Michele Bachelet... appointed 50% of women in every level of government

[bloom]

ISABEL ALLENDE: Michele Bachelet is an extraordinary person, no matter that she’s a woman. It’s wonderful that we have a woman president in Chile for the first time. And what is even more wonderful is that she has come to the government and appointed 50% of women in every level of government. So when you see a photograph of the secretaries of state or any official photograph, the caption says, “Count the women,” because 50% are women. It’s the first time in history that female energy and male energy, in equal terms, are running a country. It’s the management of the country with this female energy. And I think that it’s an extraordinary experiment. And if it works, it will be imitated, and it will open up new spaces for peace and understanding in the world.

<snip>

JUAN GONZALEZ: Isabel Allende, I’d like to ask you, getting back to a remark you made a few minutes ago about the changes in Chile and the genuine feminization of the infrastructure of the government, have you noticed the impact of that, in other words, in terms of types of policies that have been adopted that might not have been adopted in prior governments or even in other countries by overwhelmingly male leaderships?

ISABEL ALLENDE: Michele Bachelet has been accused of being weak, because her style is different from the male style. But to give you an example of something that has changed, 64% of the national budget goes to social programs. Can you imagine what the United States would be like if 64% of our budget would be for social programs?

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/11/17/1454233

___________________________

There are too depressing threads going on around here. Here is a better one. Someone is doing it right. A lesson for us.

[bloom]

1. This seems like something worthy of celebration to me.

Of course it makes the US look like a bunch of moles/ostriches/whatever with our heads in the ground.


We have our speaker of the house and that's very nice and all - but - we're not there by a long shot. No 50%. No 64% of our tax money spent on services....

[mongo]

2. I'd love to see 64% of our national budget go for social services

and women making up 50% of government -- not because of some quota system, but because half of the most qualified people for the job are women.

I think and hope that I'll see this in my lifetime. The majority of new college grads now are women.

[bloom]

3. Kick for whomever doesn't watch Democracy Now!

Who may not hear about Michele Bachelet.


I did a search and I see that she comes up on wikipedia and there is a link a Washington Post article, Democracy Now, Answers.com, Forbes, the BBC, Taipei Times, and a couple links from Chile. 2nd page - a pbs link. (Not exactly hitting all the main, corporate US news, outlets).

She is "an agnostic, a doctor, a single mother of three..." - and people in the US can't imagine electing such a person. :( Too bad for us.

[donsu]

4. wonderful progress for women and children-all the best for Chile

nt

[bloom]

5. ....

[bliss_eternal]

6. How wonderful...!

Thanks so much for sharing this, bloom! It IS important that we learn from the positive examples provided by other govt. systems.

:hi: Good to have a positive story in GD, too.