In his latest move to deepen the city’s global engagement, Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens traveled to Geneva this month to share its perspective with a United Nations panel on ending racial discrimination.
Though he spoke alongside delegates from various U.S. cabinet departments and one representative from California, the mayor wasn’t the only Atlantan in the room — he joined the event with Ambassador Michèle Taylor, a Democratic political adviser in Atlanta who was appointed by President Joe Biden as U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations Human Rights Council and confirmed in February.
Slated to speak Aug. 11-12, the group was headed to the Swiss city, arguably the primary hub of global multilateralism, to report to UN committee on the nation’s progress toward racial justice, a plan that includes reforming the health care system, addressing xenophobia, working on immigration, reducing hate crimes and helping vulnerable communities adapt to climate change, among other goals.
In short introductory remarks, Mr. Dickens focused on many of the themes that he laid out in a speech to Atlanta’s diplomatic corps in May. The common thread? Atlanta wants to contribute its authoritative voice to the conversation on a common problem that manifests in different ways around the world.
“There is a clear intersection between global and local affairs, and we are committed to finding multilateral solutions to global problems,” Mr. Dickens was slated to say, according to a copy of his prepared remarks.
He recounted the city’s civil rights bona fides as the birthplace of Martin Luther King Jr. and home of former UN Ambassador Andrew Young, as well as the more recent accolades it has received for the diversity of its workforce, especially in the burgeoning tech sector. Atlanta, he said, has been built for the last 50 years largely on Black business and community.
Still, Atlanta is one of the American cities experiencing the greatest income inequality, a portrait at odds with its reputation as a creative cultural capital and “Black Mecca.”
“Like all major cities, we face challenges of affordability, of inclusion, and of racial, economic and health disparities. In Atlanta we don’t claim to have all the answers; we are transparent on the challenges we face and take a collaborative approach to identifying and implementing innovative solutions,” Mr. Dickens said.
He noted that Metro Atlanta’s growth is set to mirror the world’s unprecedented urbanization as its population grows from 6 million to a projected 8.4 million by 2040. By 2050, the proportion of the world’s population living in cities, already the majority, could grow to about 68 percent, according to UN projections. That will put the onus on city leaders to address a host of new challenges, he said.
The mayor’s presence at the event and his collaborative tone lined up with remarks given at a luncheon he hosted for the Atlanta consular corps earlier this year. In that conversation, he enlisted the diplomats from 70-plus countries based in the metro Atlanta area to help raise the city’s profile as it “graduates” on the world stage. He also committed to a posture of collaboration and spirit of openness.
“I want to make sure that we have the best example that you can have in the nation of a community that’s ready to work with the international community,” he said at the time. “Like I said, we’ve grown. We’re on an international stage now.”
The trip to Geneva also squares with the mayor’s work as co-chair of the City and State Diplomacy Task Force of the Truman Center for National Security, a left-leaning think tank.
Vanessa Ibarra, director of the Mayor’s Office of International Affairs, traveled to Geneva with the mayor.
Read Mr. Dickens’s prepared remarks here.
Read more: Mayor Dickens Signals New Openness to International Community
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