For anyone wanting to see a woman politician operating at the top of her game, the new Danish drama Borgen offered a brilliant, if fictional, example on Saturday night. The first episode showed Birgitte Nyborg (Sidse Babett Knudsen), the Moderate party leader, in the last three days of an election race, emerging as the model of a modern political player, both morally and tactically. She is a woman willing to change course if necessary, but unwilling to compromise or double-cross. Would she support damaging information being leaked about a rival? "How dirty do you think I am?" she asks her spin doctor: "I'd never forgive myself if I came to power in that way." "In that case, I doubt you ever will," he remarks, but her ascent continues. In the TV debates she stands out in a purple dress, listening to her rivals, before suddenly discarding her prepared speech. Unscripted, she addresses the public passionately for two minutes, expressing just what voters are waiting to hear: that when politicians don't know something they should simply admit it.
- The Iron Lady
- Production year: 2011
- Country: UK
- Cert (UK): 12A
- Runtime: 104 mins
- Directors: Phyllida Lloyd
- Cast: Alexandra Roach, Anthony Head, Harry Lloyd, Jim Broadbent, Meryl Streep, Olivia Coleman, Olivia Colman, Richard E Grant, Roger Allam
It's common knowledge that this is a drama about a female prime minister in Denmark, so it's not giving too much away to say Nyborg triumphs, and her reaction is telling. "This is quite simply the beginning of something new," says her old, trusted male adviser, Bent Sejro, as she waits to address a crowd. "Now go in there and thank them, and lead them, because they want to be led by you." "What if I don't know how to?" she asks. "You'll learn it along the way," he replies.
That exchange is important, because it sums up an ongoing truth: that there is still no map for women in power. It's a reality also explored by The Iron Lady, currently a hit at the box office, as well as the new book by Jodi Kantor, The Obamas: A Mission, A Marriage. (Extracts focusing on Michelle Obama's perilously tricky role in the White House appeared in the Times yesterday.) With politics, business, the media, and most major industries still male-dominated, there is a recognised approach available to the small group of privileged men who reach the top. There is a uniform: grey suit, shirt, tie. There is a debating style: apparently straightforward, often slippery, with a tendency towards the adversarial. There is an attitude; an air of confidence and absolute certitude. Power is theirs for the taking, and they have gone right ahead.
Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady.
There is no uniform for women. As the first moments of Borgen make clear – a Machiavelli quote about war, followed by a makeup brush plunging into powder – women are still caught between two worlds, and are often left tentative, talented, yet not entirely confident as to how to proceed. The show explores this territory with wit and care. There's the moment in coalition talks, for instance, when one of Nyborg's rivals suggests that, as the surprise winner in the elections, she should sit at the head of the table during negotiations. (She takes his advice, but only once he has left the room.) There's the relationship between Nyborg and her husband, a foxy academic played by Mikael Birkkjaer, last seen as Ulrik Strange in The Killing 2, who functions as best friend, tactical adviser, enthusiastic lover and cheerleader. (As in The Iron Lady, the relationship between female politician and husband looms surprisingly large.) Nyborg is very involved in family life – she shocks her spin doctor by taking time out from the campaign to attend a child's birthday – and it turns out she and her husband have a deal whereby she can concentrate on her career for five years before he gets his turn. Their back and forth is that ultra-rare beast, a TV depiction of a couple juggling ambitions and family life, with a slim, sexy portent of doom hanging over them in the shape of a female student.
There's also a focus on clothes that is surprisingly clever. Last week in GQ, Tory backbencher Louise Mensch complained that female politicians are trivialised by the focus on their fashion choices, and she has a point. Without a uniform, everything women wear becomes significant. In Borgen, Nyborg is shown trying to struggle into a pre-approved black suit, ahead of a debate; she also worries about having been called "voluptuous" in another dress. She knows her choices will be analysed, that her body itself is a subject of debate. This is echoed in the Obama book, in the passages about Michelle Obama's outfits; the Lanvin trainers criticised as too expensive, the shorts that were too "common", the moment White House press secretary Robert Gibbs told her "you're never going to please some of these people".
Michelle Obama makes an informal speech to welcome visitors to the White House. Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
If male is the default position, women will always be judged against it. Too masculine, and we're threatening; too feminine, and we're airheaded. The Iron Lady shows Thatcher as a woman who has always "preferred the company of men," but who is derided in the Commons for her voice. "The right honourable lady doth screech too much," crows another politician. Soon afterwards, her image is addressed. She's told hats have to go, her hair must have more impact, she has to have voice training. This sequence is a reminder of the dance to define Thatcher's image in the early days, the avid, shifting attempts to make a woman in charge somehow palatable. In John Campbell's Thatcher biography he writes that during her leadership campaign there was the need to "neutralise the gender question and persuade both the public and Tory MPs that she was a credible leader. Paradoxically, she no longer needed to prove that she was tough enough for the job; it was becoming a cliche ... to say that she was 'the best man among them'. But that raised the alarming spectre of a feminist harridan – the worst sort of woman." Thatcher was therefore presented to the press and public as an "ordinary housewife", shown cooking her husband's breakfast on the morning of the ballot.
Thatcher secured her position over more than a decade in power through a brutal belief in her own outlook, a belief that became sclerotic, and led to her downfall. She suppressed dissent among male colleagues, until finally a group toppled her; she couldn't be of them, so she operated above them. In Borgen, Nyborg takes the opposite tack, attempting to secure her position through give and take, a collegiate way of working, which recognises she doesn't have all the answers, sees power in admitting this and attempting to find solutions through dialogue. Neither of these is a male approach to power. Each woman operates outside the system. And both are fascinating to watch.
• Borgen is on BBC 4, Saturdays at 9pm. The Iron Lady is out now
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9 January 2012 10:16PM
Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher...
Thatcher on the bus, Thatcher in the paper, Thatcher on the bus, Thatcher in the paper, Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher Thatcher... AARRGGHHH!!!
*breaks down and sobs
9 January 2012 10:57PM
@balsamicextremist So let me just get this straight - are you saying you DON'T want that priority ticket to see The Iron Lady? (Seriously though. I feel your pain.)
9 January 2012 11:36PM
To those that claim only female politicians are judge on their on their looks, I give you Michael Foot and John Prescott as examples of male politicians who got in the neck for years becasue of their appearance.
'In Borgen, Nyborg takes the opposite tack, attempting to secure her position through give and take, a collegiate way of working, which recognises she doesn't have all the answers, sees power in admitting this and attempting to find solutions through dialogue. Neither of these is a male approach to power. '
Really becasue that is just the way any good manager , male or female , works so there are lots of males who take this approach . The authors total failure to think outside of their own prejudiced makes no difference to that.
10 January 2012 12:08AM
Nixon looked like a crook with his "five o'clock shadow", and well..er.. turned out to be a crook. Maggie was described by Mitterand to have the "eyes of Caligula and the mouth of Marilyn Monroe" and turned out to be Cruella de Vil.
Then we got Blair who looked like a cross between John boy Walton and Kevin Costner and we got a liar and a mass murderer.
And now we have "Calm down dear, you look like someone with Tourette's", "Call me Dave" , "The NHS is safe with me", Flashman Cameron. God help us.
Give me an old man in a donkey jacket anyday.
10 January 2012 12:27AM
Promote synergy! Remember birthdays!
10 January 2012 12:52AM
Ha cheers but I'll give your priority ticket a miss. Last couple of days has felt like the bit in Being John Malkovich where he goes inside his own head, but with the Thatch instead. London has become a dystopian nightmare with Streep's uncanny rendering of that loathsome smirking face haranguing me at every turn. Chilling.
10 January 2012 1:28AM
THAT. IS. BECAUSE. YOU. ALWAYS. OVER-ANALYSE. THINGS.
10 January 2012 2:30AM
Thatcher achieved power because she often used a traditional male approach to power, i.e. assertive, confrontational and force. At other times, she used a traditional female approach to power; being attentive and dependent on powerful males, claiming 'feminine privileges' and treating other women as rivals.
By contrast, the TV series 'Borgen' would appear to feature a woman choosing a more collaborative approach to management and avoiding traditional sexist models of power.
And and a final observation...Thatcher's government was marked by discord, polarised communities, civil repression and war.
10 January 2012 2:58AM
Fictional
Do you know any men who would be be equally unwilling to double-cross?
That's great but it's a fantasy that would play out much the same whether the politician was male or female.
I'm so glad to hear that there is a "map" and "recognised approach" available to me as a man. As long as I wear a grey suit with a shirt and tie, and pretend to be straightforward in debates, I'm pretty much guaranteed to become a cabinet minister.
Seriously though, what if I believe in myself and project "an air of confidence and absolute certitude" and people laugh at me for sounding effeminate? Will you stand up for me?
If male is the default position anyone who isn't judged to be sufficiently "male" will be judged against it.
Too feminine and I'm airheaded, too masculine and I'm threatening.
10 January 2012 3:20AM
"The Lady" by Luc Besson stars Michelle Yeoh as Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate (1991) and staunch human rights advocate, imprisoned under house arrest for almost 15 of 21 years by the military junta who murdered her father and prevented her from seeing her children and her husband for most of that time (her husband died from cancer, in England, whilst being prevented from visiting his wife in Burma by said junta.)
"The Iron Lady" by Phillipa Lloyd stars Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher.
Compare and contrast.
10 January 2012 6:58AM
Women have surmounted enormous obstacles in the struggle for positive change. However, despite fighting aginst such gendered problems as pay inequality, sexual harassment, exclusion from voting/education rights, rape and other gendered violence, and the right as half the global population to have political representation/ a voice etc, women are still not liberated from limiting social expectations. In the words of one working class suffragist, women have always had to fight with 'one hand tied behind' them.
10 January 2012 7:09AM
All women suffer from being treated worse because of their gender, but very few have as an aim in life to destroy the lives of millions of people, so my sympathy for Thatcher is, let's say, limited.
10 January 2012 7:18AM
Kinnock lost the election because he was ginger and Welsh. I wish it was more complicated than that, but not even the ridiculous notion that a whole nation decided to vote against him after a party concert was deemed prematurely celebratory could shake this equally ridiculous assertion that most of England simply didn't like the look of him.
10 January 2012 7:45AM
Don't many people think David Milliband would have made a better leader of the Labour Party not because of differences in policies, but because he "looks the part" more than Ed does, and has a nicer voice? In my old age, after a lifetime of enthusiastic interest, I'm beginning to find the whole world of politics quite nauseating, and fail to understand how any decent person would want to get involved with it.
As for poor Birgitte, what's the betting it will all end in tears?
10 January 2012 8:21AM
Yes, Folklover, another Labour leader is ridiculed for his appearance instead of his policies, like Foot and Kinnock before him. It was only bland Blair who broke the mould - nothing to do with the fact that he abandoned 'socialism' and cosied up to Murdoch was it?
And this obsession with image - if you don't approve of someone, and women aren't generally approved of as leaders, or even politicians at all in many cases - then you find a reason to criticise them - something about them is inherently wrong, ie the way they look.
I found Bergen fascinating, btw, and will keep watching.
A good article.
10 January 2012 8:31AM
Women act like male leaders when they lead for the simple reason thats how you lead. Thatcher didn't act any different from any man in power. Nonsense like she was got rid of by a group of men, is exactly what happens any leader who is removed by the people below them, you are grasping at straws to make women some how different.
10 January 2012 8:49AM
I've known very high achieving women in some other fields like medicine, the difference between them and their equally successful colleagues was simply the possession of a vagina rather than the usual penis.
No one ever got a job by being 'nicer' than an equally competent male rival.