Equality, Diversity & Inclusion

From the AFP:

The high mortality rate in Mexico's drug war has seen women progress quickly in the shadowy underworld of the cartels and they are increasingly taking on key management roles, a new book says.

"Female Bosses of Narco-Traffic," by Arturo Santamaria, a researcher at the Autonomous University of the State of Sinaloa, traces the ascent of women in drug trafficking organizations.

"The narco-traffickers will become stronger as a result of this," wrote Santamaria. "They will be more difficult to fight because the women appear to be acting smarter."

An estimated 50,000 people have been killed since 2006 in a government crackdown on organized crime that has set off turf wars among rival groups even as they fight off the Mexican military's counter-narcotics units.

Santamaria said the dead have been mainly males belonging to the cartels, which has led to a changing of the guard with younger men and women rising to the top of drug trafficking organizations.

"Widows, daughters, lovers and girlfriends of the men, who are part of the same criminal families," have had to lend a hand, he said.

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From Women's eNews:

As a participant at the nongovernmental organization forum that accompanied the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995, I witnessed a delegation of Korean "comfort women" survivors who were trying to call attention to their victimization as sex slaves for the Japanese military during World War II.

By then, they were no longer young and some indeed looked frail, but they made a powerful and striking presence to demand recognition of their history.

In the early 1990s, Kim Hak Soon was the first former comfort woman to speak out, at the age of 67, and her testimony inspired other women to do the same. Within one year more than 200 other Korean women who had been enslaved as comfort women came forward. They have joined together, supported each other and shared their experience.

A local monument to these brave women was the subject of a startling May 19 story in The New York Times. The first surprise was my own ignorance of the monument, just across the Hudson River from New York City, in Palisades Park, N.J., where more than half of the population is of Korean descent. Since it's the only one of its kind in the U.S., it seemed strange that it had not attracted widespread publicity and become a major pilgrimage site for women's advocates.

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From The Telegraph:

The move to drop the “golden skirt” policy is a sign of ministers’ commitment to strip red tape from companies to get the economy moving.

Ministers said they were “standing up for British business” and were opposing the plans to impose more “burdensome regulation” on companies.

The European Commission launched a consultation in March proposing forcing companies by law to bring in the quotas.

The suggestion for quotas was praised by Prime Minister David Cameron at a summit in Stockholm in March.

However ministers will say the Government is not going to implement the quotas, and instead will merely encourage firms to hire more women in executive positions.

Figures show that nearly 16 per cent of senior positions are now held by women, up from 12.5 per cent last year. If the momentum continues, the number of women on boards will exceed 25 per cent by 2015.

Theresa May, the Home Secretary and Women’s minister, said: “We are encouraging firms to use women’s talents by helping them see the business benefits. But we must allow them to get on with their job.

“Our voluntary approach is reaping rewards. The past year has seen the biggest ever jump in the number of women on boards, and some of the UK's leading companies are now reporting on gender diversity, which will help more women rise to the top.”

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From The Wall Street Journal:

A roundup of the highest-paid bosses from 2011 in an earlier Wall Street Journal article is a reminder that women are still a rarity in the corner office. And those that do make it to the corner office are earning far less than their male counterparts.

Kraft Foods CEO Irene Rosenfeld, the top-paid woman last year, ranked 62nd on the list of more than 300 chief executives compiled by Hay Group. With a total direct compensation of $15.5 million, she earned just 1/24th of what top-paid Apple CEO Tim Cook received. (Even considering Cook’s abnormally high pay compared to the rest of the list, Rosenfeld got just one-fifth of what No. 2 Oracle CEO Larry Ellison earned.)

Research suggests the pay disparity between the two genders begins forming early on. New female M.B.A. graduates earn on average $4,600 less than their male counterparts, according to a Catalyst study of graduates from 26 top M.B.A. programs around the world. By mid-career, that pay gap grows to $31,000.

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From Sports Illustrated / The AP:

The policy calls for prompt investigation and written conclusion of all complaints. And key members of the Montana Board of Regents, hoping to ensure that all the state's campuses comply with federal and state gender equity laws, made it clear that their analysis of the university administration's handling of the situation isn't over.

The U.S. Justice Department earlier this month opened its investigation into the way the university and the city responded to sexual assault and harassment reports, which prompted a second investigation by the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights.

The university has come under fire for mishandling rapes over the past two years, particularly in the cases involving football team members. The football coach and athletic director were fired in March, mostly without explanation, but a cloud still hangs over the program.

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