Here’s a list of the first 10 women to be elected prime minister or president in any country in the world (taken from The Top 10 of Everything: 2001 by Russell Ash):
1.Sirimavo Bandaranaike, Sri Lanka, 1960-1965, 1970-1977, 1994-Present
2. Indira Gandhi, India, 1966-1977, 1980-1984
3. Golda Meir, Israel, 1969-1974
4. Maria Estela Peron, Argentina, 1974-1976
5. Elisabeth Domitien, Central African Republic, 1975-1976
6. Margaret Thatcher, U.K., 1979-1990
7. Maria Lurdes Pintasilgo, Portugal, 1979-1980
8. Vigdis Finnbogadottir, Iceland, 1980-Present
9. Mary Eugenia Charles, Dominica, 1980-1995
10. Gro Harlem Brundtland, 1981, 1986-1989, 1990-1996
And just for comparison, from the same page (63) of that book, is a list of the 10 parliaments in the world with the highest percentage of women in them:
- Sweden 42.7%
- Denmark 37.4%
- Finland 37.0%
- Norway 36.4%
- Netherlands 36.0%
- Iceland 34.9%
- Germany 30.9%
- South Africa 30.0%
- New Zealand 29.2%
- Cuba 27.6%
(In the U.S., as of the last Congress, it was 13.3%. Worldwide, the percentage is 13%. Can someone tell me what the percentage is for the newly elected Congress?)
O.K., there are several things to be noted here. Let me slowly work up to an answer to the question in the OP.
First, a number of the early elected women prime ministers and presidents were part of a political family in countries where, although the president or prime minister is supposedly elected, really it’s more like a powerful family chooses which member is to be the new leader and this decision is rubber-stamped by the legislature or the populace. (Um, perhaps the U.S. has just joined the list of those countries.) I think that accounts for the early appearance of an elected women leader in Sri Lanka, India, Argentina, the Central African Republic, and perhaps Dominica and Portugal.
Second, it’s interesting to note that one thing common in many other countries of the world, a politician whose term as leader of his or her party last decades, not just years, hardly ever happens in the U.S. It’s hard for a President to stay as the most influential man in his party just for the eight years of two terms. In other countries though, a leader can serve three terms over several decades as the party comes into and out of favor in the country. (This may be a good or a bad thing, but it should be noted.)
Third, the U.S. appears to be about average as far as number of women elected to significant political offices compared with other countries of the world.
Fourth, in no country does a majority of the legislature consist of women, despite the fact that in nearly every country of the world a slight majority of the voters are female. The only countries in which the percentage of women as legislators is in the same ballpark as the percentage of voters are those countries in northern Europe which tend to be ahead on lots of issues like this: Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Netherlands, Iceland, and Germany.
Fifth, for those of you not old enough to remember any time before 1970, it’s only been about three or four decades that the idea of a women becoming president has even been thinkable anywhere in the world. Remember, the women’s liberation movement (as a mass movement, not as a set of intellectual manifestos) dates from about 1970. It’s a decade younger than the civil rights movement and about the same age as the gay liberation movement. Yes, there were some important writings in the early '60’s, but I think of those as being intellectual manifestos, not a signs of a mass movement.
Even though women had the right to vote before 1970, the right to be elected to any office, and there were token numbers of women in many professions, there were hardly any influential professions or political offices with more than token (say, more than 10%) numbers of women in them. It’s hard to force yourself to remember now just how fast things changed. Given that it was nearly unthinkable before 1960 for a women to be elected President, note that we have had only nine Presidential elections in the U.S. since 1960. Of the 27 different Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates nominated by the two major parties since then, one of them has been a women.
So why has there been no women Presidents in the U.S. then? The superficial answer is that no major party has nominated a women as President yet, but I think you want an answer to the question, “Why has no major party nominated a women as President yet?”. Well, go back and look at what I just wrote: It’s only been four decades that it was thinkable for a women to be President. The progress of women towards equality is no faster in the U.S. than the average for the whole world. We’ve only had nine Presidential elections since then (and we’ve already had one female major-party Vice-Presidential candidate).
The reasons I’ve given may be enough in themselves to explain the paucity of women, but it seems to me that there’s another reason specific to the U.S. In the U.S., the way a person becomes President is not by becoming head of his political party, as it is in most of the rest of the world. In most of the world, a President has to work his way up in party politics over many years. In the U.S., a person can bypass party politics entirely by running in primaries (using lots of TV ads) and presenting himself as the candidate at the convention, almost without any of the party regulars even having met him. What matters more in the U.S. then is more a matter of charisma, the ability to present himself as a candidate on TV and in public appearances, and less a matter of the backslapping friendliness and wheeling-and-dealing behind the scenes at party political events. Charisma is something that almost by definition is easier for men. A man who presents himself on TV as a confident leader is considered Presidential material, no matter what positions he espouses. A women who does the same is considered a controlling bitch. Not fair, to be sure, but that’s how it is.