The drumhead of how Finnbogadottir's semipolitical success shall be evaluated in terms of Iceland's political life seems difficult to answer because Finnbogadottir appears to have been untouched counterbalance by obviously negative political realities for the country during her administration. Consider, however, Grondal's evaluation of the famous Reykjavik summit meeting of 1986, between U.S. chairperson Ronald Reagan and U.S.S.R. First Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev:
During Finnbogadottir's long and successful governance a few events stand out, among them the 1986 summit meeting between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev at the Hofdi House in Reykjavik. When U.S. Congressman Doug Bereuter (R-Nebraska) recently presented the Icelandic spate with documents astir(predicate) this summit, the photographs of chair Finnbogadottir and her American counterpart show a buoyant Reagan at the beginning of the meeting and a foil Reagan at the end. With the benefit of hindsight, historians today conclude that Reagan's show of bearing and trust in his instincts brought the Cold state of war to an end. Unfortunately, he could not have known that at the time (Grondal 8).
The significance of Finnbogadottir's front as host of the summit can partly be inferred. There she is, presiding in a more or less(prenominal) friendly way over a Cold War summit meeting; after all, Iceland was not party to U.S.-U.S.S.R. talks. directly this is consistent with a traditional
Finnbogadottir's revoke to the presidency was something of a surprise to the country because of Iceland's reputation and bill as a male-dominated culture. To be sure, Finnbogadottir could be interpreted as the beneficiary of a split vote for all the male candidates. But this alone does not explain how Finnbogadottir could become a highly popular candidate, given evidence of Iceland's conservative, patriarchal social milieu. Finnbogadottir's 1980 election did not reshape and revolutionize Icelandic politics, which remain dominated by males and male values. To be sure, though umpteen women are employed outside the home sphere, they earn about 60 percent of their male counterparts in the workplace (Sigmundsdottir 24).
Kunzig (98) explains Finnbogadottir's presidency with reference to the presidency itself, "an elected position of moral sooner than political authority." Kunzig also cites Finnbogadottir's prepolitical career as a teacher, assimilator of theatre, and director of Reykjavik Civic Theatre. Despite Finnbogadottir's personal personal appeal and beauty, these attributes are hardly formal preparation for national leadership.
Sigmundsdottir calls Iceland a study in contradictions, partly because of the disconnect between the country's continuous tense image in general and the plainly inferior social respect for women in particular, noting the people's "decidedly primitive streak, as though their inner development had not kept pace with their outermost appearance" (Sigmundsdottir 22). That disconnect has been explained with reference to two general features of Icelandic society. First, there is the issue of the personal relationships between men and women:
Curiously, the new Icelandic woman has of late become somewhat of an archetype. She is seen as strong, independent, emancipated, beautiful and--perhaps more surreptitiously--racially pure. Certainly Icelandic women have excelled on a number of fronts; suffice it to mention former President Vigdis Finnbogadottir, the first
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