Breaking Barriers? Women's Representation and Leadership at the United Nations
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Global Governance 20 (2014), 37–54
Breaking Barriers?
Women’s Representation and
Leadership at the United Nations
Kirsten Haack
The appointment of Christine Lagarde in 2011 to the leadership of the In-
ternational Monetary Fund may have been a highlight for women’s repre-
sentation in international organizations, suggesting that the final glass
ceiling for women in global governance has been broken. However, this
article shows that leadership and representation by women in global gov-
ernance continues to be curtailed by “glass walls” on the one hand, and
flexible glass ceilings on the other. While women in UN agencies today
stand on firmer floors, relying on a stronger institutional framework and
increasing numbers of women working at all levels of the UN system,
women are channeled into gender-specific portfolios, creating glass walls.
Moreover, glass ceilings, once shattered, may indeed resettle as recent
staff changes by Ban Ki-moon show. Thus, the picture of women’s repre-
sentation and gender equality in UN leadership is a mixed one. KEYWORDS:
United Nations, women, leadership.
EVIDENCE TO SUPPORT THE CLAIM THAT THE UN NOW TAKES SERIOUSLY
women’s issues, gender equality, and the representation of women in all areas
of society, including the UN and its leadership, appears to be rich and var-
ied. In his annual report on the workings of the United Nations, Secretary-
General Ban Ki-moon has repeatedly raised the issue of women, women’s
equality, and the prevention of violence against women and girls. In 2009 the
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against
Women (CEDAW) marked its thirtieth anniversary, followed in 2010 by the
establishment of the UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of
Women (UN Women), which had been on the agenda of the Commission on
the Status of Women (CSW) for some time. In 2011 Christine Lagarde
became managing director of one of the most important and, certainly dur-
ing the current financial crisis, most prominent international organizations,
the International Monetary Fund (IMF). At the Rio+20 meeting in June 2012,
women leaders of eight countries (presidents and prime ministers of Brazil,
Costa Rica, Lithuania, Jamaica, Australia, Denmark, Iceland, and Switzer-
land) pledged to “use [their] leadership positions to advance gender equality
and women’s empowerment in the context of sustainable development in
[their] respective countries and internationally, carrying this vision forward
3738 Breaking Barriers?
here at Rio+20 and beyond.”1 As the UN Committee on the Elimination of
Discrimination Against Women concluded its latest session in July 2012,
after thirty years of monitoring CEDAW’s implementation, UN Women
reflected on what The Interdependent identified as “the most critical issue . .
. for women’s equality today: women’s political representation.”2 Michelle
Bachelet, xecutive director of UN Women, called on representatives at
CEDAW’s meeting to remember the formula of 30-30-30: “At the 30th
anniversary of the CEDAW Committee, more than 30 countries have 30 per-
cent or more women parliamentarians, and we are joining forces to achieve
gender parity by 2030.” She reminded representatives that women’s equal
representation was a matter of “justice and democracy,” improving the qual-
ity of representation in general but in particular that of women’s concerns,
and also highlighted women leaders as “positive role models for young
women and girls and boys.”3
This snapshot of activity paints a positive picture of women’s issues at
the UN. Yet despite these declarations, the UN has paid more attention to
women’s issues in member states than inside its own organization, as many
women have attested to in the past.4 Indeed, with a history of UN peace-
keepers “billing” for prostitutes,5 systematic prevention of women’s advance-
ment and the first woman to be appointed to a leadership position only in
1987, the UN has not always led by example where gender equality and
women’s rights are concerned.
In this article I demonstrate that, while the representation of women and
women’s issues is intimately connected to women’s participation in UN lead-
ership, access to UN executive office continues to be constrained. After brief
references to existing research on women in politics, I apply the concept of
representation in the context of UN leadership. I show that, while women
have increasingly gained a foothold in UN leadership and are standing on
firmer floors, some barriers—namely, “glass walls” and to some extent glass
ceilings—remain. Indeed, references to the materiality of glass mask the per-
sistence of the barriers that women face. Instead, I demonstrate that these bar-
riers are flexible, potentially moving back into position as recent staff
changes undertaken by Ban show. Thus, beyond UN gender policy applicable
in the field and member states, UN leadership remains one of the last areas of
women’s representation to be addressed within the broader context of UN
activity.
Women and Leadership
Recent studies that have analyzed leadership at the UN investigated either
formal leadership, such as that of the Secretary-General, or more informal
types of leadership, such as “norm entrepreneurship”, exercised by individu-
als in all types of roles—Secretaries-General, chairpersons, diplomats,
experts, or bureaucrats.6 While accounts, such as those of the UN IntellectualKirsten Haack 39
History Project, do note contributions made by women as part of the UN’s
history, the question of gender has not received any particular attention in this
regard. Where the selection of candidates for leadership positions in UN
agencies was concerned in the past, the question of regional representation
(i.e., the gentleman’s agreement that sees positions such as that of the Secre-
tary-General rotate between the various regions) has dominated the discus-
sion. Thus, UN research has ignored the contributions made by women in
politics researchers, which highlight the specific situational and institutional
context in which women come into office and the potential contribution that
gender can make in understanding leadership in global governance. At the
same time, these researchers have paid little attention to women in institu-
tions of global governance, focusing instead on parties, parliaments, and the
executive.7 Where global dimensions have been of interest, the primary focus
has been the global institutional architecture of women’s rights and protec-
tion, or the role of women as aid recipients or subjects in the attainment of
UN goals, not as leaders in global governance.8
Following Hanna Fenichel Pitkin’s distinction between formal (institu-
tional position and authority of representative), descriptive (the nature, i.e.,
representativeness of the person), substantive (acting for constituents), and
symbolic (assigned meaning and legitimacy) representation,9 women in poli-
tics researchers have asked how women access political office and how this
access enables representation. Formal representation in international organi-
zations (i.e., the institutional context within which leadership takes place) dif-
fers significantly from national political contexts in which women have been
elected. In international organizations leadership positions are rare, relying on
appointments in the UN funds and programs and elections by member states
in the specialized agencies. There is no involvement of the public in the
appointment process and the question of whether the executive head of an
agency can, or indeed should, exercise leadership has been debated at length,10
independent of gender questions. While some regard all authority as delegated
and therefore subject to strict constraints11 (e.g., the limited provisions of lead-
ership for the Secretary-General in the UN Charter12), others have recognized
a role for UN executive heads in supporting and advancing global goals,
norms, and values.13 Thus, the question of formal representation places limits
on the substantive representation of women (i.e., the ability of women leaders
to support and advance policies that are in the interest of women worldwide).
Where substantive representation is concerned, without a doubt women
have played a considerable role in tabling women’s issues at the UN; for
example, through the CSW. Here women advanced a range of issues from
maternal and child health to female employment and labor, as well as the role
of women in development and peace, and indeed the promotion of an insti-
tution that became UN Women in 2010.14 As the number of women in inter-
national organizations at all levels has increased (descriptive representation),
so has the potential for women to represent women’s issues. However, as half40 Breaking Barriers?
of all women leaders of UN agencies are currently in office or have just com-
pleted their term, more time is needed to assess their contribution or influence
in this regard. Despite this, the question of substantive representation high-
lights that women’s participation in UN leadership goes beyond individual
careers and the achievement of equal rights for women in institutions (and the
workplace). Instead, women’s participation and representation in global gov-
ernance also has an important symbolic dimension.
Women in politics researchers note that the participation and representa-
tion of women not only symbolizes greater legitimacy of public institutions,
but also changes people’s understanding of politics as a man’s domain. Citi-
zens may view their government as “qualitatively improved” through the pres-
ence of women politicians because women are seen as less corrupt and more
focused on societal welfare; in other words, they are seen as an expression of
“good governance.”15 Thus, women leading UN agencies may become the
kind of inspiration Bachelet highlighted at CEDAW’s 2012 meeting. Their
presence can send empowering messages not only to women who encounter
women leaders during field visits, signaling that the plight of women in zones
of conflict and hunger are understood, but also may encourage women to pur-
sue international careers. Moreover, given the effect that international norms
can have on member states, the presence of a woman at the negotiation table
or as the voice representing the international community may signal to male
leaders, especially those of strongly male-dominated societies, that women’s
participation and women’s issues cannot be ignored. This is not based on the
recognition of unique female characteristics, such as an emphasis on nurturing
and mothering that has influenced discourses on the role of women in devel-
opment or peace and conflict resolution,16 but follows the understanding of
UN women’s rights activists that women’s rights are human rights and there-
fore not distinct from men or indeed culturally relative.17
An example of such modeling was identified by Susan Sunn Bush in her
analysis of the international spread of gender quotas. She found that the UN
affects women’s representation in different ways by spreading gender equal-
ity as a “policy script.” It does so by either actively supporting the institu-
tionalization of gender equality through material or immaterial support (e.g.,
training) or modeling and incentivizing behavior that is appropriate, or “legit-
imate” in the context of these policy scripts.18 Thus, Bush found that quotas
were often found in aid-dependent states and those in which a UN peace-
building mission was present. Adopting women-friendly policies and institu-
tions, such as quotas, serves states to demonstrate their “commitment to
liberal values” and thus to enhance their international reputation, thereby jus-
tifying their receipt of international aid. Bush argues that, in addition to
active promotion of gender equality, it is in particular the process of linking
the question of gender equality to development and democracy by which the
UN models gender equality. This issue linkage then allows the UN to demon-Kirsten Haack 41
strate a clear commitment to gender equality without making aid conditional
on gender equality.
Interestingly, despite the fact that not all postconflict and aid-dependent
states have adopted quotas, the UN policy of gender equality has created a
paradox: in states in which women are generally more disadvantaged (e.g.,
literacy, health), quotas have ensured a high degree of political representa-
tion. But elsewhere women may enjoy a higher degree of human develop-
ment and employment, yet are politically represented by a considerably
smaller number of women. Thus, quotas in Rwanda and Tanzania mean that
women enjoy political representation at the level of or higher than Scandina-
vian countries (58 percent and 30 percent, respectively) while the absence of
quotas in many established democracies means that their level of representa-
tion is considerably lower (e.g., women in the US Congress account for fewer
than 20 percent).
In the following sections, I investigate the extent to which women have
been enabled to act as a model internationally and analyze where, how, and
when women have come to lead UN agencies.
Standing on Firmer Floors
In order to advance to the upper levels of UN politics, women first need to get
a foothold within the organization. Indeed, the issue of gender is not a recent
agenda item at the UN. Gender questions have been raised in conjunction with
human rights questions from the UN’s inception, promoted by a group of
highly active women diplomats and activists. Following the activism of these
pioneers, the CSW was established by the UN in 1946. Over the years a num-
ber of reports have highlighted the underrepresentation of women not only in
national assemblies and politics, but also in UN delegations and the UN sys-
tem. At the same time the institutional architecture to support, promote, and
protect women has become stronger and more elaborate, drawing on the
dynamism of global conferences and resolutions to address both women’s
issues in member states as well as within the UN system.19
In her history of women and development at the UN, Devaki Jain shows
how the UN’s understanding of women and gender in politics as well as the
institutional context of the UN system have changed. Commenting on the
wording of the UN Charter, Jain notes that “the old argument that ‘men’
included ‘women’ was simply not good enough for at least this one, very sig-
nificant, time.”20 After two decades of fighting first for legal equality and the
political, social, and economic rights of women, followed by the fight against
discrimination, the CSW called for a Women’s Year to be held in 1975. This
was accompanied by a global conference in Mexico City, and followed by the
UN Decade on Women and conferences in Copenhagen (1980) and Nairobi
(1985) as well as the largest World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995.42 Breaking Barriers?
Over time women have worked jointly as a “triangular alliance” of women
working in the Secretariat, women diplomats, and women’s movements out-
side the UN.21 This activism has led to a change in how women’s lives (e.g.,
their health and education), their work, and their economic contributions are
understood and measured. Thus, development thinking has moved away from
a view of women as defined by house, home, and motherhood, to one of
women as active participants in peace and development.22
The institutional architecture has also seen marked changes over time.
From the Declaration on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women
(DEDAW) in 1967 to CEDAW in 1979, the normative and legal framework
has been strengthened while the establishment of funds such as the UN
Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) and the International Research
and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (INSTRAW) has
offered opportunities for capacity building. This institutional development of
gender issues culminated in 2010 with the establishment of UN-Women.
Often attributed to Ban, who has repeatedly raised women’s issues (especially
the fight against violence toward women and girls, women’s political partic-
ipation, and the contribution of women in peace and “social and economic
recovery”23), a single institution to deal with gender equality had long been
on the CSW’s wish list.
The UN has indeed not just committed itself to supporting and advanc-
ing gender equality, women’s issues, and women’s rights across the world, it
has also recognized the need to reflect the same issues within its own organ-
ization, both as employer as well as a political organization. In 1988, follow-
ing recommendations by the Copenhagen and Nairobi conferences, the
Secretary-General established a Focal Point for Women, which was to moni-
tor and report on the status of women within the organization and assist the
Secretary-General in achieving organizational gender balance quotas. The
1995 Beijing Platform for Action then called on the UN and the Secretary-
General to develop and implement employment strategies aimed at achieving
gender equality by 2000. While this call led the Secretary-General to estab-
lish the Office of the Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on Gender
Issues and the Advancement of Women (OSAGI) in 1997, the implementa-
tion of quotas within anticipated deadlines proved to be overly optimistic.
The General Assembly adopted its first resolution committing itself to
gender equality in 1986, aiming at a level of 30 percent of women’s repre-
sentation subject to geographic distribution; in other words, after taking into
consideration a candidate’s qualifications, geographic representation was a
more important criteria for selection than gender. The General Assembly has
since adopted eleven resolutions, raising the bar from its 30 percent goal in
1986 to today’s goal of 50 percent, introduced in 1996.24 References to the
priority of geographic representation were dropped in 1990, emphasizing
qualification and gender over any other considerations. Although the General
Assembly recognized in its 1997 Resolution 51/67 that a 50 percent goal mayKirsten Haack 43
not be met, especially at policymaking and decisionmaking levels (i.e., D1–
2, assistant secretary-general, and under-secretary-general), its call for mem-
ber states to “identif[y] and regularly submit . . . more women candidates and
. . . encourage[e] women to apply for posts within the Secretariat, the spe-
cialized agencies and the regional commissions” has certainly shown results
as women are increasingly being nominated for leadership positions.25 This is
also borne out by the increasing number of women permanent representatives
(ambassadors or chargé d’affaires) at the UN, which included a record num-
ber of thirty-one women in 2013.26
While the normative and institutional framework has ensured that gender
parity for UN staff has been formulated and adopted as UN policy27 that out-
lines both the principles of gender equality and actions through which this
challenge should be addressed, the policy’s implementation has been much
harder to achieve. Employment data collected by WomenWatch, a UN infor-
mation and resources portal for gender equality and the empowerment of
women in the UN system, show a rise in women employees since the estab-
lishment of the first gender quota. Gender parity has been achieved across the
UN system at least up to P2, the lowest level of the professional ranks. Some
Secretariat departments have also achieved parity at higher levels, such as P5,
even without necessarily achieving parity at a lower level (e.g., P3 and P4).
Between 2000 and 2010 the proportion of women increased from 35.5 percent
to 38.8 percent in the Secretariat and from 33.5 percent to 40.4 percent in the
UN system.28 Change at the upper professional and managerial levels has been
considerably slower. Here, even with an optimistic 2 percent annual growth
rate for levels D1–2 and assistant secretary-general, gender parity has been
marked as achievable by 2036 only.29 As an employer, the UN has made some
strides toward gender parity across the professional (P1–5), managerial (D1–
2), and decisionmaking ranks (assistant secretary-general and under-secretary-
general). Thus, women now stand on “firmer floors”30 (i.e., foundations that
do not keep women in low status and low paying positions or do not prepare
them for movement into higher positions). Standing on firmer floors allows
women not only to crack, but also to break the glass ceiling.
Breaking the Glass Ceiling
The often quoted “glass ceiling” (i.e., “the invisible barriers, created by atti-
tudinal and organizational prejudices, to block women from senior executive
positions”31) had been a considerable barrier for women working at the UN
as Gayle Kirshenbaum noted in her 1992 article in Ms., the US feminist mag-
azine. Kirshenbaum likened the UN to “the world’s largest men’s club,” one
in which women were systematically prevented from entering higher-level
positions, even if the occasional under-secretary-general and three women
ambassadors made an appearance in her story.32 Yet since 1987, the story has
been slowly rewritten: twenty women have held top jobs in the UN system.44 Breaking Barriers?
Thus, the glass ceiling has certainly been cracked if not broken, allowing
women to be represented on increasingly equal terms as well as enabling
women to participate in the shaping of global governance.
These twenty women holding UN leadership positions include those lead-
ing UN funds, programs, and the specialized agencies as well as the deputy
secretary-general. Overall, thirteen UN agencies have had at least one woman
leader while four organizations—the World Health Organization (WHO), UN
Population Fund (UNFPA), UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and World Food
Programme (WFP)—as well as the Office of the Deputy Secretary-General
were led by two women, respectively. Fourteen agencies remain gentlemen’s
clubs, never having had a woman leader. These include primarily the special-
ized agencies—the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), International
Labour Organization (ILO), Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), World
Bank, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), International Mar-
itime Organization (IMO), International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Uni-
versal Postal Union (UPU), World Meteorological Organization (WMO), UN
Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), UN World Tourism Organiza-
tion (UNWTO), World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)—and the
UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). (See Figure 1.)
Notably, regional representation has not suffered significantly following
the introduction of quotas to enhance gender representation. Thus, despite
Figure 1 Percentage of Women in the Professional (P1–5) and
Higher Categories in the UN Secretariat and UN System,
31 December 2010
Source: UN Women, The Status of Women in the UN System, www.un.org/womenwatch/osagi
/pdf/factsheet-UN-system-vs-UN-secretariat-dec-2010-data.pdf, accessed 2 October 2012.
Note: “UG” stands for ungraded and includes the following ranks: Secretary-General, under-
secretary-general, assistant secretary-general, director-general, assistant director-general and
deputy director-general.Kirsten Haack 45
some variation, every region has been represented by at least one woman in
UN office. Like their male counterparts, women from the United States are
strongly represented with six women leaders in the UN programs and funds.
Europe has been represented by one woman from Norway, France, and Bul-
garia, respectively. And developed countries as a whole have been further
represented by one New Zealander, one Australian, and two Canadians.
Africa has been represented by two Tanzanians and, since July 2013, by a
South African, while Asia’s cultural diversity has been represented by women
from China (Hong Kong), Japan, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan. As a continent
Latin America has been underrepresented, with only one Chilean, Bachelet,
at the helm of UN Women since 2010.
The first appointment of a woman to a leadership position followed in
the wake of the successful Beijing conference and a decade of women’s
rights work at the UN. In 1987 Margaret Anstee (United Kingdom) became
head of the UN Office in Vienna (UNOV), shortly followed (also in 1987) by
the Pakistani Nafis Sadik, who was appointed head of UNFPA. (See Table 1.)
The first wave of women was appointed in the 1990s, during the terms of
Javier Pérez de Cuéllar and Boutros Boutros-Ghali. In the following years,
Kofi Annan accelerated the appointment of women, appointing the same
number of women executive heads as both his predecessors had appointed
combined. It is, however, during Ban’s term in which women have more
widely assumed leadership of UN agencies, breaking the glass ceiling.
However, while Ban has demonstrated his commitment to women’s
issues verbally in reports and speeches, his appointment practice shows a
lack of commitment to maintain women’s representation within the UN sys-
tem. This suggests that glass ceilings are much more flexible than the
metaphor suggests. Glass ceilings may settle again as the status of women
in the first year of Ban’s second term shows. While Ban appointed a num-
ber of women to decisionmaking and leadership positions in the first two
years of his Secretary-Generalship, his cabinet and UN agencies proved not
to be immune to the kind of midterm reshuffle observed in national politics.
Analyzing the appointment of women to cabinets in the US and Europe,
Rebecca Howard Davis notes that women are much more likely to be
appointed closer to an election when the symbolic importance to appoint
women is greater. This pressure reduces midterm, leaving women’s repre-
sentation to rely more heavily on incumbency than new appointments.33
Similarly, in 2010 Ban replaced four women leaders, who had been
appointed by Annan, with male candidates. While the women leading
UNFPA and UN-HABITAT had completed two consecutive terms and thus
customarily exited UN leadership, Ann Veneman (United States) at
UNICEF and Karen Koning AbuZayd (United States) at UN Relief and
Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) did not
see their terms renewed. In addition to Asha-Rose Migiro’s replacement,
Ban completed ten staff changes at the departmental level in 2012, trans-46 Breaking Barriers?
ferring one woman to a more prestigious department (see below) but choos-
ing not to include a woman among the ten appointees.
The same fate befell the role of the deputy secretary-general, which was
established in 1997 to share the responsibility of managing the Secretariat with
Table 1 Women Leaders in Chronological Order of Access to Office
Secretary-Generalship Leader Organization Term in Office
Ban Ki-moon Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka UN Deputy Secretary-General 2013–
(2007–2016) (South Africa)
Ertharin Cousin World Food Programme 2012–
(United States) (WFP)
Christine Lagarde (France)a International Monetary Fund 2011–
(IMF)
Michelle Bachelet (Chile) UN Entity for Gender Equality 2010–
and the Empowerment of
Women (UN Women)
Helen Clark (New Zealand) UN Development Programme 2009–
(UNDP)
Irina Bokova (Bulgaria)a UN Educational, Scientific 2009–
and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO)
Margaret Chan World Health Organization 2007–
(Hong Kong, China)a (WHO)
Asha-Rose Migiro (Tanzania) UN Deputy Secretary-General 2007–2011
Josette Sheeran (United States) World Food Programme (WFP) 2007–2012
Kofi Annan Ann M. Veneman UN Children’s Fund 2005–2010
(1997–2006) (United States) (UNICEF)
Karen Koning AbuZayd UN Relief and Works Agency 2005–2010
(United States) for Palestine Refugees in
the Near East (UNRWA)
Thoraya A. Obaid UN Population Fund 2001–2010
(Saudi Arabia) (UNFPA)
Anna Tibaijuka (Tanzania) UN Human Settlements 2000–2010
Programme (UN-HABITAT)
Louise Frechette (Canada) UN Deputy Secretary-General 1998–2006
Boutros Boutros-Ghali Gro Harlem Brundtland World Health Organization 1998–2003
(1992–1996) (Norway)a (WHO)
Carol Bellamy (United States) UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) 1995–2005
Elizabeth Dowdeswell UN Environment Programme 1993–1998
(Canada) (UNEP)
Javier Pérez de Cuéllar Catherine Bertini World Food Programme 1992–2002
(1982–1991) (United States) (WFP)
Sadako Ogata (Japan) Office of the High 1990–2000
Commissioner for Human
Rights (UNHCR)
Nafis Sadik (Pakistan) UN Population Fund (UNFPA) 1987–2001
Margaret Anstee United Nations Office in 1987–1992
(United Kingdom) Vienna (UNOV)
Note: a. Heads of specialized agencies are elected by member states, not appointed by the Secretary-General.Kirsten Haack 47
the Secretary-General in order to allow him (all Secretaries-General have been
male although women candidates have been suggested as early as 1991) to
engage with his political role more effectively. With the exception of Mark
Malloch Brown (United Kingdom), who held this position in acting capacity
from April to December 2006, the deputies chosen by Annan and Ban were
women. Thus, the position of deputy secretary-general could have easily been
identified as a female one, perhaps with the intention of balancing out the dom-
inance of men in the Secretary-General’s position. However, as Migiro (Tan-
zania) left the position in June 2012 after completing only one term, Ban chose
to appoint a man, Jan Eliasson of Sweden. Migiro was subsequently appointed
UN special envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa. As a consequence of this reshuf-
fling, in 2012 only two appointed women leaders in UN funds and programs
remained while the other four women leaders were now found in the special-
ized agencies. Here, women are elected by member states and not appointed by
the Secretary-General. With Ban in office until 2017, it is conceivable that he
may appoint more women as leadership positions become vacant. Indeed, with
approximately eight of ten departmental leadership positions and ten of eleven
leadership positions at the UN funds and programs requiring reappointment or
change during Ban’s second term, there is potential to move closer toward the
goal of equal gender representation within the UN.
Drilling Holes into Glass Walls
The fact that glass ceilings may be shattered, but also replaced again, is further
exacerbated by the fact that glass walls continue to structure women’s partici-
pation in international organization leadership. The idea of glass walls denotes
a process of channeling women into specific portfolios that are considered gen-
der appropriate, and in general reflect different degrees of importance com-
pared to those portfolios held by men. The gender distribution across the
spectrum of UN agencies reveals, on the one hand, quite predictable outcomes
in relation to the portfolios that female leaders represent. On the other hand, a
few milestones in the advancement of women to executive positions have been
achieved, in particular with regard to Lagarde’s election to the IMF.
Women in politics researchers studying cabinet portfolios highlight that
women are associated with specific issues, leading not only to the stereotyp-
ing of women but also to the gendering of portfolios. In general, women are
positively associated with so-called compassion issues (i.e., child care, health
care, education, environment, civil rights, and the control of government
spending) while men are associated with military spending, foreign trade,
agriculture, crime, and taxes.34 Rainbow Murray notes that disagreement
exists over issues such as crime, which suggests the existence of gender-neu-
tral issues yet gender-specific positions on these issues. For example, the
issue of guns may become one of gun control if taken up by women, and one
of the right to hold arms if taken up by men. Similar disagreement can be48 Breaking Barriers?
observed with regard to economic issues.35 While Murray defines budget
control as a female issue, Leonie Huddy and Nayda Terkildsen identify eco-
nomic issues as male.36 This gendered dichotomy of issues is not limited to
politics, but can also be observed in the private sector, as David Brady et al.
demonstrate.37 Analyzing Fortune 500 companies, Brady et al. found that
women are more likely to hold executive positions in companies with a
female- or child-centered clientele, and in nonmanufacturing and service sec-
tor firms, including health care, social services, and retail. While manufac-
turing in particular remains a male domain, women are increasingly being
hired into the financial services, consumer products, and technology and
media sectors.
In international relations, this dichotomy appears at first glance to map
easily onto the distinction between high politics (security) and low politics
(welfare, human rights, and the environment). However, as security issues do
not easily find a clearly identifiable expression in UN agencies, and with
executive power limited, a more detailed breakdown of UN issues in gender
terms may be expressed as follows: welfare, poverty, and human rights are
identifiable as soft (female) issues while trade, industry (or industrial devel-
opment), economic and financial, and agricultural issues can be defined as
hard (masculine) issues. Moreover, issues traditionally pertaining to sover-
eignty and public goods, which in the past (more than today) required coop-
eration between states as service providers (e.g., postal services and civil
aviation) or shared use of the global commons (e.g., the seas), fall into the
category of hard issues.
Following this distinction, the prevalence of women in the various UN
agencies follows a clearly gendered pattern. Women have led the following
agencies on soft issues such as:
• the environment: UN Environment Programme (UNEP), UN Human
Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT);
• children and women: UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), UN Entity for
Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women);
• education: UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO);
• health: UN Population Fund (UNFPA);
• welfare: UN Development Programme (UNDP), World Food Programme
(WFP), UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near
East (UNRWA);
• human rights: Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR).
Women have also led agencies concerned with gender-neutral issues
such as the heavily science- based WHO and the arguably hard issue ofKirsten Haack 49
finance and lending at the IMF. While the latter may raise the question as to
what extent it is a hard issue, the importance of the IMF in global finance
suggests that it indeed is.
The remaining men-only agencies focus on hard issues such as:
• agriculture: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
(FAO), International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD):
• industry: UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO):
• trade and economic issues: UN Conference on Trade and Development
(UNCTAD), World Bank, World Trade Organization (WTO);
• science and technology: World Meteorological Organization (WMO),
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA);
• issues traditionally pertaining to sovereignty: International Civil Aviation
Organization (ICAO), International Maritime Organization (IMO), Inter-
national Telecommunication Union (ITU), Universal Postal Union (UPU).
They also focus on gender-neutral issues such as law (WIPO), crime
(UNODC), labor (ILO), and tourism (World Tourism Organization, UNWTO).
These glass walls extend beyond the executive level, applying to the rep-
resentation of women across UN agencies in general as Table 2 indicates.
Soft portfolios show a greater percentage of women across all levels than
hard portfolios, with gender-neutral portfolios occupying a midrange position
with a respectable 42.0–45.0 percent of women staff, matching the level of
44.8 percent in the UN Secretariat as a whole.
In part, this variation in representation correlates with the type of agency
and the nature of the appointment process. UN funds and programs are gen-
erally concerned with soft issues and, perhaps unsurprisingly, have had at
least one woman leader since their establishment. Leaders here are selected
and appointed by the Secretary-General. This contrasts with the specialized
agencies where only three of fourteen agencies have had a woman leader,
mirroring a stronger emphasis on masculine and gender-neutral issues. Here,
appointments are made by member states through elections and, thus, are
subject to a broader range of pressures and interests. The only agency among
UN funds and programs concerned with a masculine issue is UNCTAD.
Thus, the distinction along subject lines explains why UNCTAD has not yet
had a woman leader, but the WHO has, despite its strong scientific focus on
health and medicine. It further explains why organizations that have had two
or more women leaders are concerned with reproductive and sexual health,
gender equality, and family planning (UNFPA); children’s issues and gender
equality (UNICEF); global health (WHO); and food aid (WFP).
Glass walls clearly channel women into gender-specific portfolios,
maintaining barriers in some areas. Yet here too, first advances have been
made—holes have been drilled into glass walls, enabling women to lead50 Breaking Barriers?
hard portfolios. The election of Lagarde to IMF managing director is a par-
ticular significant example. Moreover, her election points to a greater
recognition of women as leaders by member states who elect the managing
Table 2 Representation of Women in the UN System (P-1 to ungraded level),
31 December 2009 (percentage)
UN Agencies According to Type of Portfolio
Women in Professional
and Higher Categories Female Portfolios Neutral Portfolios Male Portfolios
>50.0 UN Population Fund
(UNFPA), 57.5
UN Development
Programme (UNDP),
55.8
UN Children’s Fund
(UNICEF), 54.6
UN Educational, Scientific
and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO), 54.1
40.0–49.0 World Food Programme World Health Organization International Fund
(WFP), 48.6 (WHO), 45.3 for Agricultural
International Labour Development
Organization (ILO), (IFAD), 44.5
45.0 International
World Intellectual Property Maritime
Organization (WIPO), Organization
41.8 (IMO), 43.8
30.0–39.0 UN High Commissioner Food and Agriculture
for Refugees (UNHCR), Organization
38.7 (FAO), 37.8
UN Relief and Works World Trade
Agency for Palestine Organization
Refugees in the Near East (WTO), 37.5
(UNRWA), 37.6 International Civil
Aviation Organiza-
tion (ICAO), 34.8
UN Industrial
Development
Organization
(UNIDO), 30.1Kirsten Haack 51
director directly. The nature of finance as a hard issue and the general sig-
nificance of this portfolio in times of financial crisis in Europe (which has
traditionally provided leadership for the IMF) highlight the importance of
this breakthrough. While the particular circumstances of the European
financial crisis and the alleged sexual criminality of her male predecessor
may have worked in Lagarde’s favor, the number of women candidates pro-
posed for leadership in the specialized agencies—four women faced four
men in UNESCO’s most recent leadership contest—suggest that this is not
an exception. Similarly, at departmental level, Ban’s recent move of Angela
Kane (Germany) from the soft Department of Management to the hard
Department of Disarmament Affairs shows a willingness to break glass
walls by introducing women to leadership positions in hard areas (i.e.,
those pertaining to sovereignty, international peace, and security).
Conclusion
Women have increasingly gained a foothold in international organizations.
Not only are women considered essential to the achievement of UN goals,
but the UN itself shows a greater degree of women’s participation in global
governance at all levels, allowing women to stand on firmer floors. In addi-
tion, women have achieved positions of leadership in nearly half of all UN
agencies. These positive findings are tempered, however, first by the fact that
women’s issues continue to be seen as soft issues, leading to the creation of
glass walls that channel women into specific portfolios. Exceptions such as
that of Lagarde raise hopes that these glass walls that channel women into
particular areas will not remain for long. Secondly, these findings are bal-
anced by the fact that broken glass ceilings, once broken, do not automati-
cally remain so. Indeed, with few leadership positions available, the
importance of gatekeepers (i.e., those who appoint leaders), and their will-
ingness to actively pursue and support gender equality, is highlighted.
As gender mainstreaming has become part and parcel of UN activity,
including its recruitment, this analysis of women’s representation in UN lead-
ership shows that UN research may benefit from the insights of researchers
analyzing women in politics. In this article, I have focused in the first
instance on the distinction between descriptive, substantive, and symbolic
representation in order to understand the UN’s role in furthering women’s
issues. While women’s descriptive representation in UN agencies has
increased, its unevenness across portfolios and different types of agencies
(appointed vs. elected) remains a challenge, as do potential swings in recruit-
ment patterns over the course of a Secretary-Generalship. In order to achieve
UN goals, the appointment of women cannot just be part of a new term’s
publicity campaign, with it soon to be forgotten once attention has moved
elsewhere. Secretary-General Ban, who was routinely attacked by the media52 Breaking Barriers?
as well as UN staff and diplomats for his apparent inaction, quiet character,
and ineffectiveness, has generally benefited from the establishment of UN
Women early in his term. Thus, Ban has been considered women friendly as
he routinely raises the issue of women, their equality and human rights as
well as their role in peace and development. However, Ban’s reshuffle at the
beginning of this second term suggests that talk can indeed be cheap. For
Ban, who has studiously refrained from touching any issue too close to mem-
ber states’ sovereignty, women’s issues appear to be soft issues that are eas-
ily championed without causing too much offense. Yet for women around the
world, women leading (and otherwise acting for) international organizations
may indeed have a more substantive and symbolic effect.
In conclusion, an assessment of women’s substantive contributions
through leadership of UN agencies requires further analysis of individual
past, current, and future women leaders as well as a better understanding of
how leadership functions in international organizations. Similarly, the sym-
bolic representation of women requires further research on the interaction
between national politics and global governance. If the 2012 Olympic Games
in London in which every delegation featured women athletes (including a
Saudi Arabian woman as flag bearer) can be an example, then the presence of
women in global governance also has the potential to model increased
women’s representation and participation in UN member states.
Notes
Kirsten Haack is senior lecturer in international politics at Northumbria University.
She is the author of The United Nations Democracy Agenda (2011).
1. UN Women press release, “Women Leaders in Rio Call for Action to Prioritize
Gender Equality for a Sustainable Future,” 21 June 2012.
2. Debra Brown, “Women in Politics: 30 Years Past CEDAW,” The Interdepend-
ent, 14 August 2012, www.theinterdependent.com/women-and-children/article/women
-in-politics (accessed 2 October 2012).
3. UN Women, “Statement of Michelle Bachelet Executive Director of UN
Women at CEDAW 30: A Celebration of the 30th Anniversary of the Committee on
the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women,” 9 July 2012, www.unwomen.org
/2012/07/focusing-on-womens-political-participation-and-leadership-in-pursuit-of-
equality (accessed 2 October 2012).
4. See Avril David and Shana Sung, Women in Power at the UN. Stories to
Inspire (CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, www.createspace.com, 2011);
Gayle Kirshenbaum, “UN Exposé: Inside the World’s Largest Men’s Club,” Ms. Mag-
azine (September–October 1992); Margaret Joan Anstee, Never Learn to Type: A
Woman at the United Nations (Chichester: Wiley, 2003).
5. Craig N. Murphy, The United Nations Development Programme: A Better Way?
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006); Ian Johnstone, “The Secretary-General
as Norm Entrepreneur,” in Simon Chesterman, ed., Secretary or General? The UN Sec-
retary-General in World Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).
6. Simon Chesterman, ed., Secretary or General? The UN Secretary-General in
World Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007); Kent J. Kille, From
Manager to Visionary: The Secretary-General of the United Nations (Basingstoke:Kirsten Haack 53
Palgrave Macmillan, 2006); Simon Rushton, “The UN Secretary-General and Norm
Entrepreneurship: Boutros Boutros-Ghali and Democracy Promotion,” Global Gover-
nance 4 (2008): 95–110; Steffen Bauer, “Does Bureaucracy Really Matter? The
Authority of Intergovernmental Treaty Secretariats in Global Environmental Politics,”
Global Environmental Politics 6 (2006): 23–49.
7. See, for example, Sarah Childs and Mona Lena Krook, “Gender and Politics:
The State of the Art,” Politics 26 (2006): 18–28; Susan Durbin, “Women, Power and
the Glass Ceiling: Current Research Perspectives,” Work, Employment and Society 16
(2002): 755–759; Mona Lena Krook and Sarah Childs, “Gender, Women, and Repre-
sentation in State Politics,” in The International Studies Encyclopedia, www.isa
compendium.com, update 2010-02-15 Revision History 1 (accessed 29 September
2011).
8. See Hilkka Pietilä and Jeanne Vickers, Making Women Matter: The Role of the
United Nations (London: Zed Books, 1994); Anne Winslow, ed., Women, Politics, and
the United Nations (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1995); Devaki Jain, Women, Develop-
ment, and the UN: A Sixty-year Quest for Equality and Justice (Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 2005).
9. Hanna Fenichel Pitkin, The Concept of Representation (Berkeley: University
of California Press, 1967).
10. See Kirsten Haack and Kent J. Kille, “The UN Secretary-General and Self-
Directed Leadership: Development of the Democracy Agenda,” in Joel Oestreich, ed.,
International Organizations as Self-Directed Actors: A Framework for Analysis (Lon-
don: Routledge, 2012).
11. See Darren G. Hawkins et al., eds., Delegation and Agency in International
Organizations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006).
12. Article 97 defines the Secretary-General as the “chief administrator” of the
organization while Articles 99 and 33 define his or her role in the maintenance of
peace and security: Article 99 allows the Secretary-General to bring to the attention of
the Security Council any matter that he or she regards as threatening to international
peace and security while Article 33 implies a role that is in fact-finding, mediation,
and the provision of good offices and quiet diplomacy.
13. Haack and Kille, “The UN Secretary-General and Self-directed Leadership”;
Kille, From Manager to Visionary; Bob Reinalda and Bertjan Verbeek, eds.,
Autonomous Policy Making by International Organisations (London: Routledge,
1998); Jutta Joachim, Bob Reinalda, and Bertjan Verbeek, eds., International Organ-
izations and Implementation: Enforcers, Managers, Authorities? (London: Routledge,
2010); Richard Collins and Nigel D. White, eds., International Organizations and the
Idea of Autonomy: Institutional Independence in the International Legal Order (Lon-
don: Routledge, 2011).
14. Jain, Women, Development, and the UN.
15. Susan Franceschet, Mona Lena Krook, and Jennifer M. Piscopo, “Conceptu-
alizing the Impact of Gender Quota,” in Susan Franceschet, Mona Lena Krook, and
Jennifer M. Piscopo, eds., The Impact of Gender Quotas (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2012).
16. See Filomena Chioma Steady, Women and Leadership in West Africa: Moth-
ering the Nation and Humanizing the State (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011);
Mary Hawkesworth, Political Worlds of Women (Boulder: Westview, 2012).
17. Jain, Women, Development, and the UN.
18. Susan Sunn Bush, “International Politics and the Spread of Quotas for Women
in Legislatures,” International Organization 65 (2011): 103–137.
19. Jain, Women, Development, and the UN.
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid.54 Breaking Barriers?
22. Pietilä and Vickers, Making Women Matter.
23. UN, The Secretary-General’s Five Year Action Agenda, 2012, www.un.org
/sg/priorities/sg_agenda_2012.pdf (accessed 2 October 2012).
24. See UN Women, Legislative Basis for the UN Mandate on Representation of
Women in the United Nations System, 18 October 2010, www.un.org/womenwatch
/osagi/fplegbasis.htm (accessed 2 October 2012).
25. UN General Assembly, Resolution by the General Assembly on the Improve-
ment of the Status of Women, Res. A/RES/51/67 (31 January 1997).
26. This group of permanent representatives includes nine women representing
member states of the group of Latin American and Caribbean countries, ten women
representating the Western European and Others group, four women representing the
Africa group, and eight women representing states of the Asia-Pacific group, includ-
ing one permanent representative of a Middle Eastern state.
27. See Ramesh Thakur and Thomas G. Weiss, “United Nations ‘Policy’: An Argu-
ment with Three Illustrations,” International Studies Perspectives 10 (2009): 18–35.
28. UN Women, The Status of Women in the United Nations Systems and in the
Secretariat, 23 August 2011, www.un.org/womenwatch/osagi/pdf/factsheet-UN-system
-vs-UN-secretariat-dec-2010-data.pdf (accessed 2 October 2012).
29. UN Women, OSAGI-OFPW Gender Balance Statistics, www.un.org/women
watch/osagi/fpgenderbalancestats.htm (accessed 2 October 2012).
30. Cynthia J. Bowling et al., “Cracked Ceilings, Firmer Floors, and Weakening
Walls: Trends and Patterns in Gender Representation Among Executives Leading
American State Agenices, 1970–2000,” Public Administration Review 66 (2006):
823–836.
31. Linda Wirth, Breaking Through the Glass Ceiling: Women in Management
(Geneva: International Labour Organization, 2001), p. 1.
32. Kirshenbaum, “UN Expose.”
33. Rebecca Howard Davis, Women and Power in Parliamentary Democracies:
Cabinet Appointments in Western Europe, 1968–1992 (Lincoln: University of
Nebraska Press, 1997).
34. Rainbow Murray, “Introduction: Gender Stereotypes and Media Coverage of
Women Candidates,” in Rainbow Murray, ed., Cracking the Highest Glass Ceiling: A
Global Comparison of Women’s Campaigns for Executive Office (Santa Barbara, CA:
Praeger, 2010).
35. See Farida Jalalzai, “Women Rule: Shattering the Executive Glass Ceiling,”
Politics and Gender 4 (2008): 205–231; Kathleen Dolan, “Do Women Candidates
Play to Gender Stereotypes? Do Men Candidates Play to Women? Candidate Sex and
Issues Priorities on Campaign Websites,” Political Research Quarterly 58 (2005): 31–
44; Deborah Alexander and Kristi Andersen, “Gender as a Factor in the Attribution
of Leadership Traits,” Political Research Quarterly 46 (1993): 527–545.
36. Leonie Huddy and Nayda Terkildsen, “The Consequences of Gender Stereo-
types for Women Candidates at Different Levels and Types of Office,” Political
Research Quarterly 46 (1993): 503–525. Huddy and Terkildsen break down economic
issues into three dimensions, which include reducing budget deficits, dealing with
business and industry leaders, and handling savings and loan crises. Given the remit
of the World Bank, the IMF, and other developing banks, and the current global finan-
cial situation, a separation of these issues would be useful to identify whether eco-
nomic issues can indeed be separated into male and female roles or tasks.
37. David Brady et al., “Sector, Size, Stability, and Scandal: Explaining the Pres-
ence of Female Executives in Fortune 500 Firms,” Gender in Management: An Inter-
national Journal 26 (2011): 84–104.You can also read
