FEBRUARY/MARCH 2001
FSU LECTURER BECOMES A HERO FOR IRISH PEACE
Great Britain's political weekly, The New Statesman, calls a one-time FSU lecturer - Marjorie "Mo" Mowlam - the most popular member of the ruling Labour Party, and the most popular political figure among the British public.
The New York Times' Warren Hoge reported
two years ago that the popularity of "the famously unceremonious
and outspoken Ms. Mowlam exceeds even that of Tony Blair ...
the most popular Prime Minister in British history."
When she was the secretary of state for Northern Ireland, Mowlam, now 51, earned international fame for her role in fashioning an agreement between the warring Protestants and Catholics.
She is remembered by friends, colleagues and students at FSU, where she was a guest lecturer in 1978 and 1979, as "unforgettable" and "a delight to be around."
She is described as down-to-earth, humorous and highly skilled at connecting with people.
After she graduated from Durham University with a degree in social anthropology, Mowlam visited a boyfriend attending the University of Iowa.
Soon she enrolled, eventually receiving a master's degree and a Ph.D in political science. She taught political science at the University of Wisconsin, and then taught two years at FSU.
When she returned to England, Mowlam soon found herself immersed in British Labour Party politics.
It wasn't long before she was elected a Member of Parliament. And when the Blair-led Labour Party won a sweeping victory in 1997, Mowlam was soon thrust into the middle of one of history's longest political conflicts, the war in Northern Ireland.
Mowlam was named Sec-retary of State for Northern Ireland. Unlike any other British political figure to hold that position in modern times, Mowlam - along with U.S. Special Envoy George Mitchell - managed to cobble together a power-sharing agreement among the long-time bitter rivals: Great Britain, Irish loyalists who want to remain part of Britain and Irish Republicans fighting to reunite the Irish nation.
Many observers attribute the success of the Mowlam-Mitchell agreement to two factors: the Labour Party's strong parliamentary majority and Mowlam's personality, which helps bring mortal enemies together to work out differences around a table instead of through the force of arms.
In 1998, she visited Loyalist and Republican prisoners in
the notorious Maze prison near Belfast. She persuaded the Loyalist
inmates to give the talks another chance.
It's Mowlam's strong personality that many who knew her at FSU
recall so well.
"I helped recruit her for the job interview and will never forget the effect she had on the people in the room," recalls Paul Piccard, who was on the political science faculty committee. "The choice was unanimous."
Soon, he said, "it dawned on me that although she'd only
been here a short time, she knew more people than me."
It was perhaps, Piccard reflects, a sign of Mowlam's future success
not just as a politician, but as a well liked political figure.
Geoff Smith, former director of the Center for Participant
Education, recalls Mowlam intervening during a fray between protesting
Iranian students, student hecklers and FSU police.
"Mowlam helped to avert disaster by calming everyone down
and bringing everybody together to talk things over," said
Smith, now a partner in the law firm of Blank, Meenan and Smith.
"Mowlam knew who she was and what she believed," said Neil Friedman, who was student body president when Mowlam taught at FSU.
Mowlam recently announced that she would not run again for MP and hence would be leaving government. She has already left the office of Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and is now Minister for the Cabinet Office.
"She's writing an autobiography," Piccard says. - Jack McCarthy
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