A day to celebrate achievements. »
Margaret Thatcher was not the first of her gender to lead a nation. Historians bestow that honour on Khertek Amyrbitovna AnchimaaToka and Sükhbaataryn Yanjmaa, heads of state of the Tuvan People’s Republic in the 1940s and Mongolia in the 1950s, respectively.
In fact, Thatcher was not even the first to acquire the title of Iron Lady, notwithstanding the biopic of that name currently in theatres, starring Meryl Streep, who won an Oscar for her portrayal. Years before Thatcher’s reign, Golda Meir was dubbed the Iron Lady of Israeli politics when she served as the country’s prime minister from 1969 to 1974. Meir was the third woman in modern times to serve as a prime minister, after Sirimavo Bandaranaike of Sri Lanka and Indira Gandhi of India.
Of course, women have ruled since biblical times: Deborah from the Book of Judges led her people to victory over the Canaanites. Theodora, Empress of Byzantium in the sixth century, was arguably more influential than her husband, Justinian. Cleopatra was the last Pharaoh in Egypt 50 years before the birth of Jesus Christ.
Women continued to hold positions of authority through millennia and, at the close of the 19th century, Empress Cixi of China was said to be more powerful than her contemporary Queen Victoria.
However, recorded history has not given women their due. Women have had to fight for the right to vote, be trained and hold public office and for better pay and working conditions — causes that spawned the first International Women’s Day in 1911.
Some of these battles — pay equity or proportional representation in government, for example — have yet to be won. Women comprise only 25 per cent of members in the House of Commons, though they outnumber men in the population by roughly 275,000. This is not a trivial matter. Equal participation of women and men in public life is one of the cornerstones of the 1979 United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women ( CEDAW), of which Canada is a signatory.
The Geneva- based Inter- Parliamentary Union, an international organization of parliaments established in 1889, has set the minimum benchmark to ensure a critical mass of female parliamentarians at 30 per cent. The world average is 19.5 per cent.
So there’s still much work to do as we mark the 101st International Women’s Day today. But there’s also much to celebrate. While it’s true that women are under- represented in Canada’s Parliament, the 452 female candidates, of whom 76 were elected in 2011, set a record on both counts.
A review of who’s who in international politics and finance reveals that women rank among the most powerful and influential people in the world. There are 18 women leading their countries including Chancellor Angela Merkel in Germany, President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner in Argentina, President Dilma Rousseff in Brazil, President Laura Chinchilla in Costa Rica, Prime Minister Julia Gillard in Australia, Prime Minister Helle Thorning- Schmidt in Denmark, President Pratibha Patil in India, Swiss President Eveline Widmer- Schlumpf and Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra in Thailand. Women also head the government in Liberia, Iceland, Bangladesh, Kosovo, Mali, Slovakia, Lithuania, and Trinidad and Tobago.
But heading a government is not the only avenue to power and influence. The most powerful woman in Europe is arguably Christine Lagarde, managing director of the International Monetary Fund. The future of the European Union is in her hands.
Forbes magazine lists among the most powerful women Indra Nooyi, chief executive of Pepsico; Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook; Irene Rosenfeld, CEO of Kraft Foods; Mary Schapiro, chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission; Jill Abramson, executive editor of the New York Times; Anne Sweeney, president of the Disney- ABC Television Group; Safra Catz, president of Oracle; Ellen Kullman, CEO of Dupont; Andrea Jung, CEO of Avon; Amy Pascal, co- chair of Sony Pictures; and Carol Bartz, CEO of Yahoo!; to name a few.
There are many others who make the Earth move including Hillary Clinton, Janet Napolitano, Aung San Suu Kyi, Arianna Huffington, J. K. Rowling, Tina Brown, and Margaret Chan ( director general of the World Health Organization). Then there are entertainers whose influence stretches far beyond stage and screen including Oprah Winfrey, Lady Gaga, Beyonce Knowles, Angelina Jolie and Ellen Degeneres.
There is no lack of women who hold the power to change the world — only a lack of awareness of that fact. International Women’s Day is an occasion to recognize their achievement and to encourage more women to take their rightful place as equal participants in every segment of society — especially in those countries where oppression of women is still the cultural norm if not the law of the land.
There is no place in the modern world for prejudice against women. Let’s resolve to stamp it out.