Not long ago, the idea that the most prominent women in global politics would come from the conservative right would have seemed improbable. And yet, at the close of 2025, here we are: Sanae Takaichi in Japan, Giorgia Meloni in Italy and Maria Corina Machado in Venezuela.

Three women, three world leaders. Two of them sit at the Group of Seven table; one, Machado, was recently awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for “her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy” in Venezuela.

All three show that female leadership is not only possible. It is flourishing where many least expected it: on the political right, not on the left, despite the feminist rhetoric of “progressives.” Their stories could not be more different. Meloni, 48, rose from youth activism to the Italian premiership. Takaichi broke through one of the most male-dominated political cultures in the developed world. Machado has spent years defying an authoritarian leftist regime. But together they challenge a longstanding assumption: that the left owns feminism and that women’s empowerment is its natural terrain.

Read more at: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/commentary/2025/12/24/world/conservative-women-shatter-glass-ceilings/