On 5 March 2026, the Department of International Relations, together with LSE IDEAS, hosted a panel launching the landmark report from Women in Diplomacy entitled Strengthening the Representation of Women in Diplomacy: Lessons from the Field. Marta Kozielska, HE Laura Popescu and Alexander Evans joined the conversation, chaired by Professor Karen E Smith.
Photo by Adele Kavaliauskaite
As of today, less than one quarter of global ambassador posts are held by women.
Women diplomats are restricted by institutionalised barriers to career development, known as “glass barriers’. This includes the glass ceiling, which prevents women from ascending to leadership positions and can lead to mid-career pipeline leakage; glass walls, which restrict them to a soft portfolio of administrative tasks; and glass cliffs, whereby leadership positions are usually attained during times of crisis or scarce resources.
Much work is to be done to fill the gap of women’s representation in diplomacy. This women’s history month, Karen E Smith and Marta Kozielska, co-founders of the Women in Diplomacy Project (WiD) at LSE IDEAS, showed how they are doing just that.
Inside WiD’s landmark Report Launch
In 2025, Karen and Marta held in-person dialogues across Abu Dhabi, Brussels, Geneva, London, Mexico City, New York and Ottawa, with 200 diplomats, experts and practitioners from over 50 countries from six continents. Building on their 2024 report, Strengthening the Representation of Women in Diplomacy: Challenges and Policy Solutions, they co-created a comprehensive toolkit to meaningfully boost women’s representation in foreign ministries and diplomatic services.
As highlighted by Marta, the goal is not just to benefit women, but to benefit everyone. After all, “a diplomatic service represents a country and therefore should be representative of that country” (Smith & Kozielska, 2026, 4).
The goal is not just to benefit women, but to benefit everyone
They were joined by an impressive set of panelists: HE Laura Popescu, first woman Ambassador of Romania to the UK and Alexander Evans, Professor in Practice in Public Policy and former diplomat and adviser to the Prime Minister.
The Need for Structural and Institutional Reform
In the discussion, it became increasingly clear that structural change is essential to support women’s careers, development and influence in diplomacy. Echoing the findings of the report, HE Laura Popescu championed the need for transparent recruitment postings and promotion pathways; unclear criteria like weighting experience in hardship or prestigious postings that women are disproportionately less likely to be assigned to in the first place silently disadvantages women diplomats.
Many women diplomats from the audience applauded flexible leave allowances that enabled continued career growth beyond maternity leave. Given the universality of experiences of barriers in the diplomatic field with variation between regions, tailored yet transferable institutional measures, as opposed to one-size-fits-all mandates, emerge as the most viable strategy toward closing the representation gap.
Zooming in – Culture and Support
The panel also highlighted the power of networks and solidarity between women in supporting women’s diplomatic careers. Alexander Evans pointed to the positive transformation of the British Foreign Service as evidence that informal misogynistic cultures can, and should, be rewired. Together, we see the importance of cultural change, especially if senior leaders actively close the gap between on-paper anti-harassment policies and in-practice normalised behaviour, and therefore cement structural improvements.
Concluding remarks
The evening was filled with insightful exchanges, particularly between female students aspiring to become diplomats and established professionals sharing their lived experiences. Faced with the scale of change needed, Marta reminded us to focus on continuity by starting small and building up through policy.
Event report by Adele Kavaliauskaite
BSc International Relations, 2026
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This article represents the views of the author, and not the position of the Department of International Relations, nor of the London School of Economics.
