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By Bae Ji-sook
Four female leaders who smashed through glass ceilings in the male-dominated political arena will gather in Seoul to attend the G20 summit. This will be the largest number of female heads of state present at one place in the history of the G20 summit.
They are Christina Fernandez de Kirchner, president of Argentina; Dilma Rousseff, president-elect of Brazil; Julia Gillard, prime minister of Australia and Angela Merkel, chancellor of Germany.
Margaret Thatcher, former United Kingdom prime minister of 14 years was known as the “iron lady,” for her ruthless policies and refusal to back down in negotiations.
Her devotion was in many times downplayed as ruthlessness and he vision was often degraded as intuition.
All eyes are now on whether the new breed of female leaders will be able to speak up about complicated issues such as currency devaluation, International Monetary Fund reforms and other thorny international issues.
Breaking the glass ceiling
Despite different backgrounds, the four have one thing in common ― they have been always titled as the “first women to be…”
Merkel, 56, is the first female chancellor of Germany and the youngest in the post-war period.
With her strong willingness and thrust, she helped the country be minimally damaged by the global financial meltdown in 2008 and even helped other European countries get out of trouble.
She won her second term in the 2009 general election.
Gillard is also the first female prime minister in Australia. She started her high-ranking official career as an education minister under the Kevin Rudd administration in 2006 then was elected as prime minister herself. She once worked as a lawyer.
De Kirchner, often dubbed as Fernandez after her maiden name, has the title of the first “couple president.” She started her career by helping her husband, the late former President Nestor Kirchner, while working as a lawyer.
Dilma Rousseff is not yet president but will be visiting Seoul with the current President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, whose term ends at the end of the year.
She is also the first female to be elected as president in the South American state. The Korean government has been keen on forging ties with the new comer and has invited her to the welcome reception on Thursday and the gala dinner on Friday.
Gillard is known to be direct and stern. De Kirchner has the moniker the “Thatcher of South America,” or “Hillary (Clinton) of Argentina,” for helping her husband build his career first and having fought her way to the top after.
Rousseff is no girl-next-door either. At the age of 16, she joined a faction of the Brazilian Socialist Party and participated in guerilla activities.
However, the Seoul Summit will be a big challenge for these leaders to show off their leadership skills.
The meeting will be especially tough for de Kirchner as she is still in mourning for her husband, who passed away on Oct. 27. Now she has to prove to the world that she is fully independent from her late husband’s regency.
Gillard and Merkel are challenged to distribute their power to improve the lives of fellow females around the world: one of the summit agenda issues will be aiding developing countries and many people are hoping the leaders will bring freedom for financial deals among women in these countries ― two thirds of adults in developing countries, or 2.7 billion people, don’t have access to a saving or checking account.
“We know that when women are accorded equal rights and afforded equal opportunities, they drive social and economic progress. But for many women, the financial tools to lift themselves and their families out of poverty or to take small business to the next level are still out of reach,” said Hilary Clinton, U.S. secretary of state, in her opening speech at the women’s agenda forum held at the National Assembly, Tuesday, urging G20 leaders to lift the barriers and open a new era for underprivileged women.
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