POLITICS WATCH : Role Models

Surely it would be a mistake to let pass unremarked the ascension of two women politicians to the height of power in countries as different as Canada and Turkey.

Women prime ministers are not unprecedented, of course. In addition to former Prime Ministers Margaret Thatcher of Britain and Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan, there is Khaleda Zia, currently in power in Bangladesh. But for Bhutto and Zia a big part of their success can be found in the fact that they are part of powerful family dynasties.

Not true in the case of either Kim Campbell or Tansu Ciller. Like Thatcher, these two politicians came up through the ranks by virtue of great political skill alone.

Over the weekend in Ottawa Campbell became the first woman prime minister of Canada and in Ankara Ciller won the leadership of the governing True Path Party; later this U.S.-trained economist was appointed as Turkey’s first female prime minister.

It might, perhaps, have been expected that women would first achieve power through the politics of the left, with its trademark emphasis on so-called women’s issues. But of course that was not the case for Thatcher, a Tory. Nor is it true of either Campbell or Ciller.

In the wake of the retirement of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, Campbell was elected leader of Canada’s Progressive Conservative Party. And the Yale-educated Ciller, who comfortably defeated two rivals for the party leadership, does confess to having a conservative role model. It’s none other than Margaret Thatcher.