Storage Undergraduate Library JX 1706 175 C17 DEPARTMENT OF STATE PUBLICATION 8951 Department and Foreign Service Series 166 Released September 1978 Office of Equal Employment Opportunity For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office Washington, D.C. 20402 Stock No. 044-000-01707-5 Written histories of the United States have paid too little attention to the role of women. With this first written record of women in the conduct of foreign affairs, the Department of State hopes to make partial amends for its long period of neglect. The institutional failings in the treatment of women that appear in this work are made evident. That is as it should be. Each generation must learn from past errors if the quality of present and future life is to be improved. What is remarkable, given the obstacles that existed, is the record of achievement of State Department women described in this history. The leadership of the Department is now totally and aggressively dedicated to making women full and equal participants in the mainstream of foreign affairs. I hope that future historians will find that the record of this period reflects well on this effort. -Ben H. Read Deputy Under Secretary for Management April 1978 "This Department, whose mission it is to conduct the foreign policy of this government, must impress the rest of the world with our concern for human rights by clearly demonstrating that those same rights are guaranteed to our employees at home and abroad." -Cyrus Vance Preface In 1976, Deputy Under Secretary of State for Management Lawrence S. Eagleburger endorsed a history of women in the Department of State and the Foreign Service. The Equal Employment Opportunity Office requested assistance from the Historical Office, Bureau of Public Affairs, which agreed to cooperate in carrying out the undertaking. The project has developed in four phases. The first was an article entitled "Women in American Foreign Affairs" which was published in the Department of State Newsletter for August/September 1976 and, as a reprint, has been used widely for recruitment. When the editors of L'Echo de la Bourse, Belgium's leading financial daily, decided to honor the bicentennial of American independence with a special issue on December 23, 1976, they selected this article for inclusion. The second phase of the study was the use of the material for the Department's annual Women's Week Exhibit in August 1976, including Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger's proclamation of that annual week. The third phase of the project was an expanded history of women in the Department of State and their place in American foreign affairs, published as an in-house study in August 1977 under the title, Women in American Foreign Affairs. The fourth phase is this present revised and illustrated study of women in the Department of State. This study is intended to provide a broad historical account of the nearly 200 years during which women have been striving to achieve a greater place in the Department of State and its Foreign Service. No attempt has been made to discuss in depth the policy matters which women dealt with or to provide biographical sketches of the various women. There is a need for these to be done while recollections are still fresh. There is also a need for more detailed analyses of responses within the Department during the recent period when the government has mandated that every agency should have positive programs to create equal opportunities for women. No attempt has been made to include a discussion of women in all foreign affairs agencies. It is recognized that women in the U.S. Information Agency (now the International Communication Agency), the Agency for International Development, the Department of Agriculture, the Treasury Department, and numerous other agencies have had a role in American foreign affairs. Likewise, employees' spouses have played a part in the relations |