GEHAN ABU-ZAYD is Vice-Head of the Egyptian NGO Forum for Women in Development, the Executive Manager of Egypt Association for Development and Editor-in-Chief of Al-Nahar (the publication of the Egyptian NGO Forum for Women in Development). She has written extensively on human rights, poverty and women's political participation in the Arab world and has published articles in the International Dialogue Fund, The Netherlands, 1997; Kul Al-Ossra magazine, Emirates, 1994; Bent Al-Ard & Qadaya Al-Mar'aa Al-Arabeya,1990; Bent El Ard, 1983­1993; and between 1994­1996 she wrote a weekly column for the "Al-Araby" Newspaper.

Dr DRUDE DAHLERUP is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Aarhus, Denmark. She has undertaken extensive research on women in politics, social movements, the history of the women's movement, sex segregation of the labour market and feminist theory. She has published many articles and books in Danish including, most recently: Rødstrømperne: Den danske Rødstrømpebevægelses udvikling, nytænkning og gennemslag 1970­1985. Bd. I-II, Gyldendal 1998. (The Redstockings: The Rise and Fall, the New Ideas and Impact of the Danish Women's Liberation Movement, 1970­1985.) In English, among other things, she has published: The New Women's Movements, Feminism and Political Power in Europe and the USA, Sage 1986; "From a Small to a Large Minority: Women in Scandinavian Politics." Scandinavian Political Studies, Vol. 11, No. 4. She has also written a handbook on women's representation, which was published by the Nordic Council of Ministers.

Dr FRENE GINWALA is Speaker of the National Assembly of South Africa. A former researcher and spokeswoman for the African National Congress in exile, Dr Ginwala returned to South Africa in 1991. She was elected to Parliament in the first democratic elections. She is a member of the ANC Constitutional Commission and the National Executive Committee. She has written extensively on gender issues specifically focussing on women's political and economic empowerment.

Dr AZZA KARAM is a Programme Officer in charge of projects on Gender, the Middle East, and Research at the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA) in Stockholm, Sweden. She is also Research Fellow at the Institute for Development Research at Amsterdam University, The Netherlands, and founding member, as well as former Chair, of the Middle Eastern Women's Network, based in Amsterdam. Her publications include Islam in een Ontzuilde Samenleving (co-authored; KIT, 1996); Women, Islamisms and State: Contemporary Feminisms in Egypt (Macmillan and St. Martin's Press, 1997). She is co-editor with Ziauddin Sardar of Islam and Politics: Reinterpretation and Practice in the 1990s (London: Pluto, forthcoming).

Dr JONI LOVENDUSKI is Professor of Politics at Southampton University, UK. She researches the political behaviour of British and European women and is especially interested in women's representation in politics. Her main books are Women and European Politics (1986), a comparative study of the impact of women and feminism in Europe; Political Recruitment (with Pippa Norris, 1995), a study of the British candidate selection process; Contemporary Feminist Politics (with Vicky Randall, 1993), a study of the British women's movement in the Thatcher years and Politics and Society in Eastern Europe (with Jean Woodal, 1989). She has co-edited The Politics of the Second Electorate (1981), The New Politics of Abortion (1986), Gender and Party Politics (1993), Different Roles, Different Voices (1994) and Women in Politics (1996).

Dr RICHARD E. MATLAND is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Houston, Texas and is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Administration and Organizational Theory at the University of Bergen, Norway. Dr Matland's research interests include the fields of women and politics, comparative politics, and public policy. His work on women and politics has been published in several leading political science journals including the British Journal of Political Science, The Journal of Politics, Comparative Political Studies, and the Canadian Journal of Political Science, among others. A common theme in Dr Matland's work has been the effects of electoral systems on women's representation. He has done research on questions of electoral systems and women's representation in Canada, Costa Rica, Norway, Sweden, and the United States.

KALLIOPE MIGIROU is a lawyer, who has worked for the European Union under the auspices of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in the first field operation (HRFOR) in Rwanda. She helped create a sector in this operation for the protection and promotion of the rights of Rwandan women. She participated in the reform of the Rwandan legislation as regards women's and children's rights, to conform with international standards and norms, and she initiated a number of projects to address the problems that Rwandan women face in the aftermath of genocide. She also participated as an OSCE elections supervisor in a number of elections in Bosnia-Herzegovina. She is now working as the International Federation of Human Rights Leagues (FIDH) representative for the Nordic and Baltic States, and is finalizing her Master's degree on International and Comparative Law at the University of Stockholm.

MAVIVI MYAKAYAKA-MANZINI in addition to her duties as Member of the South African National Assembly, has special responsibilities in the Deputy President's office. She has worked as an editor of the Voice of Women, and the Journal of the ANC Women's Section. Her work there and elsewhere has covered broad areas related to gender equality and women organizing for change. She has been involved in the Constitutional negotiation process which came up with the Interim Constitution and the new final Constitution of South Africa. She has written widely on various issues related to women in general and the experience of South African women in particular.

KAREN OLSEN DE FIGUERES is a former Member of Parliament in Costa Rica and a former presidential adviser. She has promoted women's political representation in Costa Rica and throughout Latin America.

CHRISTINE PINTAT has for many years been the Officer in Charge of the Programme on the Status of Women of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), the world organization of parliaments. In this context, she has carried out extensive research on the issue of women's participation in political and parliamentary life and is the drafter or co-drafter of all IPU's publications on this issue. Among the latest such publications are a world Bibliography on Women in Politics (1998); a brochure entitled Towards Partnership Between Men and Women in Politics (1997); a world comparative survey and a poster entitled Men and Women in Politics: Democracy Still in the Making (1997), and a survey entitled Women in Parliaments: 1945­1995 (1995). She is also IPU's Programme Officer in three other fields: Inter-Parliamentary Process for Security and Co-operation in the Mediterranean; International Humanitarian Law, and the Cyprus Issue.

Dr SHIRIN RAI is Senior Lecturer in Politics and Women Studies at the Department of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick, UK. She is the co-author of Chinese Politics and Society: An Introduction (1997), and the co-editor of Women in the Face of Change: Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and China (1992), and Women and the State: International Perspectives (1997). She has written extensively in the area of women and democratic politics in the developing world.

Dr NADEZHDA SHVEDOVA is a Leading Researcher at the Institute of the USA and Canada Studies, at the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow, Russia. She has worked as a consultant to the State Duma of Russia, the Supreme Soviet, the Ministry of Health Care and Ministry of Foreign Affairs, among other institutions. She is also author of numerous works on various aspects related to women in politics in Russia, the former Soviet Republics, and the USA. Her publications include The Abyss (1988).

Dr HEGE SKJEIE is Associate Professor at the Department of Politics at Oslo University, Norway. Her current research is on social democratic political leadership. She has published extensively on Nordic equal opportunity legislation and policies, trade union politics and women's political participation. She has been the Norwegian representative to UN, UNESCO and Council of Europe committees on issues of women's political participation. She has recently been appointed to a governmental research group to investigate new trends of power distribution in Norwegian state/society relationships. Among articles published in English are: "The Rhetoric of Difference: On Women's Inclusion into Political Elites" in Politics and Society (1991); "The Uneven Advance of Norwegian Women" in New Left Review (1991); "Ending the Male Political Hegemony: the Norwegian Experience" in Joni Lovenduski & Pippa Norris. eds. Gender and Party Politics (1993); "From Movement to Government" in Alida Brill. ed. A Rising Public Voice: Women in Politics Worldwide (1995); "Women in Politics in Norway" in Kathrin Arioli. ed. Quoten und Gleichstellung (1996) and "A Tale of Two Decades" in Kåre Strøm and Lars Svaasand. eds. Challenges to Political Parties (1997).

International IDEA Gender
Advisory Board

GRÂCE D'ALMEIDA ADAMON, barrister and former President of the Association of Women Lawyers of Benin, and former Minister of Justice of Benin.

Prof MAHNAZ AFKHAMI, former Minister of Social Affairs in Iran and is currently Director of Sisterhood Global Institute ­ SIGI, in Bethesda, Maryland, and Professor of Women's Studies at Syracuse University, USA.

Dr HANAN ASHRAWI, former Spokesperson for the PLO and current Member of the Palestinian Legislative Council.

Dr FRENE GINWALA, Speaker of the National Assembly of South Africa and a Member of the Board of Directors of International IDEA.

CAROLYN HANNAN-ANDERSSON, Gender Advisor at Swedish Institute for Development Assistance ­ Sida, Stockholm, Sweden.

Prof KUMARI JAYAWARDENA, Secretary of the Social Scientists' Association and former Professor of Women's Studies and History in Colombo University, Sri Lanka.

MARIA DE LOURDES PINTASILGO, former Prime Minister of Portugal and currently on the Board of WIDER in Helsinki.

Dr KATARINA TOMASEVSKI, human rights lawyer and Professor of Law at the Oslo Institute of Peace, Norway.

TRISH WILLIAMS, former Director of Programmes at the BBC and currently working on her own media company.

Dr MOHAMMAD YUNUS, Director of the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh.