The world reacted with shock and outrage at recent events that transpired in India. A young medical student and a male friend were accosted on a bus by a gang of young men who co-opted the driver, ensued brutally raping and violating her with a metal object. Upon completion of those heinous acts, they tried to run her over with the bus ultimately failing to kill her on that occasion. She later died in a hospital in Singapore. The feminists were up in arms but the unprecedented horror of this event had only one positive outcome; it drew attention to the fringe battle for equality for women and highlighted the vast disservice of a deeply patriarchal society that manifests itself in such dreadful fashion.
As the debate rages on to ensure equality worldwide as well as observance of rights for women, the lack of commitment on the side of policy makers who by no fluke are predominantly men is quite evident. They sell the threat of gender equality as an invitation for other minorities to lay claim to their rights. It is not uncommon to find those defending the status quo perpetuating the notion that the power balance in favor of men is an essential component in maintaining social order. And of course the egotistical argument is a popular one insinuating that men are better attuned to handle tasks of great importance given their intellectual superiority and emotional balance. This has ensured a monopoly for men in top positions in both public and private institutions, whereas women have continued to be footnotes in organizations and largely passive in the grand scheme of things.
Well, the truth cannot be suppressed forever unfortunately. In areas where men historically claimed supremacy, data is starting to paint a different picture and those with a vested interest in maintaining patriarchal society have perceived this threat and are acting aggressively to prevent this information infiltrating public discourse. In a study carried out by Jack Zenger and Joseph Folckman of the Harvard business review it was discovered that women leaders in top business organizations outranked men in 12 out of 16 parameters used to measure effective business leadership skills. They scored especially highly in the fields of self development and taking initiative. Anyone who has shared a classroom environment with a woman can provide testimony to support that claim. And get this, men were once considered as indispensable in the practice of leadership because they bore the exclusive trait of strategic perspective. But that has changed as well. Women are coming out ahead in ability to institute strategic perspective and that is going to cause some major problems for male supremacists in the business arena.
The issue of risk aversion is also elevating women onto a higher pedestal as more effective leaders than men. There’s a shared conviction that the financial crisis of 2008 was part consequence of high powered male Wall Street executives taking decisions laced with testosterone that plunged them into high risk investments causing them to inevitably fail. Women are risk averse and that extra caution serves well in sound decision making. Lack of ego is always a plus.
I have for a long time been a firm believer in women being able to deliver improved leadership in both public and private sector. And having grown up in Africa and Uganda in particular, I know all too well how sup-par leadership has been the cause of untold suffering and continues to wreak havoc in the lives of many. But this vision of woman leadership cannot be achieved without the all important prerequisite of creating a level playing field. Integrating women into leadership structures should commence at the grass root level and encouraged all the way to the top and the ‘current’ leadership has to take keener interest in destroying stereotypes that advance the concept of inherent female limitations. It’s a tall order, but one of grave importance nonetheless.
No greater citation of exemplary female leadership is there other than Executive Director KCCA, Jennifer Musisi and Rebecca Kadaga, the speaker of parliament. These two have introduced ideals of transparency, effectiveness and principle into a society that had never experienced anything of the sort. It is no accident that they are both women and their pathetically incompetent predecessors were…you guessed it—men. This is not a chance occurrence or coincidental. This is a vindication of what researchers are trying to portray, women are the solution. So word to a man, don’t go about raping, killing women or impeding their rights, they just might be our only hope.
