Mandela's Code of Respect

When students fill out paperwork to enter Basic Education classes, they have to read and sign a Code of Conduct form promising to behave themselves in the classroom. It's a shame we have to waste the paper on the obvious, but there have been incidents and lawyers must make a living too. But when a student seems overly intimidated by the two-column legalese, I say, "Look, just respect the other students who are working alongside you. That's all this code means: respect one another."

I thought of that Code as I watched and read of memorials this past week to the late President of South Africa, Nelson Mandela. Surrounded by a world-wide celebration of his life, I reflected on the qualities of a Code of Respect, the basis for the Mandela legend.

One network correspondent summed his life saying Mandela believed that no one was above him. He would not acknowledge the power that others had over him, even as a prisoner for twenty-seven long years. Stories said he respected his jailers as fellow human beings, but would not bow to the system of apartheid that they represented. It takes an amazing inner reserve to respect your opponents without agreeing with them and then, in turn, to earn their respect by your strength of convictions.

Left unsaid by the reporter but equally true is just as Mandela believed no one was above him, he also believed no one was below him. He offered equal respect for people from all social and economic, racial and ethnic levels. This is what gave him his generous spirit that was loved by his countrymen and admired by the world. So many of the tributes during the past week spoke of vignettes that showed Mandela's humor and common touch when he walked among his people and focused on their individual stories. 

But respect, it seems to me, needs to crystalize within us before we can project it into the world. We need to begin our personal Mandela transformation by really, honestly, and openly accepting who we are. Self-respect may be the hardest part of the personal Code to form, because we all are too aware of our faults, gifts, and gaffes. Even Mandela. He once asked his followers, "Do not judge me by my successes, but judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again."

A life lived in a Code of Respect is an ideal that few of us can achieve on a consistent basis, which is why, I suppose, we need to be reminded of it as we sign classroom Codes of Conduct. It is also why we are attracted like moths to shining examples, like Mandela, who show us that we have the power to rise above daily pettiness and indecision that mires us to baser instincts. As Mandela once said, "A good head and a good heart are always a formidable combination."