Women dominate Spanish cabinet

‘Feminist’ Zapatero puts focus on women
By Leslie Crawford
Financial Times, 17 April 2008

When Silvio Berlusconi, Italy’s newly elected prime minister, took José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero’s courtesy call this week, the ideological gulf between the two men was abundantly clear.

“I scolded Zapatero, in a gentle way, for having formed a government that is too pink,” Mr Berlusconi said yesterday. He was not referring to the Spanish prime minister’s Socialist credentials, but to Mr Zapatero’s decision this week to form a government in which women outnumber men.

Mr Zapatero, who describes himself as a feminist, has appointed nine women to his 17-member cabinet, one more than during his first four-year term, which had an equal number of men and women.

The new cabinet includes Carmé Chacón, Spain’s first-ever female (and pregnant) defence minister, and the youngest-ever minister, 31-year-old Bibiana Aído, who will head a new ministry for equality.

Mr Zapatero wants to put Spain at the vanguard of social change in Europe. During his first term in office, he drafted a law that made wife-battering a criminal offence and introduced a gender equality law to eliminate discrimination against women in politics and the workplace.

Too often, however, Mr Zapatero’s bold initiatives, often charged with great symbolism, have proved to be little more than empty gestures. The problem, say critics, lies not with Mr Zapatero’s ideas, but with their execution.

In spite of the law against wife-battering, domestic violence is on the rise. Last year, 71 women were killed by their husbands or partners, compared with 68 in 2006 and 58 in 2005, according official figures. The problem persists because the courts and police do not enforce restraining injunctions consistently, feminist organisations say.

Mr Zapatero, whose ruling Socialist party was re-elected on March 9, has promised to eradicate wage discrimination during his current four-year term. In Spain, women earn on average 30 per cent less than men, and are virtually non-existent at senior management and board-room level.

Again, it is not clear how Mr Zapatero will fulfil his promise. Most Spanish women are stuck in low-paid, un-unionised temporary jobs, which Socialist employment policies have been unable to budge. Spain’s male-dominated business elite also watered down some statutes in Mr Zapatero’s gender equality law, which now recommends, but does not require, publicly listed companies to have an equal number of men and women directors and senior managers.

As a result, Mr Zapatero’s feminist rhetoric has failed to bring about real changes in society.

A big mistake during Mr Zapatero’s first term, which looks set to be repeated in the second, is failing to allocate resources to allow new ministers to do their jobs.

During Mr Zapatero’s first term, Ms Chacón was stymied by her insignificant budget as housing minister. House price inflation, and the subsequent bursting of the Spanish property bubble, are big social problems, but Ms Chacón was unable to deal with either problem because of her insignificant budget.

Mr Zapatero has created two new ministries in his new government: science and innovation, where Spain lags the rest of Europe, and equality. It is not clear whether they will fare any better at bringing about the desired social change than Ms Chacón during her ill-fated stint as housing minister.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008
Spain's Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero unveiled his new cabinet 12 April 2008, which for the first time included more women than men.