Robert McNamara Interview: Conversations with History; Institute of International Studies, UC Berkeley
Page 3 of 8
People in philosophy and political science departments spend a lot of time thinking about the role of contemplation versus the role of action. Clearly you as a person, although you never took a formal academic position, have understood these tensions and ambivalences, and I sense in your career that these two selves were talking to each other in a dialogue.
That's right, and at times I think there is a tension between what you call contemplation and action, but I think there is less tension than most people believe. I myself believe a person of action, let's say an administrator if you will, should put more weight on contemplation, should put more weight on establishing values in his mind, establishing goals and objectives for himself, for his organization and those he's associated with. Let me phrase it very simplistically; I don't believe there's a contradiction between a soft heart and a hard head. In a sense I don't believe there's a contradiction between contemplation and action. Action should be founded on contemplation, and those of us who act don't put enough time, don't give enough emphasis, to contemplation.
Is there a problem in the sense that the logic of action leads down paths that you might not have originally thought through?
Oh yes, but when I said those of us who have focused more on action than contemplation should put more weight on contemplation, I'm thinking particularly of contemplation that establishes objectives and particularly establishes values. If you look at the auto industry just as an illustration, we had tremendous controversy over safety, and there was an attitude in the auto industry that it should not be concerned about safety -- talking about safety will scare people away. It will be hard for you and your audience to believe this, but this is exactly the attitude that existed in the 1950s. If you talk safety to the public and say we are going to do certain things to automobiles, put in seat belts or padded instrument panels, or design the cars so the doors won't spring open and so on, reducing the injuries in the event of an accident, you'll scare people away from using automobiles. Therefore, the auto industry was in a real sense opposed to an emphasis on safety, either in design or in marketing.
I pushed that in the mid 1950s, but there was tremendous opposition. Eventually, when the rest of the industry saw that we were doing it, they came along -- GM and Chrysler as well as Ford. Ford introduced safety in its 1956 models, which were introduced and marketed in September 1955. GM and Chrysler models had some of the same characteristics at the same time, but we pushed it in our marketing. It turned out that the 1956 Ford, for reasons totally unrelated to safety, did not sell as well as the 1956 Chevrolet. The Automotive News, a trade paper, in the spring of 1956 said that "McNamara sells safety, Chevrolet sells cars." Now my simple point is that this was in a sense a reflection of lack of contemplation, if you want to call it. The objective and responsibility of the auto industry should be to produce safer cars. Cheaper cars, more functional cars, more environmentally sustainable cars.
So what then is the key to shaking up an organization so it moves down these new directions?
Well, I think to try first to ensure in your own mind that there's no contradiction between what I call a soft heart and a hard head, or there's no contradiction between what I'll call social values on the one hand and a firm's financial strength and sustainability on the other. That's what I was really first trying to prove to myself and then trying to prove to others. When I left Ford Motor Company, I was planning and had started preparations toward introducing a small car into this country. I had earlier introduced the Falcon which was a move toward a smaller car, but I was planning to introduce a truly small car which would have been the first small car made by any one of the big three companies. After I left that model program was canceled. Now there were reasons for cancellation, but I think that the cancellation failed to recognize the social value of a car of lesser weight. You didn't have to have a car of 4,000 pounds to take a single person, say a housewife, to the market to shop or to drive her children to school. You could have a car of 3,000 pounds and that would save a thousand pounds of scarce material and labor; it would save fuel as well.
Let me take an illustration of today: what are the petroleum executives of this country contemplating today in relation to their industry when they oppose action that will move our country toward increasing the fuel efficiency of our automotive vehicles? I just read the other day that gasoline consumption has risen, I think they said 25 percent from 1980 until today. And that is disgraceful. In the first place, our automotive fuel consumption per capita is roughly twice that of, say, Germany. And this is a problem. It's an environmental problem: we are putting more greenhouse gas emissions in the upper atmosphere that are going to lead to climate change. It's a financial problem: it costs us far more. It's a security problem, this fuel comes out of the Middle East and we are more dependent on a very volatile region. We are not buying anything for it. We are not buying greater comfort, more convenience, or greater mobility. We could achieve the comfort, the convenience, the safety, and the mobility with much greater fuel efficiency. The automobile industry today, I think responsibly, would move toward greater fuel efficiency. The petroleum companies are not willing to do so. There are some exceptions, I think Shell would be willing to support it (I was a director of Shell), but most of the other companies are not willing to do so.
Now I come back to contemplation. I think it is the responsibility of a leader, an action-oriented individual in our society, whether public sector leader or private sector leader, to contemplate as well as to act and to think about his role in society. And I want to suggest that the role in society of a petroleum executive today, in addition to making profits for his company, ought to be to help society increase efficiency in the use of petroleum. I don't think they think of themselves that way. They should.
Definitely leaders of private organizations don't and sometimes one can even wonder about our political leaders, which leads me to a question. Why did you never run for public office as a man who combines this contemplation with action?
Well, let me say that before the election of 1964, when Johnson was running against
Goldwater, Lyndon Johnson asked me if I would accept nomination as his vice
president and I said "No." 
I
said no and I'll tell you in a moment why I said no, but I also should hasten
to add that knowing Lyndon Johnson as well as I did, I don't want to say that
had I said "Yes" he
would have pushed the nomination. He might well have come along a week or two
later and said "Bob, I'm so grateful to you for accepting my invitation to serve
as vice president but I just couldn't ask Margaret" -- my wife -- "or your children
to accept that sacrifice. I know what it would mean to your family. So as happy
as I am for you to accept it, you shouldn't." But I didn't [accept].
Why did I say no? Not because I didn't put great value on public service; as a matter of fact I think if I had my life to live over again, I would seek to develop the capability to run for elective office. I think it is one of the highest forms of service to our society. At the time I was wise enough to know that I didn't have that ability. I had not run for anything. You shouldn't start your elective career running for the vice presidency, so I was very wise, I think, in turning him down but, as I say, if I had my life to live over again I would try to develop a capability to succeed in elective office.
And is the virtue of politics that there's a feedback mechanism that you have your ears to the ground and in essence hear what the people say?
I think that's a requirement for successful politicians. The virtue of politics to me is that you are serving your country, you are serving your people, and I think that's one of the highest forms of human activity.
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