Mirella Visser, president of the European Professional Women’s Network, looks at how far women have come and how far they still need to go since International Women’s Day was first celebrated in the early 1900’s.
" ...a day to stop and think and focus on the topic of women’s progress"
Annalisa Gigante, Vice President DSM

What started as a movement for women’s rights and universal suffrage has turned into a global day of celebrating women’s achievements. International Women’s Day has become an institute, not only for human rights activists but also for corporations, organisations and society as a whole.

Taking stock
More than half a million hits on the internet, including 200 videos, announcing thousands of events being organised around 8 March are testimony to the fact that IWD is very much alive today.

“International Women’s Day gives us the momentum to analyse what is behind the hype and the success stories that are widely communicated, and assess what is still to be done,” says Cécile Demailly, international strategy consultant and board member for the ThinkTank Groups of the European Professional Women’s Network. Annalisa Gigante, Vice President at DSM, adds: “It is a day to stop and think and focus on the topic of women’s progress”.

Diversity
The ways to celebrate are as diverse as women are. From small scale individual actions in local neighbourhoods and fund raisers for local initiatives to marches and demonstrations to ban violence against women and raise awareness of women’s underprivileged position in parts of the world where women still lack access to education and health care; highly politicised in some countries, barely on the radar screen in others.

In Italy, men give women special flowers, mimosa, not romantically, but more out of friendship and as a sign that spring is approaching. In France IWD 2008 revolves around the plight of Ingrid Betancourt, the courageous French-Colombian presidential candidate, who has been captured and held by a terrorist organisation since 2002.

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