When Interpol recently appointed its first female president, Mireille Ballestrazzi, there was widespread delight that a high-profile international body had again placed a French woman at the helm. Christine Lagarde at the IMF is another obvious role model for female graduates at les grandes écoles.

In French politics, too, there appear to have been great leaps forward. True to his campaign promise, President François Hollande’s cabinet has a perfect gender balance, with 17 out of 34 ministerial posts filled by women.

But not everyone is celebrating. A group of female activists called La Barbe (“the beard”, but also slang for “that’s enough!”) say, “There is an element of window dressing. With the exception of the Justice Ministry, the weightier portfolios remain in the hands of men.”

In the corporate world, there is no such pretence at equality: not one cac 40 company has a female ceo. La Barbe may turn up en masse at shareholders’ meetings wearing stick-on facial hair, but their commitment to accelerating change is serious. “We denounce the monopoly of power, prestige, money and privilege in the hands of a couple of thousand men,” states their manifesto.

Politicians have taken note: it will be a legal requirement that women occupy 40 per cent of corporate boardroom seats by 2017.

Switzerland’s stable economy and scenic landscape are popular with buyers of second homes, with the Alpine nation racking up half a million vacation properties. Last March, however, voters passed a law to limit holiday homes in towns to no more than 20 per cent of the housing stock, a measure aimed squarely at hundreds of mountain resorts where chalets are shuttered for much of the year while locals struggle for affordable living space. This month the Swiss again go to the polls, to vote on a zoning law that would reduce the area available for building in the cantons. Unsurprisingly, leading the “No” campaign is Valais, a key tourist region that boasts the country’s biggest concentration of vacation homes.

After a successful year as the World Design Capital, Helsinki continues to boost its international brand. This time the city’s focus is on food, with a strategy to strengthen its culinary profile and become a “top quality European culinary city”: a tough goal given the competition from gastronomic destinations such as Florence and San Sebastián.

For Finns, though, culinary culture means involving everyone. The strategy will increase organic food at nurseries and set up food commissions for school children to have a say in their own lunches; renovate and develop the city’s old foodhalls; and grant building permission for unusual initiatives such as container cafés.

Finding a job, for the youth of Spain, Portugal, Greece and Italy, means learning German. The Bundesagentur für Arbeit says hundreds of thousands of southern Europeans head to Germany for work every year.