Transcript President Carter interview

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THE ANDREW MARR SHOW

INTERVIEW:

JIMMY CARTER

PRESIDENT OF USA 1977-1981

OCTOBER 2nd 2011

ANDREW MARR:

Since leaving the White House in 1981, Jimmy Carter has been the most internationally active ex-president in American history. He founded the Carter Center in Atlanta and he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for its work promoting democracy in healthcare. But Jimmy Carter's considered by many to have been a less than successful president during a time when the US economy and the Iran hostage crisis bedevilled his administration. At 87, President Carter, however, is as busy as ever, and he's going to be appearing at the South Bank Centre in London later on this week. When I spoke to him recently, he told me about his continuing involvement in the Middle East and why his country's role there has changed since the Arab Spring.

JIMMY CARTER:

I believe that at this time, in my lifetime, the United States has the lowest level of influence in the Middle East peace process than ever before, both within Israel and also within the Palestinian area and the general Arab world. So there's kind of a vacuum there that is very unfortunate. I think it's brought to a crisis an issue that has been dormant or going back and forth with no progress made at all during the last two or three decades, and now the Palestinians, being frustrated with two promises that President Obama made - one was no more settlements, and the other one was negotiations based on the 67 borders with modifications - we have failed to carry through on both those promises, and in the absence of any progress made, the Palestinians finally decided to take their case to the United Nations, both the Security Council and/or to the General Assembly.

ANDREW MARR:

The Carter Center that you founded after leaving the White House has been doing Nobel Peace winning work for decades. Do you see it as a model for other former presidents and ex-leaders?

JIMMY CARTER:

Well I think each one of us presidents and other leaders in Europe are different. I decided to go my own way. We deal with troubled elections; we've done more than eighty of them. We'll be going the next one next month, as a matter of fact, to Tunisia to monitor that election process. And we also deal with peace negotiations like in the Middle East where we try to maintain contact with all the entities involved. But our number one commitment as far as resources are concerned - both human resources, our employees and also our budget - is the alleviation of suffering from diseases, primarily in Africa.

ANDREW MARR:

During your presidency you faced a huge economic crisis, of course, very different from the one facing President Obama now. Nevertheless, what would be your advice to him?

JIMMY CARTER:

It was a different situation then. We had basically a balanced budget. The United States government indebtedness was extremely low. It wasn't an ingrained basic problem that we are facing now in both Europe and the United States where governments have overspent and developed enormous debts, can't meet their current obligations and are having to depend on the stronger nations to support the others. So I think there's two different questions. I believe that President Obama obviously understands the question better than I do and I think his latest proposal on job increase, based on a fifty billion dollar expenditure, would be a very good investment.

ANDREW MARR:

Now, like President Obama, when you were elected, you were the sort of face of optimism and hope for change. Do you think that the weight of expectation was simply too great both on his shoulders and on yours?

JIMMY CARTER:

I had a very harmonious and undivided nation and also an undivided congress base compared to what Obama has inherited. So I had a great advantage over President Obama and he has a completely different challenge in his own administration because the Republicans have basically pledged not to give him any support on any issue, even on things that they themselves proposed previously, in order to prevent his being re-elected. I didn't have that problem when I was in the White House.

ANDREW MARR:

And so what would you then see as your legacy?

JIMMY CARTER:

Well I think my legacy has been perpetuated, whatever it might be, between the presidency and the Carter Center by a commitment to peace instead of constant wars. During my term of office, we had many challenges - from the Soviet Union, from other sources - but we had peace as a priority and we maintained the peace of our own country and brought it to other people as well. And there was the insistence on the application of human rights as a foundation for democracy and freedom. For instance in Latin America during my term in office when I took office, the vast majority of Latin American countries were military dictatorships. Within five years after I left office, all of them had become democracies because we insisted on the rights of people to establish their own government. So I would say democracy and freedom, on the one hand, and human rights on the other, along with peace.

ANDREW MARR:

President Carter, thank you very much indeed for joining us.

JIMMY CARTER:

It's been a pleasure. Thank you.

INTERVIEW ENDS

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