Power, almost indefinite source of it that comes with high offices has a rider - greater responsibilities. Men have always held such post, but women aren’t far behind.
Don’t believe us, here’s the list of women who hold the top offices in the country’s political set up. Click on to know more.
Julia Gillard
Australia's Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard is seen at the Australia's Labor Party conference at Darling Harbour. She then studied at the University of Adelaide but cut short her courses in 1982 and moved to Melbourne to work with the Australian Union of Students. She graduated from the University of Melbourne with Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Laws degrees in 1986. In 1987, Gillard joined the law firm Slater & Gordon at Werribee, Melbourne, working in industrial law. In 1990, at the age of 29, she was admitted as a partner.
Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner
Argentina's President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner looks up during a ceremony at Casa Rosada Presidential Palace in Buenos Aires. She is the widow of former President Néstor Kirchner. She is Argentina's first elected female President, and the second female President ever to serve (after Isabel Martínez de Perón, 1974-1976). A Justicialist, Fernández served one term as National Deputy and three terms as National Senator for both Santa Cruz and Buenos Aires Provinces. A native of La Plata, Buenos Aires, Fernández is a graduate of the National University of La Plata. She met her husband during her studies, and they moved to Santa Cruz to work as lawyers. In May 1991, she was elected to the provincial legislature.
Pratibha Patil
President of India, Pratibha Patil, smiles before her meeting with chief of India's ruling Congress Party Sonia Gandhi in New Delhi. Pratibha Patil started her professional career as a practicing lawyer at the Jalgaon District Court. At the young age of 27 years, she successfully contested her first election to the Maharashtra State Legislature from the Jalgaon Assembly constituency. Subsequently she was continuously elected four times as MLA from the Edlabad constituency until 1985. Thereafter, she served as a Member of Parliament in the Rajya Sabha from 1985 to 1990 and later elected as a Member of Parliament to the 10th Lok Sabha in the 1991 General Elections from the Amravati constituency. She enjoys the unique distinction of not having lost a single election that she contested to date
Laura Chinchilla
Costa Rica's President-elect Laura Chinchilla smiles before a meeting with Honduran President Porfirio Lobo inside the presidential house in Tegucigalpa. She is the first female President of Costa Rica. She was one of Óscar Arias Sánchez's two Vice-Presidents and his administration's Minister of Justice. She was the governing PLN candidate for President in the 2010 general election, where she won with 46.76% of the vote. She is the sixth woman to be elected president of a Latin American country. She was sworn as president of Costa Rica on May 8, 2010.
Mary McAleese
Ireland's President Mary McAleese inspects the honour guard during a welcoming ceremony in Riga. Mary Patricia McAleese is the eighth and current President of Ireland. Prior to becoming president she was a barrister, journalist and academic.
McAleese is Ireland's second female president and the world's first woman to succeed another woman as an elected head of state. She was first elected president in 1997 and won a second term, without a contest, in 2004. Her birth in Belfast means she is the first President to have come from Northern Ireland. She is a member of the Council of Women World Leaders. In 2009, Forbes named her among the 100 Most Powerful Women in the world.
Angela Merkel
German Chancellor Angela Merkel smiles during a news conference following a meeting with representatives of German economic associations at the International Trade Fair in Munich. Merkel is the first female Chancellor of Germany. In 2007 she became the second woman to chair the G8, after Margaret Thatcher She played a central role in the negotiation of the Treaty of Lisbon and the Berlin Declaration. In domestic policy, health care reform and problems concerning future energy development have thus far been major issues of her tenure.
Dalia Grybauskaite
Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite holds a joint news conference with Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt (not pictured) at Rosenbad, Prime Minister's office, in Stockholm. She is a Lithuanian politician and was previously Lithuania's Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs, Finance Minister, and European Commissioner for Financial Programming & the Budget. Often referred to as the "Iron Lady", Grybauskaite is Lithuania's first female head of state.
Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir
Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir is the current Prime Minister of Iceland. A long term politician, she was previously Iceland's Minister of Social Affairs and Social Security from 1987-1994 and 2007-2009. She has been a member of the Althing (Iceland's parliament) for Reykjavík constituencies since 1978, winning re-election on eight successive occasions. She became Iceland's first female Prime Minister on 1 February 2009, the world's first openly LGBT head of government of the modern era. Jóhanna is a social democrat and Iceland's longest-serving member of Parliament.
Jadranka Kosor
Jadranka Kosor is a Croatian politician and former journalist. She is the current Prime Minister of Croatia, having taken office on July 6, 2009, following the sudden resignation of her predecessor Ivo Sanader. She is Croatia's first female Prime Minister since independence. Kosor has published four books, two of poetry and two related to the Croatian War of Independence and also worked briefly as a correspondent for the BBC.
Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is the 24th and current President of Liberia. She served as Minister of Finance under President William Tolbert from 1979 until the 1980 coup d'état, after which she left Liberia and held senior positions at various financial institutions. She placed a distant second in the 1997 presidential election. Later, she was elected President in the 2005 presidential election and took office on 16 January 2006. Sirleaf is the first modern, and currently the only elected, female head of state in Africa.
Tarja Halonen
Tarja Kaarina Halonen is the 11th and current President of Finland. The first female to hold the office, Halonen had previously been a member of the parliament from 1979 to 2000 when she resigned after her election to the presidency. In addition to her political career she had a long and extensive career in trade unions and different non-governmental organizations.
Halonen is a graduate of the University of Helsinki, where she studied law from 1963 to 1968. She was active in student politics and served as the Social Affairs Secretary and Organization Secretary of the National Union of Students from 1969 to 1970. In 1971 she joined the Social Democratic Party and worked as a lawyer in the Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions until she was elected to parliament in 1979. Halonen served in the parliament of Finland for six terms, from 1979 to 2000, representing the constituency of Helsinki.
Doris Leuthard
Doris Leuthard is a Swiss politician and lawyer. Since 1 August 2006, she has been a member of the Swiss Federal Council and head of the Federal Department of Economic Affairs (the Swiss economics minister). She was elected President of the Confederation for 2010. Leuthard was a member of the Swiss National Council from 1999 to 2006 and President of the Christian Democratic People's Party (2004-2006). Following the resignation of Joseph Deiss from the Swiss Federal Council, Leuthard was elected as his successor on 14 June 2006. She received 133 out of 234 valid votes, and became the 109th member (and fifth woman) of the Federal Council. In 2009, Leuthard was elected Vice President of the Swiss Confederation, virtually assuring her election as president in 2010.
Dilma Rousseff
Brazilian presidential candidate from the ruling Workers Party (PT) Dilma Rousseff waves after the results of Brazil's general election in Brasilia October 3, 2010. Rousseff placed first in Brazil's presidential election on Sunday, but failed to win an outright victory in the first round. She is an economist, politician and President-elect of Brazil. She was appointed Chief of Staff by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in June 2005 becoming the first woman to assume the position. Rousseff was Lula's designated successor and the winning candidate in the 2010 presidential election.
Images - Reuters
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