The Icelandic women's movement has a long history. During the International Women's Year in 1975 Icelandic women attracted great attention when they organized a general strike to show how important women's undervalued work was. 90 per cent of the Icelandic women went on strike. And at the presidential election in 1980 the women's movement focused on electing a woman. After much persuasion Vigdís accepted to run against three male candidates. She was the first woman in the world to be elected president in a democratic election. She was narrowly elected, with 33.6 percent of the national vote, while her nearest rival got 32.1 percent. She became very popular and was subsequently reelected three times, unopposed in 1984, with 94.6 percent of the votes against another woman in 1988 and unopposed in 1992. In 1996 she decided not to run for reelection. She was the longest serving Icelandic president (with four terms) until Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson was elected to his fifth term in 2012.