Emerging Women Leaders in Solomon Islands: The Aims and Activities of the Young Women's Parliamentary Group

Abstract

My current research seeks to build a profile of young Melanesian women identified by their peers and fellow national citizens as playing leading roles in their families, communities and beyond. There is an enormous amount of attention given to getting women into politics, but we know comparatively little about how young women think about politics, and the ways in which they choose to engage with the formal political system. It is important to be alert to the ways in which young women demonstrate leadership outside the formal political system, for example, as entrepreneurs or through community or volunteer work. This In Brief discusses preliminary findings from recent fieldwork in Solomon Islands, where I interviewed young women leaders. I was fortunate to be able to contact these dynamic women through the Young Women's Parliamentary Group (YWPG).