Five Critical Pivotal Events in the Erosion of the Freedoms of Women and Girls in the Past Year.
This time last year, feminist advocacy groups were steeling themselves against a return of Donald Trump to office. Hardly anyone anticipated. The torrent and swiftness of executive orders emanating from the White House were interpreted as a calculated strategy to overwhelm and create panic. The tactic proved effective – there was chaos, resentment, and burnout as organisations scrambled to address the shortfall left by a major funding freeze. But this was only the precursor.
The American government has been the main instigator, aided by intense advocacy work by far-right organisations capitalizing on the climate to solidify transnational relationships with political allies.
The movement against gender equality describes a worldwide alliance of government figures, churches, and advocacy collectives as well as billionaire families and individuals that work to dismantle gains in a variety of areas. Areas targeted involve pro-choice policies, equality for sexual minorities, gender identity recognition, and inclusive relationship teaching.
They pursue this agenda via lobbying governments, supporting court cases, discrediting international efforts to promote fairness, circulating falsehoods, and resourcing aligned NGOs.
We analyze five moments that affected the safety, dignity and lives of women and girls.
USAID Effectively Dismantled
In early spring, a month and a half following a prominent humanitarian funder is frozen, causing international chaos, a senior US official reveals that over eighty percent of the institution's work will be scrapped. US diplomats, past leaders and aid and medical specialists decry the decision, cautioning that mortality will increase. Activists say that the demise of the agency is not just a financial shortfall, it is a vicious offensive against basic liberties and access to contraception and reproductive health services. Numerous groups say the impact on girls and women will be severe by waning support, especially in war zones. As the year ends, statistics reveal how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from illness, famine, inadequate obstetric services, and violence against women, with a far greater catastrophe looming. Two other major donor nations announce their own austerity measures. 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.
Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting
In the same month, several conservative religious groups meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a strategic summit held alongside the UN's flagship gender equality meeting. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to counter the UN's progressive policies. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they celebrate changes in American foreign policy on gender, diversity and abortion. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the women’s summit with a somber alert that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is back, after a analysis demonstrates that groups opposing progressive rights are deliberately weakening longstanding consensus on key women’s rights issues around the world.
African ‘Family Values’ Conferences
Over the warmer months, a series of conferences in Africa centered on the conservative family structures and national independence sparks alarm among human rights defenders. In early May, a president and first lady open a large assembly to combat what they label external influences undermining local norms. A few days later, another continental gathering on traditional morals is held. Both events are participated in by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including heads of influential networks. One speaker urges African NGOs to resist “radical global social engineering” of global institutions. In June, a prominent church hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in West Africa, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become an anti-LGBTQ, anti-gender platform. Advocates remark that the extent of foreign involvement has expanded considerably.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As health facilities across Africa report they are depleting their stocks of family planning supplies, including emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in midsummer plans to destroy millions of dollars worth of contraceptives held in a storage facility in Belgium. A leading family planning organization states that their elimination will deprive countless females from family planning options, and lead to hundreds of thousands of unintended pregnancies and unsafe abortions. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about forcing a conservative worldview globally” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A international emergency medical charity calls it “callous and reckless”. NGOs offer to buy the contraceptives so they can reach their intended destinations, but the US declines every proposal. The situation remains in deadlock as host nation officials refuse to permit usable products to be destroyed.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Bringing back the anti-abortion funding ban, which cuts American funding for groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is typical of certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the policy was restored in the first month of the year. The administration also signed onto a conservative consensus document. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to include DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) projects. Further specifics about the policy's widened application are expected in early 2026. A expert in child welfare says widening the scope will have “catastrophic impacts”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that new US aid packages being arranged with states on the continent will become dependent on agreeing to the expanded global gag.
