Women in Management: The Hungarian Case

Abstract

Although a transformation process has been underway for 20 years in the post-socialist countries, gender inequalities persist, including the under-representation of women in management and other political and economic leadership positions. The promotion of gender equality was among the top policy priorities under socialism in the 1970s, but it was a top-down simplistic process without a deep understanding of the underlying social mechanisms causing gender inequality (Bankóné Vas, 1981; Gal and Kligman, 2000).In the socialist period, the country underwent a process of forced emancipation led by the political decision-making bodies, which was not supported by the citizens, and therefore lacked widespread acceptance or genuine engagement.