The recent headline news in France was that two potential candidates in the next race for president are women. One is Michèle Alliot-Marie, defence minister. The second is Ségolène Royal, president of the regional council of Poitou Charentes – the only socialist top regional leader. A recent article in the British version of Elle magazine suggested that French women were paragons both at work and in the home and asked: “Would France be a better country if run by women rather than men?”
Progress towards gender equality in France can seem impressive, at least on the surface. Fifty per cent of university students are female and only recently a woman, Laurence Parisot, was elected head of Medef, the employers’ association. Anne Lauvergeon heads the nuclear construction industry as chairman of Areva. But a closer look, in particular at the top of the corporate ladder, challenges this positive picture. Not a single company in the French blue chip stock index, the CAC 40, is led by a woman. Across Europe, only 8 per cent of the seats on corporate boards are held by women.
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