What is it like growing up in a country in civil war? What remains to be achieved in the struggle for women's rights? Will it be possible to heal the wounds opened by the wars of the present and the past? Is it possible to reach peace when the scars of war are still visible? To answer these questions, Pedro Pinto interviews Leymah Roberta Gbowee in this episode of “It’s Not That Simple”, a podcast by the Francisco Manuel dos Santos Foundation. 

A Nobel Peace Prize laureate in 2011, Gbowee is a Liberian Peace Activist, Trained Social Worker and Women’s Rights Advocate. She is the Founder and current President of the Gbowee Peace Foundation Africa (GPFA). She also currently serves as the Executive Director of the Women, Peace and Security Program at Columbia University’s Earth Institute in New York, USA. She is the Co-Founder and former Executive Director of the Women Peace and Security Network Africa (WIPSEN-A) and a Founding Member and former Liberia Coordinator of Women in Peacebuilding Network (WIPNET).  

In this episode, Gbowee discusses her experience growing up in civil war-torn Liberia, her time in a refugee camp in Ghana, and how he set up small donut and braid businesses to be able to get food and money. Gbowee also addresses the work she does with victims of war and for peace, the biggest obstacles to peace today and what needs to be done to overcome them. Finally, Gbowee also looks at the progresses made in the struggle for women's rights, and the obstacles women still face today in cultures that do not recognize their worth. 

More on this topic

 • Mighty Be Our Powers: How Sisterhood, Prayer, and Sex Changed a Nation at War; a Memoir, Leymah Roberta Gbowee (com Carol Mithers), 2011 

• Leymah Roberta Gbowee’s Nobel Lecture, 2011 

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2011/gbowee/lecture/ 

• Documentary about Leymah Roberta Gbowee, 2008 

https://vimeo.com/188872289 

Other references in Portuguese

• Podcast [IN]Pertinente, “Vamos falar de Direitos Humanos?”, with Raquel Vaz Pinto and Pedro Vieira 

https://www.ffms.pt/podcasts/fundacao-ffms-in-pertinente/5970/politica-vamos-falar-de-direitos-humanos 

• Podcast [IN]Pertinente, “De quantas mulheres se faz a igualdade de género?”, with Raquel Vaz Pinto and Pedro Vieira 

https://www.ffms.pt/podcasts/fundacao-ffms-in-pertinente/5848/politica-de-quantas-mulheres-se-faz-a-igualdade-de-genero 

• Podcast Da Capa à Contracapa, “A situação desigual das mulheres em Portugal”, with Anália Torres and Sandra Ribeiro 

https://www.ffms.pt/podcasts/da-capa-a-contracapa/5399/a-situacao-desigual-das-mulheres-em-portugal 

• Conferência, “Apresentação do estudo «Igualdade de género ao longo da vida»”, by Anália Torres 

https://www.ffms.pt/conferencias/detalhe/2584/apresentacao-do-estudo-igualdade-de-genero-ao-longo-da-vida