“Historically, foreign policy has been a predominantly male domain, with women markedly underrepresented at decision-making levels.”

Women’s representation in international diplomacy is alarmingly low. Though it varies across countries and regions, women’s underrepresentation in international diplomacy is pervasive. There has never been a woman secretary-general of the UN or NATO, for example, and only four women have been elected to serve as President of the UN General Assembly. Bans on women entering diplomatic service were mostly lifted between the 1920s and the 1950s, but were usually replaced by a ban on married women diplomats, which began to be lifted only from the 1970s. Although the numbers of women entering the diplomatic profession have risen sharply since then, the legacy of exclusion persists in continuing patterns of underrepresentation and gendered stratification within ministries of foreign affairs.

Gender parity remains elusive, particularly in the security sector. While numbers have increased, women still represent only 24 percent of ambassadors, 13 percent of defense ministers, and less than 10 percent of peacekeepers. Women’s persistent underrepresentation in security roles, alongside recent dips in representation, raises serious concerns about the durability of past gains.

In 1933, Ruth Bryan Owen was appointed as the first female chief of mission as head of the U.S. embassy for Denmark and Iceland. For most of its history, the Foreign Service was a male-dominated institution. Women who did enter were often forced to resign when they married, a rule that was not fully eliminated until the 1970s. Although the Department has made significant progress in recent decades, women remain underrepresented in the senior ranks relative to their proportion in the overall workforce.

This literature review underlines that “the share of women in political offices has increased considerably over the past few decades in almost every country in the world,” indicating that historically this share was low. It frames the rise in female representation as a recent trend and asks whether “an increase of women in politics” has broader effects, implicitly recognizing that political decision‑making, including in areas such as conflict behaviour and defence spending, has long been dominated by men.

While gaps persist, women's representation at management and ministerial levels in the areas of foreign affairs and security has increased whether in the European Union (EU), the United States (US) or at the United Nations (UN) level. However, the foreign policy establishment remains 'disproportionately dominated by white men'. Women made up 44 % of the State Department's permanent staff, but only 29 % of Foreign Service specialists.

Women are clearly underrepresented at senior levels in diplomacy. Only 23.4% of the world’s ambassadors in 2024 were women, according to the most recent available data. While many foreign ministries have achieved near gender parity at entry level, the proportion of women drops sharply at higher ranks, particularly in ambassadorial and other senior decision-making posts.

Women are generally under-represented in political offices worldwide, and their under-representation becomes larger in more senior positions. Of the four dimensions considered in the World Economic Forum’s Gender Equality Index, the dimension called Political Empowerment, which measures the extent to which women are represented in political office, records the poorest performance, with only 25% of a hypothetical 100% gap having been closed to date. Given the persistent under-representation of women in political institutions, where important decisions that shape societies are taken, economists and political scientists are increasingly interested in understanding the causes of the gender gap in political representation.

Data compiled for this study confirm that women’s participation in peace processes and related foreign policy decision-making remains extremely low. Between 1990 and 2010, women represented only 2 per cent of mediators and 8 per cent of negotiators in major peace processes. This chronic underrepresentation reflects the broader reality that international peace and security institutions, including foreign ministries and defence establishments, have historically been male-dominated spaces.

To do so, we introduce the most comprehensive dataset on any modern diplomatic corps: the Key Officers of the U.S. Foreign Service, covering 34,000 unique officers across all U.S. foreign missions from 1966–2017. In brief, our findings indicate that even as women’s representation in the U.S. diplomatic corps continues to trend upward, there is substantial gender-based discrimination which manifests in retention and promotion outcomes. We further provide evidence of an implicit “quota” system that prevents multiple women from being assigned to leadership positions within the same embassy.

The paper notes that “women are still underrepresented in parliaments and other political decision-making bodies around the world,” despite gradual increases. It discusses mechanisms such as “reserved-seat quotas” and concludes that these are more effective in guaranteeing “women's meaningful political inclusion,” indicating that without such interventions, political decision‑making structures, including foreign policy, have historically been heavily male dominated.

This paper identifies challenges that women face when working overseas in diplomatic positions, a professional environment that historically has been male dominated. The infamous glass ceiling phenomenon has curtailed women with regard to their hiring, promotion, and retention. When looking at the glass ceiling phenomenon in diplomacy, women have also had difficulty being promoted beyond the junior and mid-levels. As a result, in 1976, Alison Palmer, a mid-level career officer, sued the US Department of State, claiming widespread discrimination against women and that women were clustered at the junior and mid-levels.

From 1992 to 2019, women constituted, on average, 13 percent of negotiators, 6 percent of mediators, and 6 percent of signatories in major peace processes worldwide. In many high-profile negotiations, there were no women at the table at all. These figures highlight how, despite some symbolic appointments of women in foreign policy, the core decision-making processes on war, peace, and international security have remained overwhelmingly dominated by men.

The article explains that “while women are still severely underrepresented in politics, they globally do not have the same legal rights as men regarding their opportunities and potential to participate in the economy at the same time.” It presents research showing that higher representation of women in parliaments, cabinets, and as heads of government is still the exception, reinforcing that political leadership, including foreign-policy decision‑making, has historically been dominated by men.

As the data reveals, there is a deficit of women among high-ranking Foreign Service positions such as ambassadorships as well as of Black women in the upper echelons of the Foreign Service. The history of the U.S. Foreign Service shows long-standing exclusion and marginalization of women and particularly Black women from decision-making roles.

The review notes “growing attention to women's representation and involvement in decision-making and leadership in public and private sectors,” precisely because “women have historically been excluded or marginalized from key decision-making spaces.” It stresses that despite progress, women “remain underrepresented in senior leadership roles in politics and governance,” which encompasses high‑level policy fields such as foreign affairs.

International IDEA notes that gender quotas were introduced in many countries “to counter the historical underrepresentation of women in political decision-making bodies.” It explains that these measures seek to improve women’s access to elected office in contexts where “men have long dominated political institutions,” underscoring that political domains, including those responsible for foreign policy, have traditionally been male.

Academic surveys of twentieth‑century diplomacy consistently report that until the late 20th century women were almost entirely excluded from diplomatic careers and especially from ambassadorial or ministerial foreign‑policy posts. Legal barriers in many states required women diplomats to resign upon marriage or barred them from senior ranks, and it is only since the 1970s–1990s that a significant number of women began to reach positions such as foreign minister, national security adviser or ambassador.