Running head: WHO RUN THE WORLD? (NOT GIRLS) 1

Who Run the World? (Not Girls):

Recommendations for Multinational Corporations Seeking to Combat Global Gender Inequality

Heather Abrams

Discussion Section 31

Multinational Campaign on Gender Equality (Topic 5)

The George Washington University

WHO RUN THE WORLD? (NOT GIRLS) 2

Who Run the World? (Not Girls)

Although the issue of gender inequality and sexism has decreased enormously, the globe

has still not achieved Beyoncé's anthem in which girls run the world (2011). All corporations,

particularly multinational ones, should bind together to promote gender equality and reduce

barriers to women globally. I recommend three simple but effective courses of action for

multinational corporations to combat global gender inequality: investment in each female

employee's personal life, fair gender practices in the corporate setting, and activism.

When looking at barriers to working, companies must consider the archetypal bounds of

the "home-maker" lifestyles. Historically, activists of early 1950s feminism, such as Betty

Friedan—who is often credited as the face and harbinger of second-wave feminism in the United

States—have had to counter some of the "stereotypes justifying lower pay for women: they were

physically weaker, entered the work force only temporarily, had no families to support [because

the husband acted as bread-winner], and worked only for pin money" (Horowitz, 1996, p. 15).

The truth, both then and now, differs greatly—women, particularly those lacking affluence, often

must work to make ends meet, but they struggle to also maintain their homes simultaneously.

Magdalena S. Carmona and Kate Donald (2014) suggest in their research in Gender &

Development, "all women should have economic and physical access to high-quality, culturally

appropriate child care for children under school age" (p. 452). Even Sheryl Sandberg (2013),

Chief Operating Officer of Facebook, pointed out in her famed book Lean In that as "women

must be more empowered at work, men must be more empowered at home" (p. 353). Increased

investment to help women shed some of the unnecessary burdens of working and acting as a

mother concurrently would vastly improve gender equality.

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In addition to help at home, companies should also invest in women's health needs.

Considering that "women and girls are among those most affected, for example, by floods,

droughts, devastated landscapes and livelihoods, given the precariousness of their livelihoods

and the burden of securing shelter, food, water and fuel — tasks that largely fall to them"

(Stevens, 2015, para. 2), it only seems fair that companies provide fair coverage to protect

against such damages. If companies can reduce the element of insecurity for its employees,

particularly the most-afflicted group—women—then these same female employees can better

focus on their corporate lives and increase their efficiency and productivity at work. In The

Economist article "Growth is not enough," author J. P. (2011) points out that the world expects

female mortality to decrease as countries grow richer because of improvements to technology

and increased access to health care; however, if companies don't invest in helping women utilize

the new health care, the world can never fully realize the talent of its female power (para. 2). All

this data and analysis essentially demonstrates to companies the need to provide health and

safety—whether through insurance or technological access or otherwise—to its female

employees in particular.

Perhaps the foremost issue for women globally, however, is the need for fair gender

practices in corporate settings. For instance, women's current ability to participate in the labor

force is limited in many parts of the world. In their extensive piece, "Entrepreneurship and

Gender Equality in Academia," Lena Abrahamsson, Britt-Inger Keisu, and Malin Rönnblom

(2015) explain that the "gender equality problem is that women are less entrepreneurial because

of gender segregation in the labor market" (p. 82). Although the authors' recommendations

originally portend to Swedish business, any company can apply these findings and suggestions to

its policies: "if more women researchers were to work in the male-dominated areas of research

WHO RUN THE WORLD? (NOT GIRLS) 4

that are already entrepreneurial, we would get more women academic entrepreneurs. Some of

these researchers saw some practical problems for women because of the research areas’ male

dominance" (Abrahamsson et al., 2015, p. 86). Essentially, corporations should encourage

women to join high-level career fields—and then follow through by actually hiring women. But

beyond just hiring them, companies also need to promote women. Justin Wolfers of The New

York Times found that "[fewer large companies are run by women than by men named John, a

sure indicator that the glass ceiling remains firmly in place in corporate America" (Wolfers,

2015, para. 1). What this insinuates is that firms simply are not properly promoting and

recognizing their outstanding female leaders. In fact, according to Wolfers (2015), only one in

twenty-five of the S&P 1500 companies hosts a female CEO (para. 4). In addition to hiring

practices, Tianhong Chen and John A. Turner (2015), researchers of gender issues in China, also

"recommend a policy of gradually raising the retirement age of women [in China] so that it

eventually will equal that of men. This change would be an important step toward the equal

treatment of men and women in the Chinese labor market" (p. 1367). Overall, setting up and,

consequently, following said practices, will provide instrumental foundations for gender equality

globally.

It is absolutely imperative to close the wage gap between females and their male

counterparts; the urgency is undeniable: "If we do nothing," Emma Watson warned the United

Nations, "it will take seventy-five years [...] before women can expect to be paid the same as

men for the same work" (United Nations [UN], 2014). Additionally, J.P. (2011) of The

Economist also noted "discrimination against women persists despite economic growth. Women

do similar sorts of work — health, care, retail business and communications — in countries at

very different levels of income. They are also paid less [...] in countries as different as

WHO RUN THE WORLD? (NOT GIRLS) 5

Bangladesh, Mexico and Sweden" (para. 7). What this indicates is that not only is gendered pay

common, but that it is universal—unequal pay for men and women can be located in nearly

every country across the globe. Even the world's most equal country in terms of economic

participation and opportunity for the sexes—Burundi—scores only 0.8630 out of one (a score of

one representing perfect gender equality) in the Global Gender Gap Report, meaning that not

only do equality leaders have a long way to go, so does the rest of the world, especially some of

the countries lagging toward to the bottom of the list—Syria, Pakistan, and Jordan, to name a

few (Bekhouce, Hausmann, D'Andrea Tyson, & Zahidi, 2014, p. 10). Companies' role in aiding

this lies in their ability to offer equivalent compensation to their female and male employees.

Furthermore, companies need to emulate positive female role models. Corporate global

culture "needs to find a robust image of female success that is first, not male, and second, not a

white woman on the phone, holding a crying baby," Sheryl Sandberg demanded in Lean In

(2013, p. 158). Carmona and Donald (2014) agree that it is imperative to support policies that

challenge traditional gender roles (p. 453), as do people like Jewell Parkinson, who implement

targeted training programs and partner with other firms that share similar visions of gender

equality (Caprino, 2015, p. 3-5). Activism on behalf of multinational corporations can create

what George Washington and American University Political Science professors Sean Aday,

Henry Farrell, Marc Lynch, John Sides, and Deen Freelon (2012) define as "'boomerang effects,'

in which activists in one country can create political momentum in another country to put

pressure on their own home government" (p. 20). In the same way that Egyptian utilization of

Twitter aggravated the power of social revolution both within Egypt and throughout other

countries, firms that enact gender-equal policies and practices stand to encourage others near and

far to "copy" them and create similar gender-fair rules.

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Corporations must also lobby for support from their state. Carmona and Donald (2014),

ever full of advice, continue to recommend that, "Campaigns and education will be key tools in

this regard, whether undertaken by States, development partners, or civil society" (p. 452). Here

is where multinational companies come into play: firms have the opportunity to campaign on

behalf of women and educate their partners and employees to foster a more positive and fair

culture towards gender equity. In countries like Angola, progress is being made—even if the

effects have not yet been fully realized: Angolan minister Filomena Delgado has spoken of the

ways that "laws have been drafted and approved in favour of the promotion of equality of

gender, and Angolan women empowerment and human rights" (AllAfrica, 2015, para. 4). If

corporations lobby, they can be a part of the reform that ultimately propels women to sit on an

equal stage with their male counterparts. Companies cannot wait around for governments and

grassroots activists to create change; multinational corporations have an incredible ability and

opportunity to combat it using their own extensive resources—both financially and physically.

Due to multinational companies' presence in many different locations globally, they have the

unique chance to create and foster a gender-positive policy in one country (perhaps a more

developed one to begin with) and then spread that same policy cross-borders and into other

countries, including those that may lag in gender equality.

Achieving gender equality in one country is difficult; to achieve it globally appears an

almost impossible and goliath task. But through investment in each female employee's personal

life, fair gender practices in the corporate setting, and activism, multinational companies can

impact the sweeping tides of change. Change occurs slowly, but can still occur only if leaders—

in this case, multinational corporations—are willing to step up to the challenge; their assistance

in tackling this issue may help hasten the rate of reshaping of the global gender culture. One day,

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the world must achieve Sheryl Sandberg's vision: "In the future, there will be no female leaders.

There will just be leaders" (2013, p. 562). Companies have an indisputably significant role to

play in achieving this vision, lest the globe allow women to continue to be oppressed. With the

right advances in the most inequitable places, we can answer Beyoncé's question: "Who run the

world? Girls."

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References

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Academia — a Complex Combination in Practice. Nordic journal of working life studies,

5(1), 69-92. Retrieved from http://rossy.ruc.dk/ojs

Aday, S., Farrell, H., Lynch, M., Sides, J., & Freelon, D. (2012). Blogs and Bullets II: New

Media and Conflict After the Arab Spring. United States Institute of Peace. Retrieved

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AllAfrica. (2015, March 11). Angola Has Recorded Remarkable Gender Equality Progress -

Minister. AllAfrica. Retrieved from http://allafrica.com

Bekhouce,Y., Hausmann, R., D'Andrea Tyson, L., & Zahidi, S. (2014). The Global Gender Gap

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the impact on women's rights and gender equality. Gender & Development, 22(3), 441-

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Chen, T., & Turner, J. A. (2015). Gender and Public Pensions in China: Do Pensions Reduce the

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P., J. (2011, September 19). Growth is not enough. The Economist. Retrieved from

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Sandberg, S. (2013). Lean In: Women, work, and the will to lead [iBooks version]. New York,

NY: Alfred A. Knopf.

Stevens, B. (2015, March 11). Promoting gender equality together. Deutche Welle. Retrieved

from http://www.dw.de

United Nations. (2014, September 22). Emma Watson at the HeForShe Campaign 2014 - Official

UN Video [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=

gkjW9PZBRfk

Wolfers, J. (2015, March 2). Fewer Women Run Big Companies Than Men Named John. The

New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com