Clinton says mayors must stand up to tribalism

Bill Clinton, the former US president, has told mayors that they are the best answer to the divisive politics that has become all too common at the state and national levels in the US as well as globally.

Addressing the US Conference of Mayors’ Summer meeting this afternoon which is taking place in Miami Beach, Florida, Clinton said that mayors’ commitment to get things done was the main reason he met with them every year during his two terms as president.

He joked: “I went to the White House as governor, served as president, and came out a mayor.”

Clinton said that cities are less tribal as “real life keeps intruding”.

“In cities you are comfortable with diversity and more likely to understand that the ‘us versus them’ mentality is a very poor way of thinking,” he said. “Creative societies are about multiplication not division and diverse groups make better decisions than homogeneous groups.”

In an hour-long speech to the meeting, which has brought together 250 mayors, Clinton highlighted the breadth of issues which cities must tackle including indigenous rights, opioid addiction, immigration, and funding infrastructure all of which need a consensual approach to find solutions.

“The rise of tribalism has created an ‘us versus them’ mentality–for us to win they have to lose,” said Clinton. “If you did that [as mayors] you would be out of a job.”

But it was his comments on climate change and the US withdrawal by President Trump from the Paris Climate Agreement that drew the largest applause from mayors.

“All this controversy about America getting out of the Paris Agreement, you can get out of it or in it but the water’s going to keep rising. Politics has no influence on science or nature,” he quipped.

He emphasised that tackling climate change offered an opportunity for economic growth citing the example of Pittsburgh which was renowned as America’s ‘steel city’ but now employs 13,000 people in clean energy.

“It’s good economics which you can talk about with facts,” he told the mayors. “You don’t need to attack with rhetoric.”

In his closing comments, he advised mayors and the public to combat tribalism by seeing each other as people and revering their good qualities. This would reinforce the role of cities in testing and implementing new ideas.