Category: International Leader / page 3

Vigdís Finnbogadóttir
Vigdís Finnbogadóttir


President of Iceland from 1980 to 1996, Vigdís Finnbogadóttir was the first democratically, directly elected, female president. Finnbogadóttir was born in Reykjavík, Iceland, on April 15, 1930. Her mother, an active feminist, participated in the nurse’s trade union for 35 years. Her father was an engineer and professor and encouraged Finnbogadóttir to pursue the arts. She graduated in 1949 from Reykjavík College and continued her education in France and Sweden at the University of Grenoble, the Sorbonne and the University of Uppsala, respectively. Later, she taught drama, theatre history, and […]
Indira Gandhi
Indira Gandhi


Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi served as the prime minister of India for three consecutive terms (1966 to 1977) and a fourth term (1980 to 1984). She adhered to the quasi-socialist policies of industrial development that were begun by her father, Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of independent India. As prime minister, Gandhi established closer relations with the Soviet Union, depending on that nation for support in India's long-standing conflict with Pakistan. Gandhi was born November 19, 1917. She attended Visva-Bharati University, West Bengal, and the University of Oxford. In 1942, […]
Julia Gillard
Julia Gillard


Julia Eileen Gillard served as the 27th prime minister of Australia, and the Australian Labor Party leader from 2010 to 2013. She was the first woman to hold either position. Gillard was born on September 29, 1961, in Barry, Wales, and migrated with her family to Adelaide, South Australia, in 1966. She graduated from the University of Melbourne with a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Laws in 1986. In 1987, she joined the law firm Slater & Gordon, specializing in industrial law. Gillard was elected to the Australian […]
Dalia Grybauskaite
Dalia Grybauskaite


Dalia Grybauskaite was elected president of Lithuania on May 17, 2009, the country's first female president and the first president of Lithuania to be reelected for a second consecutive term. She held the position until 2019. Grybauskaite was born in Vilnius on March 1, 1956. She studied political economy at Leningrad University. In 1988, she defended her Ph.D. thesis at Moscow Academy of Public Sciences. She holds the academic qualification of doctor of social sciences. In 1991, she completed a special course for senior executives at Georgetown University in Washington. […]
Tarja K Halonen
Tarja K Halonen


Tarja Halonen served as president of Finland from 2000 to 2012, the first female head of state in Finland. Halonen was born December 24, 1943, in Helsinki, Finland. As a student at the University of Helsinki, Halonen served as the social affairs secretary and the general secretary of the National Union of Finnish Students. After earning a law degree in 1970, she began her professional career as an attorney with the Central Organization of Finnish Trade Unions. From 1974 to 1975, Halonen served as the parliamentary secretary to Prime Minister […]
Sheikh Hasina
Sheikh Hasina


Sheikh Hasina first became Bangladesh's prime minister in June 1996, serving until 2001, and then again assumed office January 2009, serving until August 2024. Hasina was born on September 28, 1947, in Tungipara, East Bengal, the daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who would become the founding father and first president of Bangladesh. Hasina actively participated in the mass upsurge of 1969 and at the time of the Liberation War of 1971, she was imprisoned by the Pakistani occupation army along with her husband, mother, sister and brother. She graduated from […]
Tsai Ing-wen
Tsai Ing-wen


Tsai Ing-wen is the current president of the Republic of China (Taiwan), elected on Saturday, January 16, 2016. She is the first female president of Taiwan and the first of Hakka and Aboriginal descent. Tsai grew up Fenggang, in southern Taiwan and moved to Taipei as a teenager. She earned a Bachelor of Laws at National Taiwan University, a Master of Laws from Cornell University and a Ph.D. from the London School of Economics. Upon returning to Taiwan after graduation, she taught law at School of Law at Soochow University […]
Janet Jagan
Janet Jagan


Janet Jagan, Guyana's fourth executive president, achieved a number of firsts in her long history of involvement in her adopted country's politics. She was to become Guyana's first woman Deputy Speaker, its first woman to be elected to the Georgetown City Council, its first woman cabinet minister, the country's first woman prime minister, and the nation's first woman president. Born in Chicago, Illinois on October 20, 1920, she was educated at the University of Detroit, Wayne University, Michigan State College and Cook County School of Nursing. She married Cheddi Jagan […]
Atifete Jahjaga
Atifete Jahjaga


Atifete Jahjaga served as the president of Kosovo from 2011 to 2016. She was the first female president of the Republic of Kosovo, the first non-partisan candidate, and the youngest female head of state to be elected to the top office. Jahjaga, a Kosovo Albanian, was born April 20, 1975, in Đakovica (now called Gjakova), then a part of Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. She graduated from the University of Prishtina at the Faculty of Law in 2000. In 2007, she completed a graduate certificate program in police management and […]
Katrín Jakobsdóttir
Katrín Jakobsdóttir


Katrín Jakobsdóttir served as the prime minister of Iceland from 2017-2024. Jakobsdóttir was born February 1, 1976, in Reykjavík, Iceland. She earned a bachelor's degree in Icelandic and with minor in French in 1999 and a Master of Arts in Icelandic literature in 2004, both from the University of Iceland. She worked as a language advisor at the news agency at public broadcaster RÚV from 1999 to 2003, a freelancer for broadcast and print media from 2004 to 2006, and a lecturer at the University of Iceland, Reykjavík University and […]