Women's rights in Nordic countries rank the highest around the European continent. According to a global gender gap report issued by World Economic Forum, the top five countries in gender equality are those five from Northern Europe. Countries from Western Europe rank in the middle while those from Southern Europe are the lowest in the continent. Thus it is similar to their terrains, "higher" in the north and "lower" in the south.

Why? The report says this is because these areas are the cradle of women's rights movement which started in the 1960s. The movement of "women voting for women" promoted the process for women to be equal with men in their political rights in Nordic countries. And since then women have participated in various political life such as in parliament, government, political parties and trade union.

Women's rights movement reached its peak in Europe, but the development is not very balanced. Comparatively speaking, Northern European countries have made great achievements and completed their legal system. Their governments have taken effective measures to pave the way for gender equality.

For instance, gender equality ideas are taught starting from primary education. The Nordic countries have always talked about a golden rule that nobody can claim he or she is better or cleverer than others. Sticking to such a rule, Nordic countries have taken a series of effective measures to realize equality between men and women in social, political, economic and educational fields. Norway and Sweden took the lead in allowing women soldiers to serve in the submarines, making the saying that "Farewell, Women!" out-of-date.

In fact, gender equality in Northern Europe is no longer a slogan, but a kind of life style. However, it is more interesting to notice that women's employment rate in Norway and Iceland is not very high. The report explains that this is not due to job shortage, but because excellent living environment makes women choose to stay at home.

In contrast, things are so different in Southern Europe. Taking Italy as an example, the constitution stipulates that all citizens enjoy equal opportunities in political, economic and social life, but due to long-term male-dominant ideas, women's status were severely affected. Statistics show that in 2004, female parliament members accounted for less than 10 percent of the total. The employment rate of women college graduates were 15 percent less than that of men.

Women's salary was also 20 percent less than that of men with the same education background. Most Italian men don't cook or do house work in their families. About half of the 29 years old or below including those young mothers with various education backgrounds had been forced to become full-time housewives. Among those employed, women still deal with house work for more than 10 hours everyday.

Apparently, Switzerland should be a pioneer in equality. However, its ranking in the report is surprising. In fact, Swiss women enjoy good health care and welfare, high representative rate in decision-making institutions. This is a great progress considering that Swiss women only got voting rights in 1971.

However, in education, girls' enrollment has always been lower than boys. And although law endows equal opportunities for education, after nine years of compulsory education, three are far fewer girls who complete higher education than boys. In addition, Switzerland also lags behind in women's opportunity to participate in economy and employment. Women's salaries are one-third of their male counterparts in senior management positions and after graduation.

On the issue of gender equality, European countries differ in their understanding, which reflects an imbalance of civilization. Perhaps Southern European countries should make more efforts to learn from their Northern counterparts. But in global terms, to be fair, European women's status is still very high.

By People's Daily Online