Hillary Clinton got closer than any American woman to the nation’s top job, but her loss this week has thrown a spotlight back on the question: Why has the United States lagged behind so many countries around the world in choosing a female leader?

Tiny Sri Lanka became the first to shatter the political gender barrier more than a half-century ago, when that island nation was known as Ceylon. Its giant neighbor, India, followed a few years later. Since then women have attained top leadership posts — president, prime minister or its equivalent — in more than 70 countries in Europe, Latin America and the Asia-Pacific. Today, women run two of Europe’s most powerful nations, Angela Merkel in Germany and Theresa May in Britain. So why not the United States?

Historians have offered a range of reasons. Many of the earlier women’s pathways were eased because their husbands or fathers were autocratic or charismatic leaders first. Some were chosen via parliamentary deal-making, not direct elections. Others were tapped as temporary leaders. Some scholars say that European democracies may view women as more suited to high political office because their governments are known for generous social-welfare programs, something that seems maternal. In contrast, the president of the United States is primarily seen as commander in chief, which is a frame more difficult for women to fit into.

History: In 1966, Indira Gandhi became the first female prime minister of India, the world’s largest democracy. She was, of course, the daughter of India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. She held the office until 1977 and then again from 1980 to 1984, when she was assassinated by her bodyguards. Four years later in neighboring Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto, another daughter of a former prime minister, became the first woman to head a Muslim-majority country.

Not to forget: Perhaps the best known modern female wartime leader was Margaret Thatcher, Britain’s prime minister, who was known as “the Iron Lady.” Europe’s first elected head of government, Mrs. Thatcher ordered Britain’s military into war against Argentina in 1982 over islands that Britain called the Falklands and Argentina the Malvinas.

Another stereotype-defying woman leader was Golda Meir, who was prime minister of Israel when war erupted in 1973. She was known for pithy quotes about women in politics. “Women’s liberation is a just a lot of foolishness,” she once said. “It’s the men who are discriminated against. They can’t bear children.”

America is still seen as the policeman of the world, the guardian of the world and still has a very gendered version of what leadership means. Did people vote against Clinton because she was a woman or because her name is Clinton? Of course, both could be.

Among the 193 member states of the United Nations, 18 women now serve in the top leadership positions. Executive positions are the hardest for women to crack. That’s true in business, true in politics.

Tuesday’s election not only failed to break the glass ceiling and put a woman in the Oval Office, but it elevated to that throne a man accused of multiple sexual assaults who has made degrading comments about women. Other male leaders, too, are seen as misogynists.

Still, many experts see an underlying bias that has discouraged American women from seeking political office, impeding the flow of potential female presidential candidates. Even after the ratification in 1920 of the 19^th Amendment, which grantes women the right to vote, some states restricted their right to be candidates; Oklahoma did not allow women to seek executive office until 1942!

The United States ranks 97^th among 193 nations worldwide in the percentage of women in the lower house of Congress, according to data compiled by the Inter-Parliamentary Union. Only six of the 50 state governors are women, as are 20 of 100 United States senators.

Although female leaders abroad are no longer rarities, men still far outpace women in politics: 22.8 percent of the world’s parliamentarians were women as of June 2016, according to the United Nations, up from 11.3 percent two decades ago.

„We have this curious gender polarization in politics where one part of the world is moving in the direction of female or feminine leadership, and the other part of the world is yearning for macho leadership,“ said Niall Ferguson, a British historian and senior fellow at Stanford University.

I think he isn´t wrong.