Yet it sometimes seems that Asian women who want to get on in politics would be well advised simply to marry a man with the same ambition.

ECONOMIST: Only widows and orphans?

Although Brussels Eurocrats, depressed after the two ineffective commission presidencies of Jacques Santer and Romano Prodi, hanker after a man with the grand dreams and vaulting ambition of Jacques Delors, president in 1985-95, who pushed through the single market and plans for monetary union, a low-key but effective president may now be just what is needed.

ECONOMIST: European Commission