Introduced by the tycoon Lakshmi Niwas Mittal at the World Steel Association, the top administration official argued that the international system is changing and hence 'great, large countries' would have to be accommodated in that global framework.
"... we have been trying to build over these last several years to expand access to the global economy. We have indeed been deepening our engagement with emerging economic leaders.
"We have strong relationships with China, and with India, where I just visited, and with Brazil, and with others.
"Because international system is changing, and the emergence of these great, large economies has got to be accommodated in an international framework," Rice told the gathering in Washington.
Highlighting the importance of education and global engagement, Rice cited the contribution of high-skilled Indian professionals in the America's IT revolution.
"On the subcontinent, where I just visited in India, a place where universities
are springing up all over to bring innovation and technology to the core so that those great Indian software scientists who are populating my home, the Silicon Valley, might also populate Hyderabad," Rice observed.
She also pointed out the need for educating women across the world as an important measure to put nations on the path of democracies.
"Whether in Afghanistan, where finally girls are going to school and women are learning, and that they're learning that they ought to be in the parliament of Afghanistan; or in West Asia, where women's education is making great strides or whether in Africa, we know that if women are educated and given a chance, they don't just lift up their families, they lift up whole villages," Rice said.
She said the US has convened the Major Economies framework to seek a new and better approach to the interrelated issues of climate change, energy security, and economic growth globally.
"... No nation is going to be able to withdraw from the world, to isolate itself and to deny the realities of a 21st century in which we are all integrated and entangled with one another... the siren song of protectionism is a self-defeating and self-destructive proposition," Rice said.
