Wonder Woman May Have Cost the United Nations Its Coveted Gender Parity

It is clear today, with the installment of a hypersexualized cartoon character as the Honorary Ambassador for gender equality and the empowerment of women, and with the selection of a male Secretary General despite a worldwide campaign to have a female Secretary General for the first time in 70 years, that the United Nations does not recognize the incredible importance of gender equality. Its’ support for the empowerment of women is a farce, present in its Security Council Resolutions and its Sustainable Development Goals for 2030, but missing from its actual deeds.

These events, in addition to slowing the process of gender equality worldwide, will have far-reaching consequences for the United Nations’ long-sought goal of achieving gender parity (50% women, 50% men) among its employees. Social psychological research on stereotype threat explains how this can happen. Stereotype threat occurs when a person feels that an aspect of their social identity is not valued in their work environment.

Countless studies have shown that this perception impairs their work performance and makes them less likely to want to apply to or stay at that company. If women at the UN understand these events as representing the UN’s true opinion about the value of women, the UN may have a difficult time hiring and retaining women in the coming months.

The UN has sent a clear message to women: it is not willing to do the actual hard work of taking steps to increase gender equality and it does not see the empowerment of women as important enough to warrant a real-life human as the Honorary Ambassador. That is not a sentiment that will attract potential female employees or that will make current female employees feel welcome.

Diversity cannot be spoken into existence with a flashy resolution. Diversity will only occur when the environment becomes hospitable to it. Unless the UN can clearly demonstrate its commitment to the gender equality, gender parity at the UN will continue to be a mere pipe dream.

Gina Roussos is a graduate student in Yale’s social psychology PhD program and she is currently interning with the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues’ Representatives to the United Nations