This chapter explores the experience of Greece in the aftermath of the Eurozone crisis as a lens through which to view the problems women encountered there and in other parts of Europe. The chapter also considers the role that women might play in the progress towards economic recovery from the financial crisis and the more recent COVID-19 pandemic. We advocate measures that address empowerment and development of women in society and not just as economic actors. This matters for sustainable value creation for which the Sustainable Agenda 2030 requires women’s equal representation to influence corporations’ achievement of sustainable value creation and to improve their sustainability performance. From this perspective, our discussion of the role women play and the impact of policies on women brings the gender aspects of value creation under the spotlight and is in keeping with the discourse on sustainability and development internationally, gender equality featuring, for example, as one of the Sustainable Development Goals established in 2015.

Women have become increasingly central to initiatives aimed at achieving sustainable development and changing corporate practice. Global gender empowerment projects have allowed corporations to expand into new markets, while increasing the number of female leaders is thought to bring business advantages. These initiatives reveal a preoccupation with offering women more opportunities to participate in shareholder-centric corporate life but fail to address the real reason for women’s exclusion and subordination within companies: deep-seated structural barriers and biases. This Chapter explores how gender might be a catalyst for change towards sustainability. It suggests three reforms: changing conceptions of the ideal corporate worker to recognise companies’ dependence on unpaid caring labour; recognising how the process of globalisation is creating fresh patterns of inequality; and replacing the social norm of shareholder primacy with a corporate purpose based around principles of proportionality that may act in pursuit of strong sustainability.