On Friday, former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice spoke with University President Fr. Robert Dowd, with much of the conversation revolving around a recent article Rice penned in Foreign Affairs about “The Perils of Isolationism.” The event was billed as part of this year’s Notre Dame Forum, the theme of which is “What do we owe each other?”
The political scientist and diplomat spoke on stage in a packed Leighton Concert Hall ahead of the Notre Dame-Stanford game. Rice has long been affiliated with both schools. She graduated with a master’s degree in government and international studies from Notre Dame in 1975. She also served on the University’s Board of Trustees from 1994 to 2001. She last spoke at Notre Dame two years ago in a conversation with Fr. John Jenkins.
Rice has been on the faculty at Stanford since the 1980s, outside of stints serving in the government. She was provost in the 1990s and is currently director of Stanford’s Hoover Institution.
Rice addressed her split loyalties on stage after Dowd asked her who she would root for in this weekend’s football game.
“I said no hard questions,” Rice said, noting she was wearing neutral colors, and that she would wear blue and gold for part of Saturday and red for part of it. “John Kennedy was asked one time, [which team would he root for] when Notre Dame played Navy? And he said, ‘I think I'm going to root for Navy, but I'm going to pray for Notre Dame.’”
Rice and Dowd discussed ideas of isolationism and American leadership in a relatively brief chat that lasted approximately 35 minutes.
Rice said the piece in Foreign Affairs was meant to address her theory of the “four horsemen of the apocalypse.”
“That’s also another Notre Dame reference, I guess,” she joked. “It’s populism, nativism, isolationism and protectionism, and they tend to ride together.”
Rice said she understood the recent tendency in American politics towards these instincts.
“And I understand that Americans may feel tired after almost 80 years of international leadership. You know, haven’t we defeated the Soviet Union? Didn't we unify Germany? Did we then defeat al-Qaeda? Couldn't somebody else do it?” she said.
Rice’s response turned to great power politics and the American obligation to the world.
“And what I really wanted to say to Americans is that great powers don’t mind their own business. They try to shape the world, and if we don’t shape it, the great powers that will shape it are authoritarians like China and Russia, and we won’t like that world,” she said.
Rice also spoke to other grievances in the American electorate.
“In keeping with your theme, there are an awful lot of Americans who got left out of globalization, the unemployed coal miner in West Virginia, the unemployed steel worker. And this time around, we can’t just say globalization was good for you. We have to make sure that we give people the skills and the education to keep up in a world in which they have to compete. And if we can’t do that, we won’t be confident in international leadership,” she said.
Dowd asked Rice about China, Russia and his area of focus, Africa.
Rice said American universities should keep not close themselves off from China.
“Let’s stay open. Let’s stay true to ourselves. You know, nobody wants the research we do to be used to and to enrich the [People’s Liberation Army]. Nobody wants that, but universities are not going to thrive if we don't remember that we benefit when we think of knowledge as without boundaries,” she said. “I'm all for as many Chinese students as I can get to come to Stanford and Notre Dame and wherever they'd like to go, because I think we can influence that generation about the value of democracy.”
She also said Vladimir Putin had made miscalculations strategic mistakes in Russia’s war with Ukraine: assuming Ukrainians did not have a distinct identity, assuming the Russian army was good and assuming the world would not respond.
Rice recalled her time engaging with Putin.
“I do know Vladimir Putin pretty well. In fact, he kind of liked me early on because he thought I was a Russianist, I would understand them and so forth. But he always had this ambition about reconstituting the Russian Empire, not the Soviet Union, the Russian Empire. He told me once, ‘Condi, you know us, Russia’s only been great when it’s been moved by great men like Alexander II and Peter the Great.’ He didn’t say Lenin and Stalin. He said the Tsars at the furthest extent of the Russian Empire. And so that was his ambition,” she said.
Rice also answered two questions from students, junior Tia Mittle and sophomore Patrick Smart. Mittle asked about how to address the rise of nationalism and populism in the United States.
“Sometimes you have to paint a future of what it would look like without American leadership and remind people that every time we have tried to withdraw from the world, we had to reenter,” Rice said.
In her closing thoughts, Rice spoke about Notre Dame.
“I’m always delighted to be back at Notre Dame. This place was very, very special to me. I came to Notre Dame as a very young graduate student,” she said.
Dowd noted she was just 19.
“What I really love about this place, and I hope that each and every one of you folks soak it in while you’re here, is that there really is an emphasis, not just on the learning, although there’s an emphasis on that, not just on what you’re going to do when you get out of here, although there’s an emphasis on that, but on how you mature into people that have the right values as you do [proceed],” she said.
She also offered some words of advice directly to students.
“One of the most important values that you can develop is the willingness to listen to those with whom you don’t agree. It is very easy, particularly in the age of the internet, to go to your tribe, to go to your aggregators, your influencers, your websites, only talk to people who think like you do, and to become overly confident in your own high opinion of your opinion,” she said to laughs.
“In dorms or wherever, don’t avoid those difficult conversations. But sometimes, if you’re gonna have a difficult conversation, just one other thought, it’s really important to listen, not just transmit. And I think you’ll find that those are our values that will serve you well throughout your life,” Rice added.
As Dowd thanked her for time, Rice had one more note on the football game.
“I know at this point I’m supposed to go ‘Go Irish.’ I’m gonna say ‘Go Irish,’ but I can't repeat that other part about ‘beat somebody,’” she said.
