Recognising

This, the international community has encouraged countries to keep at least 30 percent of seats in national parliaments reserved for women, as a stepping stone to a time when women will hold fully half the world’s positions of leadership.

There have also been 27 elected women presidents and 42 women prime ministers since 1945. The elections of three more women heads of state—Angela Merkel in Germany, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf in Liberia, and Chile’s Michelle Bachelet—made political waves in the latter part of 2005 and early 2006. Bachelet, for one, put women’s rights front and center in her campaign and has a record of improving laws for women relating to divorce, sexual harassment, and domestic abuse. Johnson Sirleaf is the first elected female president in Africa and managed to defeat a popular football star in Liberia’s first election after 14 years of civil war. But whether these new leaders have the will and capacity—given other priorities—to bring unique proposals to the table remains to be seen.

For more information see www.unmillenniumproject.org

Back Women Worldwide

Back: Home