Today is the International Women's Day. The 8th of March has been designated to celebrate the women achievements regarding social and political rights, and to remember discriminations and violence that women are still facing in the World.



It is positive to celebrate the role of women. But it is also sad that we still have to talk about gender discrimination. And the worst aspect of this celebration is listening some politicians (male) speeches, where they point out how women are important in our life, but in practice they are less available to leave space in the political system to them.

The women condition in Europe seems much better than in the rest of the World. But, just to remind some numbers:

- there is a discrepancy of salaries about 16% between women and men for the same kind of job (from 30% in Estonia till 2.5% in Slovenia);

- the women member of a Parliament are just the 20% of the total;

- considering the most important EU Members, just Germany has a female Prime Minister (Uk has had a long experience with Margaret Thatcher, France had a female premier for few months in the early 80s, whilst Italy and Spain never had a woman to lead a Government).

- in the top 50 World's Most Powerful People listed by Forbes, there are just 5 women: Angela Merkel (5th, German Prime Minister) , Janet Yellen (6th, Head of the Federal Reserve), Dilma Rousseff (31st, President of Brazil), Christine Lagarde (33th, Head of the IMF), Park Geun-hye (46th, President of South Korea).

(For some information about the violence against women, please refer to the lat post about Ozgecan Aslan).

The situation is much better than fifty years ago. But let's try to avoid rhetoric and let's go ahead to create the right condition toward a real gender equality.

Happy Women's Day