Angela Merkel, Germany’s first female chancellor, has been praised by many for her pragmatic leadership in a turbulent world and celebrated by some as a feminist icon. But a look at her track record over her 16 years at Germany’s helm reveals missed opportunities for fighting gender inequality at home.
Angela Merkel, Germany’s first female chancellor, has been hailed as a feminist icon and praised for her leadership.
According to the Associated Press, some opportunities in the fight against gender inequality were missed during Merkel’s 16-year presidency.
“One thing is clear: a woman has demonstrated that women can do it,” Alice Schwarzer, Germany’s most famous feminist stated.“However, one female chancellor alone doesn’t make for emancipation.”
Schwarzer, the 78-year-old women’s rights activist, is the most prominent founding member of the German women’s liberation movement.
“She’s the first one who made it all the way to the top,” Schwarzer, who has met Merkel for several one-on-one dinners over the years. “But has she done anything for women’s policy aside from her sheer presence? Honestly, not a lot.”
According to Schwarzer, one reason for Merkel’s reluctance to fight more openly for feminist issues in Germany may be her own struggle to get to the top of German politics.
“Merkel got a lot of pushback as a woman,” especially early in her political career, she said. “She didn’t expect that, so that may be a reason she didn’t pick out the fact that she is a woman as her central topic.”
Merkel, sexism, and men’s power struggles
She had to get used to the power games of alpha men in international politics. In front of cameras, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi made her wait while he took an apparently more important phone call; Russian President Vladimir Putin brought his large, unleashed dog to a meeting, well aware that Merkel is afraid of them. And US President George W. Bush gave her a surprise shoulder massage without asking her consent. Merkel was later admired by women around the world for her subtle handling of sexism and mansplaining. Her eye roll during a conversation with the Russian president at the 2017 G20 summit became legendary.
“She learned to assert herself in a male environment, maybe sometimes also to play out the position of women a little bit. But she has never made herself a real fighter for women,” says Merkel biographer Boysen.
Merkel, who earlier served as minister of women’s affairs, has had a complex time advocating and implementing equal opportunity policies, “because she also wanted to be elected by men,” says Jacqueline Boysen.
Women’s rights vs. strategy
Merkel’s quest for tactics, according to experts, was at the root of it all: Merkel needed the support of her party to stay in power, and centre-right conservatives were far apart from the feminist agenda.
Merkel grew up in the old East Germany, where it was common for moms and women to work outside the home. Her party, on the other hand, has been dominated for decades by a traditional family view: a mother, father, and children, with the male working and earning money while the woman stays at home with the children.
However, along with her ruling coalition partners, during Merkel’s 16-year rule, new laws were passed that would contribute to a more modern family image: parental leave and parental financial allowances were introduced, day cares were expanded nationwide, and regulation to make it easier for young mothers to return to work after maternity leave.
Green Party MP Franziska Brantner said in an interview that the first female prime minister with so much power and authority could and should do more: “An effective fight against violence against women; financing shelters. A fight against inequality of pay of women and men in Germany; women on boards, more effectively fighting family and child poverty… There are many things that she could have done.”
Surrounded by female counselors
On the other side, more women have held important positions in the German government during this 16-year period than at any previous time in history. They took on the Ministry of Defense’s responsibilities. Merkel’s most trusted aides were all female. In the prime minister’s office, there were four women state ministers.
Merkel has mentioned women’s and girls’ rights several times throughout her travels abroad, including a visit to a women’s shelter in Niger and urging female students in South Korea to get involved in politics. Were these, however, purely symbolic efforts? “I haven’t really seen her push for gender equality at the UN or at the EU level or within Germany.” adds Green Party member Franziska Brantner.
Where has Merkel brought Germany in regards to gender equality?
Merkel, who had previously avoided defining herself as a feminist, has long resisted proposals for a female quota in senior corporate management positions.
She thought that businesses would automatically promote more women to managerial roles, but that didn’t happen, and in late 2020, a legal change was required. Merkel acknowledged earlier this year that making such progress was challenging. “I honestly believed that everything would be easier when I entered politics in 1990.”
When it comes to political representation, Germany lags behind other European countries.
According to Eurostat, the European Union Statistics Agency, the proportion of women’s seats in parliaments in 2020 was below 31.4% in Germany, 49.6% in Sweden, 43.3% in Belgium and 42.2% in Spain. . In Germany last year, only 14.6% of senior executives at large listed German companies were women. According to the Federal Statistical Office, women have one of the largest gender pay gaps in the EU, with women earning 18% less than men in 2020.
A role model
“Angela Merkel did not take up her job with the claim to use her role as chancellor for the support of women or making gender equality her vested interest,” said Julia Reuschenbach, a political analyst at the University of Bonn. “However, she did very much engage in promoting other women in politics.”
Merkel’s greatest legacy, according to writer Janina Semenova, Oxana Evdokimova, is her demonstration that a woman can lead the country — and do so successfully through so many crises. “Today, no one laughs at a girl when she says that she wants to become a minister or even chancellor,” said Merkel in 2018. Today, she is a role model for women all over the world.
As her chancellorship comes to an end, Angela Merkel appears to be more free to speak on gender issues; after all, she no longer has to win an election. Just recently, she finally declared herself a feminist, adding: “We should all be feminists.”
Source: Associated Press, DW