Social-Cultural Factors and Women’s Participation in Higher Educational Leadership in Mogadishu, Somalia

Abstract

Participation of women in leadership, particularly in higher education is an issue that attracts global attention from educational practitioners. The SDG 5 data shows that the world is not on track to achieve gender equality by 2030. Women’s representation in positions of power and decision-making remains below parity. Women’s participation in government, research, and resource management remains far from equitable to that of men. It is with this background that this study sought to investigate the relationship between social-cultural factors and women's involvement in higher educational leadership in Mogadishu, Somalia. The social feminist theory is employed to theoretically anchor the study. Pearson's correlational design was employed. Descriptive statistics such as mean, standard deviation, frequencies, and percentages were used while Pearson correlational analysis was used to establish correlations. The findings revealed that social-cultural factors (r = -0.631, p<0.05) had a negative and significant relationship with women's participation in higher educational leadership. The study concluded that social and cultural factors contribute significantly to the decrease in women's participation in higher educational leadership in Somalia. The study recommends that university management should discourage gender stereotyping when it comes to leadership by encouraging and training employees to adopt a universal leadership mindset.