural North Carolinaabout elections.
You need the people in ruralNorth Carolina to talk about
what they care about in theircommunity, why elections are
(22:04):
important, and then, are theseelections being run properly?
Like?
You get to that conversation bycommunity discussion and by
sitting with your neighbor, notby imposing things, and so I do
think that that is wherePresident and Rosalind Carter
came from was.
They weren't going to impose it, but they made it clear where
(22:24):
the values were.
Bishop Wright (22:26):
Yeah, I love it.
I love it.
Well, as we sort of finish uphere, I wonder what you want to
tell the audience about theCarter Center.
I mean, how can they getinvolved?
How could they make donations?
I mean, I was just inMinneapolis where Habitat built
(22:47):
148 homes on a restored golfcourse.
It was a golf course that hadfallen into disrepair and was
sold to Habitat and they put up140, some odd homes in honor of
President Carter's 100thbirthday.
So, in closing, what do peopleneed to know?
How can they get involved?
(23:08):
How can they contribute?
Paige Alexander (23:11):
You know, going into our website, the
cartercenterorg, you can see thevarious pieces of work that we
do, and there's usually not beenan opportunity for people to
get involved unless they wantedto go overseas and observe an
election.
Now we have the opportunity thatwe're doing.
We are doing a lot in the US,but our goal is still to help
(23:38):
the people at the end of theroad, the most vulnerable people
, working where others don'twork and not duplicating the
efforts of others.
And so a lot of our work comesbecause we can rely on our field
offices and those boots on theground, as you mentioned, to
carry out that work.
And so, you know, a donationgoes so much further because
it's not used to pay Atlantaoverhead, it's used to pay the
(24:00):
people in the field.
And so, if anyone has questions, there's an active area on the
website that people can go toand ask questions about how to
get involved.
But, honestly, it's ourpartners on the ground, it's the
partners of the ministries ofhealth in all of these countries
who need that kind of help andwho are looking for that
(24:24):
technical assistance that webring, and those are our real
partners and those are the oneswho we're supporting, paige,
thank you, and those are ourreal partners and those are the
ones who we're supporting.
Bishop Wright (24:30):
Paige, thank you, and thank you for pledging
yourself to this good work andto being a peacemaker.
Holy Scripture says beautifulare the feet of those who
proclaim the gospel of peace,and so we thank God for you and
for the Carter Center.
Thanks again.
Paige Alexander (24:48):
Thanks, bishop, appreciate being here to talk
about it.
President Carter has a wonderful statement
that he makes that he says I dowhatever I can, wherever I can,
whenever I can, for as long asI can, with whatever I have to
try to make a difference, and Ithink that's a motto that people
should live by.
What keeps me going is the factthat this is the right thing to
(00:20):
do at the right time,regardless of it's you know one
side or the other, but you haveto have the facts to do it.
Bishop Wright (00:40):
Good morning everyone.
This is For People with BishopRob Wright, and today's special
guest extra special guest isPaige Alexander, ceo, chief
Executive Officer of the CarterCenter since 2020.
Paige welcome.
Paige Alexander (00:56):
Thank you, it's a pleasure to be here.
I'm looking forward to ourconversation.
Bishop Wright (01:01):
Awfully glad to have you here.
We were together not long agowith a bunch of faith leaders
from across lots of differentdenominations and faiths, to
both to talk about invitingpeople to vote, to making their
voices known, but also about notbeing disagreeable, even as we
(01:24):
have legitimate disagreements.
So a great extension of thework of the Carter Center.
You've got a distinguishedhistory in this kind of
wonderful work, and so tell us alittle bit about what prepares
you to do this work.
Paige Alexander (01:42):
Well, you know, I grew up in Atlanta and I grew
up in a very politically andcivic active family Miles and
Elaine Alexander.
My parents moved here in thelate 50s and my mom came from
Boston and was sort of anindependent and one of the
things they wanted to see whenthey moved to the New South was
(02:03):
the changes that they hoped for,and so they got very active in
political campaigns.
My mom ran Maynard Jackson'scampaign, my dad was an all-case
lawyer.
They just got very active and Igrew up with that.
I grew up with John Lewis at mytable and Andy Young, and these
were my parents' friends, andso it's not a surprise that this
(02:26):
draw back to Atlanta after 35years of working around the
world in public service andnonprofit brought me back to
Atlanta to head up the CarterCenter.
It just seemed like a perfectbookend to my career.
Bishop Wright (02:41):
Sure.
So we know Jimmy Carter, welove Jimmy Carter and Rosalind
Carter.
I mean my gosh from the WhiteHouse to pictures with a hammer
in overalls, you know, showingus about how to live a life of
moral leadership Just had his100th birthday.
(03:05):
I think people know that andwe're grateful for his example.
And though he's lived a goodlong life, we know that at some
point he will go.
We won't have him for a lotlonger and that makes us sad and
yet it leaves behind anincredible legacy.
I wonder for people listening,refresh for us.
(03:29):
What is the mission of theCarter Center?
What gets you up every day?
Paige Alexander (03:37):
What are you delivering?
Sure?
Well, when President andRosalind Carter started the
Carter Center in 1982, it wasbecause they had seen the world
and they wanted to continueparticipating in it, and some of
what they saw at the WhiteHouse was when they went to the
end of the road in Africa orAsia.
They saw people who were verysimilar to the people that they
(03:59):
grew up with in a town of 600people in Plains, georgia.
It was the same village, andwhat they started seeing were
that people were lacking basichuman rights the ability to vote
, and then it became a healthissue.
They saw people with guineaworm, with blinding eye diseases
, and so the Carter Center wasfounded as a place that could be
(04:22):
like Camp David and bringpeople together to resolve
conflict, to talk about humanrights, to work on democracy.
But health also became a basichuman right, and so now our two
North Stars are global healthand ending neglected tropical
diseases.
As President Carter says, thereare no neglected diseases,
there are only neglected peopleand human rights and conflict
(04:45):
resolution.
And so we do that for 40 yearsabroad.
We've always workedinternationally.
Then, when I came in in 2020,I'd been living in Europe, and
when I landed here on June 1st2020, we were in the middle of a
global pandemic.
It was the weekend after themurder of George Floyd, and we
had a president of the UnitedStates who was tear gassing
(05:07):
Lafayette Square on TV when Igot to my parents' house and I
thought how can we do this workabroad if we're not willing to
look in our own backyard?
And that's now led to a set ofdomestic programs, democracy
programs so when we're inVenezuela doing election
monitoring, we're now in FultonCounty doing election monitoring
(05:27):
, and the conflict resolutionwork we do in Sudan and Mali, we
now do in Arizona and NorthCarolina, and so it's been this
growth because President Carterwanted to be flexible.
He wanted to go where the needwas, and he made a lot of
principled but unpopulardecisions during his term as
(05:48):
president, and so sometimes weget involved in places that are
questionable but nobody else isworking in them, and we want to
bring that type of conversationto the table.
Bishop Wright (06:01):
You know, I love this sentence the Carter Center,
as it is transitioned from anorganization that was founder
led to one that is guided by itsfounders principles, right, so
so if you had to distill thosejust sort of concisely, what are
the?
What are the foundingprinciples here?
And founders principles?
Paige Alexander (06:21):
Well, the tagline that we have which I
think is really sums it upnicely we wage peace, we fight
disease and we build hope.
And so those three elements ofwhat the founders wanted to what
(06:42):
we're doing as we grow, youknow, those are the walls that
we wage peace, fight disease andbuild hope.
And so we don't go off and doeducation programs, we don't do
humanitarian you know programs.
We work in the areas that weknow how to work on with the
people that we've been workingwith for decades now.
Bishop Wright (07:04):
So let me have you put your CEO hat on and sort
of administrative hat on.
So how many boots on the grounddo we have at the Carter Center
?
What's the annual budget?
How's all that?
Look, take us down to the room.
Paige Alexander (07:16):
Sure Down to the nuts and bolts.
So we have almost 300 staffhere in Atlanta and we have
3,500 staff overseas.
So those are boots on theground.
They are villagers at the endof the road.
That are Guinea wormambassadors that work with the
village leaders, the villageelders, to make sure that the
(07:40):
educational piece of fortrachoma, blinding eye disease,
for example, we have somethingcalled the safe strategy, that
we do surgery, we giveantibiotics, we have facial
cleanliness and we haveenvironmental concerns like
having the latrine built and sothose type of programs that we
(08:00):
run, all to make sure people donot end up with a blinding eye
disease.
It takes a lot of people and99.99% of them are non-American
and are not third countrynationals.
They are all local.
So when COVID shut manynonprofits down, it didn't shut
us down because everybody wasalready in the field, they were
(08:21):
living in their villages and sothat was a big change.
Our budget is about $180million a year.
That does not include thewonderful gifts that we get from
Merck and Pfizer for some ofthese antibiotics that are
needed for river blindness,lymphatic filariasis and
(08:42):
trachoma, and that's another 300million a year.
But those are gifted and we'revery appreciative to the
public-private partnership wehave with the pharmaceutical
companies for those.
Bishop Wright (08:55):
Absolutely.
I mean that's formidable.
What you've outlined isformidable.
I mean that's getting the workdone.
And yet one piece of work ismaking peace or trying to
facilitate peace, trying to bepeace workers.
So talk a little bit about that.
What's the peace work?
(09:15):
Particularly in our own countryhere, because I imagine lots of
countries around the world arepointing to us right now and
saying, well, you're talking agood game abroad, but your
nation is divided, volatile inmany ways in terms of the
inflammatory conversation andcomments that we're having back
(09:36):
and forth in this politicallydivided season.
So tell me about the peace work.
Paige Alexander (09:41):
Well, so President Carter and the Carter
Center has always looked topursue peace rather than issuing
a moral judgment.
So when we're havingconversations in Sudan, trying
to broker an agreement to allowhealth workers to get into an
endemic area, sitting down withwarlords on both sides, is
(10:05):
important that we've not calledone group of terrorists because
they're not going to sit downwith us.
So sometimes you have to haveconversations with difficult
players, but it is part of ourraison d'etre is to get people
to the table together to havethe conversations.
So, doing that overseas is thesame thing as dealing with the
(10:26):
polarization we have here now inthe US.
Bringing people togetherbecause we have more in common
than we realize and finding thatcommonality will eventually get
us to conversations that canhopefully open the door that we
can respect each other in waysthat we've always been able to
(10:48):
have political differences.
It's just gotten so fraught nowthat how do you find that
commonality, and I think that'swhat we are doing here in the
States now?
Bishop Wright (11:01):
Even if the challenges are a bit different.
At least they seem moreinflamed than any time that I
can remember in my 60 years.
Are there new tactics thatyou're employing?
Are there new ways in, or arewe just staying steady with the
things we know that work?
Paige Alexander (11:20):
Well, I think it's become very difficult with
social media because people endup in their own echo chambers
and what attracts people is themost exciting thing that they
see on social media and thenthat goes viral.
Important part of what we try todo we do this overseas with
(11:48):
election integrity.
People walk into elections hey,it's going to be stolen.
I know it's going to be stolen,but if you have an international
observer in there who says weobserved X number of polls, y
number of places and we didn'tfind any difficulty, or you do a
hand recount after, these arethings that should build on the
(12:10):
integrity of an election, and soa lot of those issues in
particular are being done herein Georgia as we speak with.
You know, one of the things thatwas put into place in 2020 was
a risk-limiting audit to allow ahand recount and invite people
in, invite partisan observers in, invite the public in to watch
(12:32):
the ballots be counted again,and it's supposed to give people
the sense of security that,okay, the election happened,
they're not little men in themachine changing the vote and
there is going to be a handrecount, and so announcing the
hand recount before the electionwas very important in 2020.
And now it's written intoGeorgia law and a lot of states
(12:54):
do this, and I think that it'shard to disprove a negative is
the biggest problem we'refinding.
So the only way to fight thatis by truth and visuals of
reality, and so I think that'sthe biggest key that we have now
.
Social media is a negative, butit can be a positive if it is
(13:15):
putting out accurate information.
(13:46):
people say is that we live in abeyond fact world now, and
because the echo chambers havebecome so airtight, um, there's
a real resistance to any newfactoids, um, and it really
makes, uh, people like your workreally, really difficult.
So so here's the question Ilove to ask when I meet people
like you and I'm fortunateenough to meet people like you,
so you've got big work and along road right to make progress
(14:10):
.
So how do you keep yourselfgoing?
Because what happens to somepeople when these are the giants
that they choose to fight, soto speak you know inequity in
health, you know peacemaking inthe world is that they succumb
to despair or cynicism.
(14:31):
And you know my experience ofyou are not those two things
right?
I mean, folks can't see youright now, but you've got a
bright smile on an early morning.
You seem like you're ready togo, and that's been my
experience of you when I was atthe Carter Center.
So how are you sustainingyourself with this difficult
(14:53):
work?
Well, I certainly picked a field that
I'm not going to work myself outof a job in my lifetime.
But I'll tell you PresidentCarter has a wonderful statement
that he makes that he says I dowhatever I can wherever I can,
whenever I can, for as long as Ican, with whatever I have to
(15:14):
try to make a difference, and Ithink that's a motto that people
should live by.
I'm privileged to live in acountry that gives me all of
this freedom to have a job thatallows me to share my
experiences, and I realize thatevery day.
And so what keeps me going isthe fact that this is the right
(15:36):
thing to do at the right time,and making those decisions to be
involved is a decision.
I mean, I could bury my head inthe sand, anyone could bury
their head in the sand, anyonecould bury their head in the
sand, and during a politicalseason, sometimes that feels
like the right thing to do.
Yeah, sure, it's too much comingat you, but you know people
have to stay and I don't want touse, you know, words that
(15:58):
indicate negativity, but peoplehave to stay and fight.
You have to believe in whatyou're doing is going to make a
difference, regardless of it's.
You know one side or the other,but you have to have the facts
to do it, and so I feel likemaking sure people are
knowledgeable about what thefacts are and knowledgeable
(16:19):
about their ability to accesseverything from health to
education to a ballot box arepart of what I have and I've
been blessed to have, and it'swhat I want others in the world
to have.
Bishop Wright (16:32):
Yeah, listening to you, I'm reminded of a couple
of things I've been thinkingabout quite a bit lately, and
that is how to hold boldness andgentleness together, right?
And that aggression is not thesame thing as strength.
Paige Alexander (16:49):
Very, very true .
There's a nuance that peoplesometimes lose because we've
become very binary you pick oneside and you go with it, and if
it's aggressiveness, you go withit, as opposed to recognizing
there's a nuance there that it'sstrength to show, and part of
being strong is knowing whatsize weight you're picking up.
(17:10):
It's not just you know carryingyour message forward, it's
understanding and knowing whatthe message is.
Bishop Wright (17:17):
Jimmy Carter has been and is a pretty outspoken
Christian, someone for whomfaith has mattered an awful lot,
you know, impressivelycontinued to teach Bible study,
you know, for many, many yearsin his church church I think,
that he grew up in.
(17:38):
You know, what's interestingabout watching him and the work
of the Carter Center is that,even though it has this founding
DNA, so to speak, it findsitself alongside of lots of
kinds of people who believe inparticular ways or no way, in
particular, and so say a word ortwo about that, about how you
(18:11):
embody this kind of broad anddeep Christian faith in the work
of the center.
Paige Alexander (18:15):
Well, you know, president Carter was the most
religious president in mylifetime, certainly and he was
guided by faith but neverprojected that upon others.
And I think that that is one ofthe other guiding North Star
spaces, uh, spaces that I I tryto occupy.
And I'll be our firstconversation.
Well, our last face-to-faceconversation.
He said to me it was his 98thbirthday and he said, uh, you're
(18:38):
going to church.
I was down in Plains.
He said you're going to churchtoday, right, that's like you
remember, I'm Jewish, right?
And he goes, we're going tochurch today, right.
And I thought, wow, hishearing's really going.
So I said it again and he saidI said, you're going to church
today.
I was like, oh yes, I'm goingto church today.
I mean, he wanted me toappreciate Maranatha Baptist
(19:01):
Church the way he appreciated itand he wanted to make sure that
, you know, everybody has thisopportunity, which is why he
taught Sunday school and did thesermons for so long down there
and people would line up at sixo'clock in the morning to be
able to get in, because hiswords were valuable, regardless
of whether it wasJudeo-Christian, muslim.
It was a sense of a grounding,guiding light for him.
(19:26):
And again, didn't project it offinto other people.
He just wanted people to feelgrounded in some faith, and so
that's where we are.
We're not a faith-basedorganization, but we don't run
away from those conversationswith religious leaders.
We want and need to have them,because in many cases they do
run a village, sometimes theyrun an entire government, and
(19:50):
those are, you know, people offaith, are people of faith, and
it doesn't matter what faith.
Bishop Wright (19:56):
I work with Jonathan Reckford, who is the
executive director of Habitatfor Humanity International, as
you well know, and of course itwas President Carter who really
helped us to get to know Habitatin really wonderful ways.
And at Habitat's founding,jonathan tells me they have this
wonderful phrase that they useto try to articulate what you
(20:18):
just have articulated, and thatis our Christian faith is our
center, but it's not our border.
Faith is our center but it'snot our border.
And for me that is the measureof a deep and abiding faith,
whether it's Muslim or Jewish orChristian or Baha'i or Sikh or
whatever it is.
And that is does your life withthe divine.
(20:45):
Surprised that a man and a wifewe shouldn't forget Rosalyn and
her significant contribution toall of it, to everything that
kind of a faith where it may betheir personal center, but it's
not a border and it doesn'tblock relationships.
In fact it enhances it.
And we saw that on the ground.
(21:07):
They talk about the theology ofthe hammer at Habitat for
Humanity, which is how about webuild something together and
then let's have a chat.
I think that's the way to go.
Paige Alexander (21:21):
And that's absolutely the way to go.
I mean the Jewish faith.
We have something called TikkunOlam, which is repair the world
, and every faith has that, asyou know, has something like
that as a guiding principle, andwith Habitat, the concept that
people get together to build ahouse for somebody else.
That is a lot of what we do inour conflict resolution programs
(21:42):
at the Carter Center.
We bring people together tohave conversations that are not
necessarily political.
They are something about thecommunity.
I mean, you don't need someonefrom Atlanta trying to tell
someone in rural North Carolinaabout elections.
You need the people in ruralNorth Carolina to talk about
what they care about in theircommunity, why elections are
(22:04):
important, and then, are theseelections being run properly?
Like?
You get to that conversation bycommunity discussion and by
sitting with your neighbor, notby imposing things, and so I do
think that that is wherePresident and Rosalind Carter
came from was.
They weren't going to impose it, but they made it clear where
(22:24):
the values were.
Bishop Wright (22:26):
Yeah, I love it.
I love it.
Well, as we sort of finish uphere, I wonder what you want to
tell the audience about theCarter Center.
I mean, how can they getinvolved?
How could they make donations?
I mean, I was just inMinneapolis where Habitat built
(22:47):
148 homes on a restored golfcourse.
It was a golf course that hadfallen into disrepair and was
sold to Habitat and they put up140, some odd homes in honor of
President Carter's 100thbirthday.
So, in closing, what do peopleneed to know?
How can they get involved?
(23:08):
How can they contribute?
Paige Alexander (23:11):
You know, going into our website, the
cartercenterorg, you can see thevarious pieces of work that we
do, and there's usually not beenan opportunity for people to
get involved unless they wantedto go overseas and observe an
election.
Now we have the opportunity thatwe're doing.
We are doing a lot in the US,but our goal is still to help
(23:38):
the people at the end of theroad, the most vulnerable people
, working where others don'twork and not duplicating the
efforts of others.
And so a lot of our work comesbecause we can rely on our field
offices and those boots on theground, as you mentioned, to
carry out that work.
And so, you know, a donationgoes so much further because
it's not used to pay Atlantaoverhead, it's used to pay the
(24:00):
people in the field.
And so, if anyone has questions, there's an active area on the
website that people can go toand ask questions about how to
get involved.
But, honestly, it's ourpartners on the ground, it's the
partners of the ministries ofhealth in all of these countries
who need that kind of help andwho are looking for that
(24:24):
technical assistance that webring, and those are our real
partners and those are the oneswho we're supporting, paige,
thank you, and those are ourreal partners and those are the
ones who we're supporting.
Bishop Wright (24:30):
Paige, thank you, and thank you for pledging
yourself to this good work andto being a peacemaker.
Holy Scripture says beautifulare the feet of those who
proclaim the gospel of peace,and so we thank God for you and
for the Carter Center.
Thanks again.
Paige Alexander (24:48):
Thanks, bishop, appreciate being here to talk
about it.
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