City Beat | Gender equality should be more than having a female leader or just talking about it on International Women’s Day
- Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam tried to bring about changes to the city’s gender landscape, after making history as the first woman to take up the top job in 2017
- But policy and leadership matter more for any leader, regardless of gender. And the public cannot pin too much hope on the gender of a leader for equality either
Perhaps it was just an unhappy coincidence, but any hope for the world’s superpower to elect its first female president was dashed just ahead of International Women’s Day when US Senator Elizabeth Warren pulled out of the Democratic Party nomination race.
It will now be left to one of two men, Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders, to challenge incumbent President Donald Trump.
Warren’s decision to quit has triggered a new round of debate on the “electability” of a woman candidate – she was not even able to get as far as Hillary Clinton, who at least managed to reach the final stage as an official presidential candidate before Trump defeated her back in 2016.
Moving beyond the election itself, Warren’s case has raised an evergreen issue: how much does gender matter in winning public support?
Sociologists are fascinated by this subject, and as we celebrate International Women’s Day, it is worth contemplating as the gender issue makes headlines again.