18 February 2014. Women govern countries, lead corporations, write bestsellers and administer justice. They are top-notch athletes, have careers, bear children and run everyday family life. They opt for professions in male domains and go to war as combatant soldiers. They enjoy their independence, are skilful at business deals and make use of their talents. They push through glass ceilings and configure society to their taste. It’s all a bed of roses, then, being a woman – or is it?

Is this the world in which women live today? Pioneer Simone de Beauvoir would be proud. “One is not born a woman, one becomes one,” the French philosopher observed 66 years ago. How do women frame their lives today? What inspires them, what do they want to change?

From Brazil to China

The dossier of the February 2014 issue focuses on women’s lives in different countries, industries and roles. Eight out of the 29 women who have been elected state presidents since the 1970s come from Latin America. Yet neither Brazil’s head of state Dilma Rousseff nor Argentinia’s president Christina Kirchner exercise a great deal of influence on world politics, argues our Brazilian author, Ana Clara Costa. Cultural scientist Daria Berg follows up the lives lived by women in China. “We need more female entrepreneurs in Iran,” says the Iranian e-learning designer Negar Kalbasi in an interview. She helps women in Teheran to start up their own businesses.

A literary foray

“Women often lead their teams with empathy and enthusiasm,” says human resource management professor Heike Bruch in a video about different styles of leadership. Dominique Künzle, philosopher and feminist, muses about what a woman actually is. Whether women judges deliver different rulings, is the question asked by lawyer Revital Ludewig. Gender expert Christa Binswanger casts a glance at sex appeal in pop culture. Carina Gröner takes us on a foray into women’s literature, and ice-skater Alessia Rohr tells us how she is able to be a top-class athlete and an HSG student at the same time.

HSG Focus is published digitally as an app, optimised for tablet computers and available in a smartphone version. Free download through the App Store (from iOS 6.0) and Google Play (from Android 4.0). Landing page: www.hsgfocus.ch