While today women enjoy the same rights as men — the right to education, to work, to leadership positions in both the public and private sector and an income that guarantees them a life of luxury — have they in reality achieved their ambition of being equal to men?
The International Labor Organization (ILO) recently announced that women are most often employed in low-level jobs and are not paid as well as men. This indicates that women’s skills are less highly regarded. Women are understandably aggrieved.
The European Commission recently said European companies weren’t making enough effort so that women can assume top-level administrative jobs. In its latest report it said that women’s participation in the work force is increasing very slowly, mainly because there are not enough opportunities for women to use their skills. Between 20 and 30 percent of European women have top-level positions in the public sector, but the number is much lower in the private sector. In France, women hold two percent of top-level positions in the private sector, in Germany 3 percent, and 5.3 percent in the UK.
The European Commission isn’t merely demanding that women be promoted to high-level administrative positions but that women should also actively participate in political life. EU studies have shown that women do in fact participate to quite a high degree in political life. Sweden tops the list — 42 percent of its politicians are women. Denmark comes in second place with 37 percent, and Norway with 36 percent, while Algeria is at the bottom of the list with 3 percent.
According to the latest research, European women are increasingly learning to use the Internet. In Italy 42 percent of women are using the Internet, in the UK 40 percent and in the US 51 percent. By 2010, as many women as men will be using the Internet.
What more do women want?
Can they for example enter the world of the mafia, gangs and drug trafficking and be as successful as men? The best-selling Spanish author Arturo Perez Reverte says that it is indeed possible. He illustrates it in his latest novel, “Queen of the South.”
The story centers around a Mexican widow named Teresa Mendoza, the widow of a pilot who flew a small cargo plane. After his death she decides to head for Spain and start a new and different life — she enters the drug trade.
As a result Teresa becomes a strong businesswoman, working with a number of drug trafficking gangs, and after a while she finds herself heading a cocaine trafficking ring in the Mediterranean countries, later consolidating her relationship with the Russian mafia.
This is the first time that the Spanish author has made a woman the protagonist of one of his novels. Nevertheless he has brilliantly portrayed Teresa’s personality — the conflict between her feminine nature and her work as head of a drug trafficking ring. She sometimes feels weak, lonely and in need of a man, but continues to run her business aboard the yacht were she lives in the middle of the ocean without mercy or hesitation. She is seen as obstinate and determined to attain her goal, and it is these attributes that enable her to co-exist with members of the global mafia rings.
In over 600 pages of violent chases between members of competing gangs and others with the police, Teresa manages to escape every trap set for her.
The author began his career as a correspondent for Spanish television, then 10 years ago decided to leave his job and dedicate himself to writing fiction. His stories are well-known for their thrilling chase scenes. It is perhaps his love of the genre that accounts for Reverte’s success.