Mary Robinson Quotes

In a society where the rights and potential of women are constrained, no man can be truly free. He may have power, but he will not have freedom.

I was elected by the women of Ireland, who instead of rocking the cradle, rocked the system.

If we took away barriers to women's leadership, we would solve the climate change problem a lot faster

Human rights are inscribed in the hearts of people; they were there long before lawmakers drafted their first proclamation.

Feel empowered. And if you start to do it, if you start to feel your voice heard, you will never go back.

Today's human rights violations are the causes of tomorrow's conflicts.

To make progress we have to build a multi-stakeholder process, harnessing the appropriate energies.

Climate change is the greatest threat to human rights in the 21st century.

The whole human rights structure is based on the accountability of governments.

An endless war against terrorism can tend to inflate the terrorists, because being at war is attractive to some angry, unemployed, disaffected youth.

If you are small and don't particularly want credit for what you are doing, you can achieve a lot.

I want to take human rights out of their box. I want to show the relevance of the universal principles of human rights to the basic needs of health, security, education and equality.

We will not let governments off the hook. We will look to civil society to help us, to pin governments, to what they have committed to here. And we will report on it.

The fight for human rights is about speaking truth to power.

If you live in a global world and you want to champion liberty in it, then you have you got to sign up to that global world.

We now know that climate change is a driver of migration, and is expected to increase the displacement of populations.

There's a worldwide linking of environmental activists, developmental experts and human rights advocates. And they're using the two frameworks, in particular environmental standards and human rights.

Freedom from discrimination for women, ensuring that female children can learn to read, these are human needs for half the human race, not western values.

All countries are particular and no models are perfect.

The Snow-drop, Winter's timid child, Awakes to life, bedew'd with tears.

The fossil-fuel-based development model has not benefitted all people and those who have benefitted least are now suffering great harm in the face of climate change.

The MDGs have been useful in moving human rights and development discourse together and in highlighting the need for greater accountability at all levels.

Maybe this society, if anything, has become more patriarchal, and that has to be combated.

I have a sense that South Africa is my other country apart from my native country that I particularly love, [that I] want to see succeed, and I did really want my message to be listened to.

It is necessary to ensure that the requirement to combat terrorism is not used to clamp down on freedom of expression, legitimate dissent, freedom of association and so on.

I can see the immense capacity of business to give leadership.

Many people today in the developed countries are so far removed from poverty and suffering and starvation that they lack empathy for the sufferings of others.

The changing climate is a threat to human rights.

I do not support individual countries taking military action against another country because of its human rights record, or subsequently justifying taking such action on human rights grounds.

Companies should increasingly see themselves as major corporate citizens with a wider responsibility to the community. Nothing less than their reputation - their image - is at stake.

It is people who go through suffering that have an empathy for the suffering of others.

One of the richest countries in the world - the United States of America - is facing a real ethical dilemma in terms of providing equitable access to health care.

It's only after their death that people are truly appreciated. It's because they are true to values.

Finance ministers must realize that the health budget can save them money if it's applied well.

Many people think that we have no shared value system in the world today but we actually do.

You can convene a wider cross-section if you have no turf to defend, because then you don't cut across anyone else's agenda and you can achieve a great deal.

I want to see a UN that enables a gathering of energies in which business plays its proper role.

If the Chinese business community takes the Declaration of Human Rights, core labor standards, and environmental standards seriously, the government of China will take them far more seriously, too.

Particularly here in the United States there is a lack of comprehension about anything to do with the United Nations.

Sharing experience and building public support for the full range of rights is more powerful than legal cases.

Ireland is not in a good place at the moment. We have our own humiliation of losing our economic sovereignty, and we're now regaining it slowly and painfully.

The question now is how best to help the Iraqi people build a democratic and free Iraqi society that ensures respect for the rights of all Iraqis.

Using human rights commitments more effectively, either as part of negotiations in the WTO or as part of the trade policy review process, poses issues of equality in a practical venue.

When a genocidal killing occurs, as happened in Rwanda, it is not just an internal domestic matter.

…to own only a little talent…was an awful, plaguing thing….being only a little bit special meant you expected too much, most of the time.