Abstract:
Despite the fact that women are almost half of the population of the world, they are under-represented in political leadership across the world. Only 20% of parliamentarians were women in 2011 and only one country in the world has women-majority parliamentarians and that is Rwanda. This research analyzes and compares the gender component in terms of leadership style, performance and the characteristics desired among Kenyan youths. Twelve focus groups discussions (FGDs) were conducted in six different universities in Nairobi with undergraduate and graduate students as a method of collecting data for the study. In addition, a content analysis of media was undertaken as part of the research method. Among other findings of the study, participants of the FGDs concluded that women in Kenya are still treated differently in comparison to men especially in the political sphere despite the increase of women vying for political positions.