Female top politicians world wide? An international comparison of women in political leadership positions

For more than four decades, women occupy political leadership positions as head of state / government or opposition leaders. I was part of a one-year graduate student research seminar at the University of Duisburg-Essen where students of social and political sciences analyzed the phenomenon of female political leadership in an international comparison (Latin America, Europe, sub-Saharan Africa, Asia). Our guiding questions were:

1. Which types of political recruitment and participation exist on the legislative and executive level?


2. How did female top politicians assume leadership positions, i.e. which career paths can be identified?


3. What is their political agenda?


4. How are they perceived and evaluated by the general public?

Only those female top politicians were considered who served for more than one year as head of state or government. In addition, we also looked into one of the regions which still represents a white spot on the political landscape of women: the Middle East.