Last year, for the first time, many Americans wondered if the country "was ready" to elect a woman president — a question already answered in many nations. The UN, which tracks women in elected positions globally, notes that in 2008 there were more women in politics than ever, accounting for 18.4% of parliament members worldwide. There are highly visible women leaders dotting the globe — in Ireland, Bangladesh, Chile, Germany, Argentina and Liberia. But the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) notes that "even at the current rate of increase, developing countries will not reach the 'parity zone' where neither sex holds more than 60% of seats until 2045."

UNIFEM also tracks less easily quantified measures of women in decision-making positions: women's ability to require government accountability, access to basic human rights, freedom from violence and sexual extortion, women's pay equity and place in business management positions, among many others. UNIFEM's 2009 interactive report "Progress of the World's Women" is a comprehensive guide and organized by country and topic.

Study the map above in detail. It includes women in parliaments, heads of state and those in ministerial positions. (PDF)

Ellen Johnson was born in Monrovia, Liberia in 1938. She attended high school at the College of West Africa. After marrying James Sirleaf, she traveled to the U.S. to study. Johnson Sirleaf received a B.A. in accounting from the University of Wisconsin in 1964, a diploma at the University of Colorado in economics and a master's degree in public administration from Harvard University in 1971.

After Harvard, Johnson Sirleaf returned to Liberia and became the assistant minister of finance in William Tolbert's administration. In 1979, she became the first female minister of finance. In 1980 she was one of a few officials to avoid death when a firing squad killed 13 Liberian cabinet ministers. In 1980, Samuel Doe assumed power in the country following a military coup. Johnson Sirleaf went into exile to Kenya, where she worked in the Nairobi office of Citibank.

In 1985, Johnson Sirleaf returned to Liberia to run for the Senate. She was briefly imprisoned for criticizing the Doe regime and initially supported rebel leader Charles Taylor. During 1989 to 1996, when Liberia was entrenched in a civil war, Johnson Sirleaf lived in Washington, D.C. and worked as an economist for the World Bank and as the director of the United Nations Development Program Regional Bureau for Africa.

Johnson Sirleaf returned to Liberia in 1996 and ran against Charles Taylor in the 1997 presidential election under the Unity Party, coming in a distant second. Taylor charged her with treason. She campaigned for his removal from office, serving as the head of the Governance Reform Commission and assuming a leadership role in the transitional government after the second Liberian civil war ended in 2003.

In 2003 when Charles Taylor was exiled to Nigeria and the National Transitional Government of Liberia (NTGL) was formed, Sirleaf was selected to serve as Chairperson of the Governance Reform Commission where she led the country's anti-corruption reform by changing the reporting mechanism of the General Auditing Commission from the Executive to the Legislature thereby strengthening and reinforcing its independence. She left this position to successfully contest the 2005 Presidential elections resulting in her historical inauguration on January 16, 2006, as President of Liberia. (SOURCE: IRON LADIES OF LIBERIA and Liberian Executive Mansion)

Photo Credit: Eric Kanalstein/UNMIL