We need to talk about THAT Cop27 Leaders Photo
Photos of women have changed and documented the course of history. A Swedish holocaust survivor clobbering a neo-Nazi with her handbag in 1985. Margaret Hamilton standing beside the towering pile of software code she had written for the Apollo Project in 1969. Kathrine Switzer completing the Boston Marathon even as male race officials try to physically restrain her. These photos represent the complexity of humanity, and women’s progress in fighting for equality, representation and participation.
Then we have the leaders’ ‘family photograph’ from this year’s COP27 Climate Change Summit. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres stands flanked by Egyptian President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi and COP27 President Sameh Shoukry. Behind them are rows and rows of men, white shirts spliced with neckties making a consistent pattern. Scrutinising the photograph like a ‘Where’s Waldo’ cartoon, one can spot a rare woman; European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on the right, and Prime Minister of Barbados, Mia Mottley, towards the centre. But many news outlets cropped the photo so that not a single woman was visible. The image is stark not because of its representation of women, but because of its lack of them.
Why is this important? Well, aside from the fact that women make up 49.6% of the global population, and at the very least should be represented equally, women are being dramatically and disproportionately affected by the impacts of climate change. The UN estimates that 80 percent of people displaced by climate change are women, and displacement leaves them vulnerable to discrimination, exploitation, and violence. Food production workers and people living in poverty are likely to be most severely impacted by climate change: women represent up to 80 percent of the former, and 70 percent of the latter. Despite this, women continue to be marginalised from important climate decisions. At the 2021 G7 Summit, there was only one woman among the decision makers. Out of the 110 COP27 leaders, there were only seven.
Decision making bodies which reflect the diversity of the people they represent make better decisions. Countries which have at least 30 percent women in their parliaments have lower levels of corruption, lower mortality rates, and women in national legislatures have been linked to higher GDP and better law enforcement. There are strong links between diverse teams and efficient decision-making processes, as well as better results.
And when it comes to climate change, we are in desperate need of fast, high-quality decisions and results. While COP27 has made steps towards gender inclusivity, with 14 November designated as ‘Gender Day’, more action is required. We must petition our national government representatives for greater female representation in climate decision-making. We must make climate-conscious and gender-conscious choices at the ballot box. And those with power – government officials, politicians, decision-makers of all kinds – should consider ceding it to give voice to the underrepresented.
Our current, male-dominated decision-making processes are not working. We are set to pass 1.5 degrees of warming by 2040; 18 years away, the same distance between today and 2004, the year of the Athens Olympics and the Indian Ocean tsunami. Even at 1.5 degrees, we will see ecosystem collapse, large-scale drought, and tens of millions thrown into poverty. We are rapidly approaching catastrophic tipping points, but we are emitting more carbon than ever.
Former Irish PM Mary Robinson commented that COP26 was ‘too male, too pale, too stale’. If we don’t take serious action soon, we will be another thing: too late.
Opinion piece by Katherine Quinn
