Madeleine Albright

Copyright 1998 ABC-CLIO, Inc.
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COUNTRY: United States
PERSON: Madeleine Albright

HEADLINE: Biographies

The former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations (UN), Madeleine Korbel Albright became secretary of state in 1997 when she accepted the portfolio for President Bill Clinton's second term. She is the first female ever to hold the nation's top diplomatic post. "I hope my heels can fill his shoes," she remarked of her well-admired predecessor, Warren Christopher, when Clinton announced her nomination.

Albright was born Madeleine Korbel in Czechoslovakia on May 15, 1937. Her father, Josef Korbel, was a Czech diplomat who found himself evicted from the country twice once when the Nazis invaded in 1938 and again in 1948, during the communist takeover, after which Korbel brought his family to the United States. A naturalized citizen, Albright attended Wellesley College, receiving a B.A. in 1959. She married media mogul Joseph Medill Patterson Albright (the couple divorced in 1982) and earned her Ph.D. at Columbia University while raising three daughters. After completing her doctorate, she spent two years at the top Washington-based research institutions Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars and the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

During the 1970s, Albright served as the chief legislative assistant to Democratic Sen. Edmund Muskie and worked under President Jimmy Carter's National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski. After Carter lost his bid for a second term, the 1980s found Albright acting as foreign policy adviser for presidential candidates Walter Mondale and Michael Dukakis. She was also a professor of internal affairs and the director of the Women in Foreign Service program at the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service. During 1984-93 Albright was vice chairperson for the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs in Washington, D.C.

In 1992 Albright met Clinton, and the two hit it off. While Albright kept a fairly middle-of-the-road position when it came to the politics of the Democratic Party, she was highly regarded as a team player, and Clinton named her ambassador to the UN. She reportedly loved the job, although she was known to show some frustration occasionally at the sometimes patronizing "boys club" of the Washington political scene. Hawkish and outspoken, Albright was a strong proponent of human and civil rights abroad and took a fierce stand against the ethnic persecution in Bosnia. She advocated U.S. and UN intervention in Haiti and slammed Fidel Castro for Cuba's February 1996 downing of two private American planes. On the administrative front, she pressured the UN directors to reduce the bureaucracy so criticized by the U.S. Congress.

After sailing through Senate confirmation hearings, Albright was sworn in on Jan 24, 1997. She has said that she will focus on "sustaining momentum toward the creation of a Europe that is united, stable, and democratic" an endeavor in which her fluent Russian, French, Czech, and Polish are sure to come in handy. Albright has also indicated that an extensive, lasting peace in the Middle East is one of her top priorities and that she will continue to enthusiastically represent the United States in its support of democracy the world over.

[Sources: All Politics; Federal Staff Directory; Japan Times; Newsweek; The New York Times]

LOAD-DATE: February 18, 1998