'Seoul Sisters' share experiences as women in diplomacy

There is a growing number of diplomats in Korea who call themselves the Seoul Sisters. “Wherever I am, having a group of women peers is an incredible and useful springboard,” said Tamara Mawhinney, ambassador of Canada to Korea, referring to women...

From left, Philippine Ambassador to Korea Maria Theresa Dizon-De Vega, Brazilian Ambassador to Korea Marcia Donner Abreu and Canadian Ambassador to Korea Tamara Mawhinney at the Gyeongbok Palace in central Seoul. [WOO SANG-JO]

There is a growing number of diplomats in Korea who call themselves the Seoul Sisters.

“Wherever I am, having a group of women peers is an incredible and useful springboard,” said Tamara Mawhinney, ambassador of Canada to Korea, referring to women ambassadors and heads of missions based in Seoul.

The group, born out of casual meetings to exchange ideas and information, has grown over the years to include some 25 members, a welcome sign that diplomacy worldwide is being represented by more women, said Brazilian Ambassador Marcia Donner Abreu.

“It is by no means an exclusive group, nor a one-of-a-kind,” Abreu said. “I spent many years in Geneva, working in the World Trade Organization, and the women’s group we had was very powerful.”

Each Seoul Sister would host a talk at their diplomatic residence every few weeks with a special guest, who have ranged from the foreign minister to members of the media, academia or politics, and even social media influencers.

“We invited Jasmine Lee, who shared her very interesting narrative about being a migrant woman in Korea and her experiences as the first foreign-born non-ethnic Korean to serve as a lawmaker here,” said Maria Theresa Dizon-De Vega, ambassador of the Philippines in Korea, who recently hosted her fellow Seoul Sisters at her home.

Jasmine Lee, a former lawmaker in Korea from the Philippines, addresses Seoul Sisters, or a group of female heads of diplomatic missions in Seoul, at the diplomatic residence of the ambassador of the Philippines in Seoul in March. [EMBASSY OF THE PHILIPPINES IN KOREA]

The Seoul Sisters wouldn’t limit their meetings to presentations and policy discussions, for it would be in the casual conversations that they would often share their tips on experiencing Korean culture and heritage, like their experience of buying traditional Korean clothing in Namdaemun Market, or the latest K-pop trends, like the fact that BTS members are known to take as many as eight shots of espresso in their cup of coffee.

The strength the Seoul Sisters are able to draw from one another in their meeting also stems from their shared experiences of being a woman in the world of diplomacy, which can come as an advantage or challenge, and often a mix of both.

To hear more, the Korea JoongAng Daily and its affiliate the JoongAng Ilbo recently sat down with three Seoul Sisters at a cafe in downtown Seoul.

━ Voices of women in Seoul

Gender equality issues know no borders and have become a prominent issue in Korea as it has welcomed more multiethnic families over the years.

Korea is home to around 32,000 multiethnic households, of whom nearly 40 percent had lived in Korea for 15 or more years as of 2021, according to the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family.

As they came to call Korea their new home, many also had children in Korea — 58 percent of around 15,000 multiethnic families surveyed in 2021 said they had at least one child.

That same year, 14,322 children were born to multiethnic households, taking up 5.5 percent of dwindling new births in Korea.

The mothers were from Vietnam, China or the Philippines and other countries, in descending order, according to Statistics Korea.

To address the needs of some of these families, the Philippine Embassy has been hosting a series of meetings called “Know Your Rights and Responsibilities” with families and legal experts.

Philippine Ambassador to Korea Maria Theresa Dizon-De Vega speaks with the other Seoul Sisters, the Korea JoongAng Daily and JoongAng Ilbo at a cafe in Seoul recently. [WOO SANG-JO]

“Many of these families would be in need of legal assistance, especially when it came to adoption,” said Dizon-De Vega, referring to cases whereby Korean husbands would try to adopt the children their Philippine wives had from their previous marriages or relationships.

“It’s a rather complicated process, where you have to navigate Korean domestic law, Philippine domestic law, and private international law,” she said. “So, we have to have all hands on deck, including legal practitioners from both the Philippines and Korea.”

Targeted as one of the sustainable development goals at the UN, gender equality is a topic that the Korean government had put forward in its international campaigns as well, including in its candidacy for a non-permanent seat at the UN Security Council from 2024 to 2025.

“Foreign Minister Park Jin also spoke to us of the initiative,” said Mawhinney, recalling the meeting with Park and the other Seoul Sisters earlier this year at the diplomatic residence of the ambassador of Portugal in Seoul.

“Women are not just victims when it comes to security crises and conflicts. They can be and ought to be represented at the negotiation table and in decision-making positions,” she added. “We can all agree and are hoping that this will be an important part of Korea’s membership at the Security Council going forwards.”

━ Women in diplomacy

Abreau, a career diplomat who entered the Brazilian foreign service in 1987, has seen the scene of diplomacy evolve over the years, but not speedily enough when it came to gender equality.

Women make up less than a fourth of the Brazilian diplomatic corps today, with just 12 percent of ambassadorships granted to women, according to a report by the Guardian earlier this year.

Still, where Brazilian women were practicing diplomacy, they have left their mark, said Abreu.

“I have been asked many times about the hardships of being a woman diplomat,” she said. “And every time I have replied that the challenges are big, but from my experience, my life has been richer because I am a woman — I am able to multitask and step into multiple social roles and assume them fully and engage on issues with more varied perspectives and bring empathy into the picture.”

Brazilian Ambassador to Korea Marcia Donner Abreu speaks with the other Seoul Sisters, the Korea JoongAng Daily and JoongAng Ilbo at a cafe in Seoul recently. [WOO SANG-JO]

To tell the stories of such women, film director Ivana Diniz has produced a documentary following the footsteps of Brazilian women in diplomacy, beginning with the country's very first, Maria Jose de Castro Rebello Mendes.

The film, “Exteriores,” was screened at the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in March at the initiative of the Brazilian Embassy. While challenges remain for women diplomats, it would be remiss to rule out completely the efforts and progress made for more equal gender rights in foreign service, said Mawhinney.

“Diplomacy has changed for the better,” she said, citing diversification in the recruitment practices of the Canadian diplomatic service in recent years to attract new recruits reflecting a set of diverse experiences and backgrounds.

To encourage more women to join the diplomatic service and excel, the foreign service world should be looking to adopt a more holistic approach to the labor market, she added, one that considers education, recruitment, benefits, social welfare and health.

━ Not a zero-sum game

After juggling both motherhood and a full career in foreign policymaking, each Seoul Sister has a lesson they’d like to offer to the next generation of women diplomats.

“I always tell young women, study hard, work hard, you have to equip yourself,” Dizon-De Vega said. “Never go into something from a position of ignorance, show them that you know what you’re talking about. There is no substitute for preparing well for whatever it is you want to do.”

There’s a lot of studying even after one becomes a diplomat, Abreu added, as the areas of expertise one will be asked to acquire on the job are quite expansive.

“You have to be ready to improvise, and ready to answer questions even if it is not an area of your expertise,” said Abreu. “Be ready for these challenges. A diplomat is rarely 100 percent a diplomat.”

Canadian Ambassador to Korea Tamara Mawhinney speaks with the other Seoul Sisters, the Korea JoongAng Daily and JoongAng Ilbo at a cafe in Seoul recently. [WOO SANG-JO]

And remember, added Mawhinney, that women in diplomacy often have a great partner in the other half of the population.

“It’s important to turn around this perception that women’s rights are gained at the expense of everybody else’s,” she said. “It’s not a zero-sum game. Men have to be involved; everybody has to be involved across the gender spectrum.”

BY ESTHER CHUNG [chung.juhee@joongang.co.kr]