A Quintet of Key Moments in the Challenge to the Freedoms of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.
Twelve months prior, groups dedicated to gender equality were anticipating a second Trump term. Scarcely anyone expected. The torrent and swiftness of administrative decrees originating in the White House were viewed as a deliberate tactic to overwhelm and create panic. This strategy had its intended impact – there was chaos, resentment, and burnout as groups rushed to fill the gap left by a major funding freeze. But the situation was about to worsen.
The Trump administration has been the key driver, aided by intense advocacy work by far-right organisations capitalizing on the climate to forge international alliances with ideological partners.
The anti-rights movement signifies a transnational grouping of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that seek to undermine progress across a wide spectrum of issues. Areas targeted involve abortion, LGBTQ rights, trans rights, non-traditional family structures and comprehensive sexuality education.
They accomplish their goals by lobbying governments, supporting court cases, discrediting international efforts to promote fairness, circulating falsehoods, and resourcing aligned NGOs.
We review five moments that affected the security, respect, and well-being of women and girls.
USAID Effectively Dismantled
In March, a month and a half following a major US aid agency is frozen, causing global disruption, a leading figure in the administration announces that over eighty percent of the organization's initiatives will be axed. American foreign service officers, past leaders and aid and medical specialists denounce the action, stating that people will die as a result. Rights defenders say that the dismantling of this institution is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a savage attack on human rights and birth control and maternal healthcare. A multitude of agencies say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by shrinking assistance, especially in war zones. As the year ends, reports confirm how a tremendous loss of life has already occurred from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with many more millions at risk. Additional key contributing countries initiate similar reductions. A leader of an international advocacy group says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.
Christian-Right Groups Raise Voices During UN Women Summit
In March, several Christian-right organisations meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a biannual gathering held in parallel with the annual UN Women gathering. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to oppose what they term a UN overreach. They are in buoyant mood as they welcome shifts in US policy on gender, diversity and abortion. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the gender equality forum with a stark warning that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is resurgent, after a analysis demonstrates that opponents of gender equality are deliberately weakening historic agreements on key women’s rights issues around the world.
Summits Promoting Conservative Norms
Over the summer, a series of conferences in Africa centered on the traditional family and national sovereignty triggers anxiety among equality campaigners. In early May, a head of state and partner open a large assembly to resist what they label overseas agendas corrupting societal morals. A soon after, another continental gathering on conservative ethics is held. Both events are graced by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including leaders of well-known groups. One speaker urges African NGOs to stand up to “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of multilateral bodies. In June, a prominent church hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in an African nation, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a stage for criticizing gender equality. Campaigners note that the scale of their presence has grown significantly.
US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives
As health facilities across Africa report they are facing shortages of birth control, including emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in midsummer plans to destroy a vast stockpile of birth control held in a European depot. A leading family planning organization states that their elimination will deprive a huge female population from access to birth control, and lead to a public health crisis of unwanted pregnancies. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “callous and reckless”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US refuses all offers. The situation remains in deadlock as host nation officials will not allow perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which halts US aid to groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is standard practice for certain US administrations. It came as no surprise when the rule was reinstated in January. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to expand the global gag rule to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to cover diversity programmes. Additional information regarding the policy's widened application are likely forthcoming. A leader in global maternal health says widening the scope will have “catastrophic impacts”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that new US aid packages being discussed with African nations will become contingent upon adopting the expanded global gag.
