Women

The World Economic Forum posted the 2009 Global Gender Gap Report today, its yearly survey of gender inequality based on economic, political, educational and health factors.  For the first time, two African nations entered the top 10 rankings:  South Africa at #6 position (up from #22 in 2008) and Lesotho in the #10 slot (up from #16 in 2008).

The increased ranking for South Africa is due to increases in parliamentary and ministerial positions for women under the new government. Lesotho holds its strong position thanks to its lack of gender gap in health and education services.

These advances for South Africa may come as a surprise to many who feared for women's empowerment in South Africa following the May election of President Jacob Zuma, a practicing polygamist and accused rapist.

The World Economic Forum reports that two thirds of countries surveyed have made reduction in their gender gaps since 2006. However, the United States fell four spots since last year, coming in at #31 on the list. It looks like the death of macho due to the global recession may not be occurring as quickly as some expected. In any case, the United States is not alone in its loss of gender equality; Germany, the United Kingdom and France also saw declines in their rankings since last year.

Unsurprisingly, the bottom of the list remained largely unchanged from last year with Yemen, Chad, Pakistan, Benin, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran continuing to boast the world's worst gender gaps.

ALEXANDER JOE/AFP/Getty Images

The Financial Times reports on a new cottage industry in Korea -- matchmaking services pairing South Korean men with women who defect from North Korea:

Defying the gloom among small businesses in South Korea, Mr Hong predicts a rosy future for his enterprise, run from a small office in the suburbs of Seoul. Driven by a haemorrhaging economy, defections from the authoritarian North are soaring, and the overwhelming majority of asylum seekers are women. Of the 2,809 defections registered last year – up from 1,043 in 2001 – 2,197 were women.

In 2006 Mr Hong was the second South Korean to open a specialist agency finding husbands for them, but his niche market is exploding. The 39-year-old has identified 10 competitors, most of them established last year.

Mr Hong’s own match certainly lends credibility to his business. His wife, Kang Ok-shil, defected from North Korea in 2002 and has a crucial foothold in defectors’ social networks. They have named their agency Nam-nam-buk-kyo, an ancient adage meaning “the south’s got the boys, the north’s got the girls”.

Mrs Kang, a 41-year-old former electrical worker, says many North Korean women see South Korean men as less domineering. “North Korean men are more authoritarian. North Korean men have the perception that men are the sky and women are the ground,” she says, quoting a famous Korean aphorism.

South Korea’s unification ministry offers less romantic reasons for the disparity. The men in the North are trapped in military service, often for 10 years or more. Women become the breadwinners and are increasingly involved in cross-border trading, presenting opportunities to defect. Many women are also trafficked into prostitution and hostess bars.

While South Korea has a skyrocketing divorce rate, the company claims that almost none of the marriages they have arranged have broken up. They attribute this to the fact that “North Korean women are more persevering."

Amidst the continued debate and controversy surrounding South African world champion runner, Caster Semenya, South African officials have gone a bit overboard in their outrage about gender testing procedures used by IAAF. In regard to revoking Semenya's title, South African Sports Minister Makhenkesi Stofile stated earlier today:

"I think it would be the third world war. We will go to the highest levels in contesting such a decision. I think it would be totally unfair and totally unjust."

AFP/Getty Images

If you got it, flaunt it. At least that's what my grandmother used to say, and I imagine if she could see the campaign ads coming out of Germany this week, she'd probably laugh. And Vera Lengsfeld, who is running for a parliament seat in Germany's upcoming September elections, is banking on the fact that constituents will have a sense of humor.

The ad (shown above) pairs pictures of Lengsfeld and none other than Chancellor Angela Merkel, shoulder to shoulder showcasing the bountiful assets bestowed upon them by Mother Nature -- two very ample bosoms barely contained by two seriously wide and plunging necklines. The line that runs across reads: "We have more to offer."

No doubt, where there's more chest, there's more attention. Lengsfeld, who did not clear the ads with Merkel, reports that traffic to her blog has increased, getting as many as 17,000 visitors since this campaign went public.

Her takeaway on all this? 

If only a tenth of them also look at the content of my policies, then I will have reached many more people than I could have done with classic street canvassing."

It's an interesting acknowledgement on Lengsfeld's part, she's clearly aware that the show-stopping photos aren't appealing to the thinking minds of men and women, though it sounds as though she's hoping the ad's wit will trump the old T&A approach.

Many of those not laughing are likely to be women who find the posters, and the ploy behind them, cheap and offensive. The glass ceiling runs far and wide, thicker over some places than others, and apparently the profiles of men cast long shadows, even over the most powerful women in global politics. Truthfully, I'd like to see a man foolish enough to market his campaign "package" in the same fashion ... Or has Berlusconi kind of done that already?

MICHAEL GOTTSCHALK/AFP/Getty Images

Nepal has to get some credit for creativity with its public policy.

Following an official's recent suggestion of pocketless pants as a method to reduce airport corruption, the Nepalese government has a new plan. To keep widows integrated into society the government will provide a $650 grant to men who marry them.

The government says that "single women," as widows are known in Nepal, are often neglected by society, particularly in rural communities. The subsidy is supposed to help by reducing the stigma attached to widows, who traditionally lose their status when their husband dies.

Widows and women's groups however, were less than thrilled, and around 200 marched in protest yesterday in Kathmandu (pictured at left) telling the government to reverse its decision.

From AFP: 

Women chanting slogans and waving placards that read "We don't want government dowries" and "Don't put a price on your mother" marched to the government's headquarters to hand over a letter of protest.

The BBC coverage a few weeks ago helps explain the widows' point of view:

Widows like 29-year-old Nisha Swar, whose husband was killed by Maoist fighters six years ago, say the policy of offering payment for remarriage could lead to discrimination.

"Men could want to be with us for the sake of getting the 50,000 rupees. It is like putting a price tag on our head and we are very humiliated by this," she says.

Her friend, 30-year-old widow Poonam Pathak, agrees.

"I feel embarrassed because now anybody walking on the road could say, look, there's a widow! I could get 50,000 rupees if I married her," she says.

So far, the government has defended its decision, but even if it is overturned the publicity is a good sign: at least Nepal is concerned about improving the status of widows.

PRADEEP SHRESTHA/AFP/Getty Images

Back in February, Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah appointed Noura Al-Faiz as deputy minister for education, the highest post a woman has ever reached in Saudi government. The appointment was hailed far and wide as a sign of Saudi Arabia reforming its government and its stance of women's rights - TIME Magazine even named al-Faiz to its TIME 100. But perhaps that excitement came prematurely:

 

Noura al-Faiz today confounded advocates of greater equality when she said she could not appear on television without permission.

"I don't take my veil off and I will not appear on television unless it is allowed for us to do so," she told the daily Shams newspaper, which published a picture of Faiz wearing a headscarf with her face showing.

She also dismissed calls for girls to be allowed to do sport at school. "It's way too early," the paper reported her as saying[...]

At the time she said she was confident her appointment was not tokenism and that other women would be appointed to government jobs. Sceptics wondered, however, whether the new minister would wield any real power, or whether she would suffer the fate of other women who had been appointed to lower councils and sunk without trace.

Perhaps TIME should have reconsidered when they could not find a photo of her to use for their feature (Google only found a blurry picture of her photo in a Saudi paper).

The new speaker of India's lower house of Parliament, the Lok Sabha, breaks the glass ceiling:

India’s lower house of parliament elected Meira Kumar, a former diplomat and five-term Congress party lawmaker, as speaker, the first time a woman has been chosen to run a male-dominated chamber known for its rowdy debates and frequent walkouts.

Kumar, 64, was the only candidate and had the support of the ruling Congress-led coalition and the alliance led by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party. Her appointment as speaker, or presiding officer, was announced by stand-in speaker Manik Rao Gavit in the Lok Sabha, or lower house, in New Delhi today[...]

The speaker conducts the proceedings of the house and occupies a pivotal position in India’s democracy, the world’s largest.

For the most part, female leadership is nothing new for India -- Indira Gandhi was prime minister from 1980 until her assasination in 1984, and her daughter-in-law Sonia has been president of the Congress Party for over a decade. But the Lok Sabha, despite having more female members than ever, is still almost 90 percent male.

While the headlines have focused mostly on gender, though, it is also noteworthy that Kumar is a Dalit--also known as an "untouchable"--a member of the lowest class in India's caste system. With the recent success of a Dalit-led political party, the Bahujin Samaj party, Kumar's election may be a victory for Congress with not one, but two key voter groups.

RAVEENDRAN/AFP/Getty Images

Ida Odinga, wife of Kenyan prime minister Raila Odinga, has joined a Lysistrata-like nationwide sex boycott aimed at forcing the countries leaders to overcome a political impasse.

Kenyan women's groups started the boycott in an effort to end the feud between the factions led by Mr. Odinga and President Mwai Kibaki that has paralyzed Kenya's government for weeks. Kenya's Federation of Women Lawyers has urged the wives of both leaders to withold sex from their husbands until the feud is resolved. The president of the group told the BBC: 

"Great decisions are made during pillow talk, so we are asking the two ladies at that intimate moment to ask their husbands: 'Darling can you do something for Kenya?'"

The group has also said it's willing to pay prostitutes in order to make the ban more effective. No word yet on whether Kibaki's notoriously short-tempered wife Lucy will join the movement.

Kenyans have many good reasons to want the feud resolved, but I suspect that no longer having to hear allusions to Mwai Kibaki's sex life should be reason enough by itself. 

Update: Jimi Izrael also weighed in on this story at our sister site, The Root.