Women's Leadership

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says New Zealand has an “even stronger” footing to speak on gender equality as lawmakers past and present celebrated Parliament becoming one of few in the world to be the majority women.

Dame Jenny Shipley, the first woman prime minister, and former prime minister Helen Clark were among the political figures to speak at an event in Parliament on Wednesday night after Labour MP Soraya Peke-Mason was last month sworn in as the 177th woman MP.

“We got here through blood, sweat and electoral reform,” Ardern said.

Click here to read the full article published by Stuff on 10 November 2022.

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has developed a 10-Point Action Agenda for Advancing Gender Equality in Crisis Settings (10PAA), a roadmap to guide its development programming towards results that will help transform and advance gender equality in crisis contexts and achieve the Women, Peace and Security agenda. The 10PAA is central to UNDP’s new Crisis Offer, as well as its new Gender Equality Strategy 2022-2025. It represents a strong corporate commitment to addressing the most stubborn roots of gender inequalities.  

The 10PAA is the result of a broad consultation process that aimed at finding entry points to strengthen gender-transformational results and women’s leadership and participation in crisis contexts. It is grounded in the understanding that deep-rooted, intersectional discrimination sits at the heart of the multiple challenges humanity faces and reinforces models of dominance that exclude and leave women behind, especially in crisis settings.  

Click here to access the publication.

In December 2020, Sustineo was engaged UN Women under the Women in Leadership in Samoa (WILS) Project to lead the design and implementation of Research on Leadership Pathways of Women in Samoa.

The purpose was to better understand the barriers that hinder Samoan women’s access to leadership roles across different levels of society and to identify innovative strategies to support women’s access to leadership.

The research had four objectives:

1. To identify pathways of leadership for Samoan women.
2. To identify factors that facilitate women’s access to leadership in Samoa and factors that create barriers.
3. To identify strategies used by Samoan women leaders to gain access to leadership positions.
4. To identify innovative strategies for development partners on how to support and encourage an increase in women’s access to leadership in Samoa.

These research objectives were investigated through a mixed-method approach, drawing primarily on qualitative data.

Click here to access the report.

This chapter surveys the literature on gender and politics in Portugal, focusing on explanations for gender differences in political participation and representation. We map trends in women’s inclusion in key areas of political life: from conventional to unconventional political participation, to the election of women to parliamentary parties (descriptive representation), and responsiveness to women’s policy demands (substantive representation). Examining Portugal in comparative perspective, we highlight the crucial roles of state feminism, women activists within parties, and strategic incentives for parties to advance gender equality. We propose several avenues for developing future research which leverages the Portuguese case, including the downstream impacts of political gender quotas, intersectional and non-binary analysis, and the symbolic impact of women’s inclusion in public life.

Click here to access the article.

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu has become a target for white supremacists. Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal of Washington was stalked outside her house by a man with a gun. And New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez receives an “astronomical” number of threats on a daily basis.

Politics has become increasingly dangerous for women in the United States, where they are three times more likely than their male colleagues to be targeted, according to a new national database.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if a senator or House member were killed,” Sen. Susan Collins of Maine recently told The New York Times.

Click here to read the full article published by Forbes on 2 November 2022.

Linda Thomas-Greenfield and Gayle Smith on the choices they had to make to succeed, and why — from Iran to Afghanistan to America’s heartland — they think today’s young women will build a better world.

Linda Thomas-Greenfield and Gayle Smith both know what it’s like to be the only woman in the room. “I seethe every time I think about it,” says Thomas-Greenfield, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, recalling the moment at a U.N. meeting when a man across the table told her, “we thought you were going to be a good girl.”

Fearful of being labeled an “angry Black woman” she bit her tongue, and regrets it to this day.

In the latest installment of POLITICO’s 15 Conversations series, Thomas-Greenfield talks with Smith, a former USAID administrator, President Joe Biden’s global Covid response coordinator and now head of the ONE Campaign, about how to make sure more women are involved in crafting the future of the world — and why that would be better for everyone.

Click here to access the video.