women's rights

With Janet Yellen slated to become the next chair of the Federal Reserve, the nation is abuzz with the implications of her historic nomination. But while Yellen is the 28th woman Obama has chosen for an executive role, the percentage of women entering top political positions is still disproportionate to the percentage of women in the country. This is abundantly clear during election season. Though 2012 saw a record number of women elected as public officials, few women make it to the ballot in the first place. Why?

President Obama's nomination of the qualified, prescient, and eminently deserving Janet Yellen as the chairman (chairwoman?) of the Federal Reserve yesterday will make her — if confirmed — the first woman in history to hold the position. It's far from the only D.C. office never to be occupied by a boss with two X chromosomes: Just seven women are currently serving among the Obama administration's 23 cabinet-level jobs, and only 45 women have held such spots in the history of the country.

If Janet Yellen becomes head of the Federal Reserve, as she is expected to in January, she will become one of the most powerful women in the world. But who are the others? Yellen will be the first woman to head the mighty US Federal Reserve if she takes over at the central bank in January. Her job will be to maintain the stuttering recovery of the world's largest economy.

Chairwoman of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), Megawati Soekarnoputri, has urged more women to join politics in the hope that some of them would be the presidential candidates of the future. “We should have another woman president. I don’t know in what year, though,” Megawati said in a discussion about women and civilization held at the party’s headquarters in South Jakarta on Wednesday. She said she lamented the fact that so many women were reluctant to join politics these days. “Most of them say they aren’t given permission by their husbands,” she said.

Dr. Sima Samar, head of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC), has been named one of the Top 10 Most Influential Women in South and Central Asia for 2013 by Central and South Asia Business.

We invite our users to read the complete article published October 2 2013