Women leaders are more successful in stopping coronavirus than their male counterparts

Countries like New Zealand, Germany, and Finland have had striking success in fighting the coronavirus. What do they have in common? For one, they all have women leaders. Other place that have done remarkably well include Iceland, Taiwan, and Denmark—all of which also have women leaders.

While experts warn that the gender of leadership is only one factor in successfully fighting the pandemic, they also make clear that having women at the helm likely has something to do with why fewer people have gotten sick and died than in countries led by strongmen.

“We do need to be careful about lumping men and women into homogenous categories and keep in mind that the percentage of female national and global leaders is much smaller,” Kathleen Gersen, a professor of sociology at New York University, told The Hill. “But with that being said, among the countries which have done a better job of handling this pandemic and the spillover effects that it has had, women are disproportionately represented to a rather startling degree.”

Women leaders moved effectively and quickly to stop the virus. They did so by being decisive in actions that reduced risk and by being expansive in their thinking: They relied not just on epidemiological models produced by their own advisors (as President Trump is doing in the U.S.), but also data from medical providers—indicating that they are willing to have humility in pursuit of a solution to the crisis. Germany’s Angela Merkel studied what happened in South Korea to determine her own country’s testing and quarantine policies, The New York Times reported today.

“Germany jumped right over the phases of denial, anger and disingenuousness we’ve seen elsewhere,” Avivah Wittenberg-Cox wrote in Forbes. New Zealand’s Jacinda Ardern ordered a countrywide lockdown early on. She also quickly enacted a policy of self-isolation for anyone entering the country, then banned foreigners from entering. “Clarity and decisiveness are saving New Zealand from the storm,” Wittenberg-Cox wrote.

The willingness of women in leadership positions to bring diverse voices to the table likely has something to do with being part of that diversity themselves.

Amanda Taub argued in the Times that “the presence of a female leader may be a signal that a country has more inclusive political institutions and values.” Taub spoke to Devi Sridhar, the chair of Global Public Health at the University of Edinburgh Medical School, who wrote in an op-ed in the British Medical Journal: “The only way to avoid ‘groupthink’ and blind spots is to ensure representatives with diverse backgrounds and expertise are at the table when major decisions are made.”

With societal norms indicating that male leaders should be strong and aggressive (see: Trump won’t wear a mask) and that women leaders should be empathetic and compassionate, both genders face challenges in how they govern. What it comes down to, Helen Lewis wrote in The Atlantic, is leadership styles. Still, just because there are societal expectations put on leaders, it doesn’t mean that those who govern can’t adopt successful traits from their oppositely (or even, looking forward, thirdly) gendered counterparts.

Gersen at NYU told The Hill that both strength and the ability to feel are critical in what she calls a fully developed leader. She argued that “if women can lead the way in showing that these are not competing and conflicting attributes, but in fact complementary and necessary for good leadership—I think not only will society benefit, but so will men.

“Maybe then we can begin to open up the scripts for roles that leaders play, regardless of whether it’s a woman or a man or anything else,” she said.