By Katherine Rivard, MUP ’21
Imagine a stereotypical American middle-class household in the 1950s: a father, mother, and a couple kids. The father goes to work each day to “take care of business” while the mother remains busy cleaning, cooking, and maintaining the household. Luckily, the mothers don’t go at it alone. They have other moms with whom they discuss favorite recipes, provide parenting tips, lend baking pans, and so forth. When the father starts to flounder at work, when he does not close the deals, even when he has a mid-life crisis resulting in erratic behavior (perhaps even withdrawing from the Paris Climate Accords), the mother is still at home, making sure that her kids are following through on the family values. The “bread-winners”–or national governments–may think they know it all, but it is the mothers–or cities–that are ensuring brighter futures for their offspring.
Now, with the introduction of the City and State Act, the U.S. government is formally recognizing the vital role of cities. This act by Congress would create the Office of Subnational Diplomacy in the U.S. State Department, connecting city governments to their counterparts across the globe. The proposal for this new level of international cooperation is an astute step toward solving future problems transnationally, recognizing the increasingly urban nature of global issues at hand. However, too much congratulations for the initiative disregards the many ties that cities have already made among themselves.
Nonprofit organizations and think tanks have studied the role of cities for years. For example, the GMF Cities program of the German Marshall Fund of the United States, a non-partisan nonprofit headquartered in DC, connects and coaches city leaders in the United States and Europe by bringing them together to discuss common challenges and potential solutions. The Wilson Center lists urban governance as a core issue of research and the Brookings Institution studies cities and regions. Similarly, annual conferences between city leaders have been an impetus for change, creativity, and innovation for years. UNESCO holds an annual conference for its Creative Cities Network and, in the U.S., the United States Conference of Mayors has been bringing together American mayors since it was founded by FDR in 1932. These organizations bring together academics as well as city leaders–from Dayton to Chengdu and everywhere in between.
City governments have also networked independently to share best practices. In New York City, the Mayor’s Office for International Affairs sets an example of how cities can make a global difference locally. Mayor De Blasio used the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals to create OneNYC, a sustainable development plan for New York City. In turn, that office uses these sustainable development goals and the city’s progress in reaching them to share innovations and lessons learned with cities and countries around the world that are committed to these same goals.
With so many established organizations and groups at work, what value added can this new office within the U.S. State Department provide? In many ways, its creation feels akin to society finally recognizing the unpaid work of mothers as meaningful work in its own right. Cities have been busy working together for years. However, the City and State Diplomacy Act promises to finally make these conditions official, putting greater emphasis on the importance of these ties and providing funding to continue the work.
As cities continue to play an integral role in the lives of citizens around the world, it would be foolhardy to discourage the promotion of an Office of Subnational Diplomacy. Nevertheless, this smart addition to our federal government will be most successful if it learns from, and works closely with, the agencies and nonprofit organizations that have already laid the groundwork to ensure that urban centers continue to innovate and grow for years to come.
After all, while it’s great to see dad doing the dishes, it’s even better to see him recognize that mom’s been doing the cleaning for years.