Placement at the World Economic Forum

My third week at the World Economic Forum in Geneva, Switzerland has begun, and I am settled into my work and my team. I am interning within the Special Constituents group, which focuses on engaging Civil Society Organizations (CSO), faith leaders (FL), as well as women leaders in the Forum's work.

My team is truly representative of the multinational nature of Geneva. Each of them speaks at least 3 languages, and come from a variety of countries. They all welcomed me warmly, and I feel as though I have been part of this group for years.

Regarding my role here at the Forum, I am currently assisting the managers of the CSO and FL constituents with a variety of tasks. First, I compiled a list of the top 50 most influential faith leaders, paying particular attention to women faith leaders given their under-representation in this area. More specifically, the Forum will be holding a Summit in India in November, and a number of faith leaders will be invited, including women faith leaders stemming from my and my supervisor's research.

I have also begun a mapping project for my CSO manager, which aims to identify gaps in relationships between the Forum and current CSO partners. The Forum is constantly searching for new NGOs to work with, and this summer I will be assisting in identifying these potential partners.

Toward the end of my internship, I am excited to have the opportunity to contribute to the Forum's Global Gender Gap Report, under the supervision of the Director of the Special Constituents Group, Ms. Saadia Zahidi. The Global Gender Gap Report is an Index that ranks countries based on a variety of variables (such as the proportion of women in parliament, wage parity, etc), and acts as a benchmark for states to monitor and improve the status of women.

For more information about the report, and to find out how your country ranks in terms of gender parity, I encourage you to click on the cover below:

For the upcoming 2011 Report, the Gender team has sent out surveys to Ministries of Women's Affairs to provide additional value to the report. I will update this blog as we continue to receive completed surveys, and with any interesting developments at the Forum.


Take care!


Alexandra