Although women are represented in many judicial systems, particularly in the U.S., they still are not represented at the same levels as men. While the percentage of women in judicial systems varies from one country to the next, we will use the United States as an example.

According to the latest statistics, women make up about 26% of the sitting circuit judges and about 34.5% of active judges in the U.S. Judicial system. Yet, women constitute 51% of the total population.

That goes to show just about everyone that women are underrepresented as judges. We learned all of this thanks to a holiday called the International Day of Women Judges — a holiday that is observed every March 10th.

The History Of International Day Of Women Judges

This holiday was first observed on March 10th, 2022. It was created by the United Nations after they passed UN General Assembly Resolution 75/274 in 2021.

This day was conceived as a holiday that serves as an important milestone in ensuring ongoing efforts toward gender equality and building upon the Global Judicial Integrity Network’s work toward addressing gender-related judicial integrity issues. This holiday has been observed ever since all around the globe.

Some Facts About Gender Representation In Judicial Job Occupations

To highlight the issue of underrepresentation in the judicial field, we thought that we would list some of the things that we uncovered during our research. Although we already went over the stats of how many women currently work in the U.S. judicial system as judges, we thought that we would expand on that by including other jobs in this field. Let’s take a look at them below.

• About 37.9% of lawyers in the U.S. are women.
• About 84.8% of paralegals and legal assistants in the U.S. are women.
• About 72.1% of title examiners, abstractors, and searchers in the U.S. are women.
• In the world, the percentage of judges who are women rose from 35% in 2008 to 40% in 2017.
• In national supreme courts around the world, women represent only 41% of the judges and about 25% of the court presidents.
• Women’s representation in judicial systems around the world is rising, but it is happening at an extremely slow rate.

Observing International Day Of Women Judges

This holiday is one that encourages everyone to get involved with gender equality. People can do this in different ways. They can take a stand for women’s rights by protesting or writing letters to their government representatives, they can encourage girls and young women to pursue a career in law, and they can advocate for underprivileged women. People can also spread the news about this holiday using the hashtag #InternationalDayOfWomenJudges.