Five Landmark Occurrences in the Challenge to the Freedoms of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.
A year ago, groups dedicated to gender equality were preparing for a new Trump administration. Scarcely anyone expected. The flood and velocity of executive orders emanating from the White House were viewed as a deliberate tactic to cause confusion and fear. The tactic proved effective – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as organisations scrambled to fill the gap left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But the situation was about to worsen.
The Trump administration has been the key driver, aided by intense advocacy work by far-right organisations exploiting the situation to strengthen global ties with sympathetic regimes.
This opposition to progressive rights refers to a global network of government figures, churches, and advocacy collectives as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that seek to undermine forward movement on multiple topics. This encompasses abortion, LGBTQ rights, trans rights, non-traditional family structures and comprehensive sexuality education.
They do this by influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to push for parity, disseminating propaganda, and supporting ideologically-matched groups.
We examine five junctures that shaped the safety, dignity and lives of girls and women.
USAID Dismantled
In the month of March, six weeks after a major US aid agency is its funds are blocked, causing international chaos, a leading figure in the administration confirms that the lion's share of the body's projects will be terminated. American foreign service officers, former presidents and aid and medical specialists decry the decision, predicting that lives will be lost. Rights defenders say that the dismantling of this institution is not just a financial shortfall, it is a vicious offensive against basic liberties and family planning and reproductive care. Numerous groups say females will bear the brunt by waning support, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, reports confirm how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from sickness, hunger, poor pregnancy healthcare, and abuse targeting females, with many more millions at risk. Additional key contributing countries proceed with parallel slashes. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a choice to reduce international development funding is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.
Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting
In the same month, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a two-day conference held in parallel with the annual UN Women gathering. It is an chance to exchange strategies on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. 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 global conference with a somber alert that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is returning, after a report shows that opponents of gender equality are actively undermining established norms on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
Summits Promoting Conservative Norms
Over the warmer months, a series of conferences in Africa focused on the conservative family structures and national independence triggers anxiety among equality campaigners. In May, a president and first lady open a large assembly to combat what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A shortly thereafter, another continental gathering on traditional morals is held. Both events are participated in by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including leaders of well-known groups. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to resist “radical global social engineering” of global institutions. In June, a global faith group hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in an African nation, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Campaigners note that the level of external participation has expanded considerably.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As clinics in sub-Saharan Africa report they are running out of contraceptives, including post-rape care packages, the US announces in July plans to dispose of a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A leading family planning organization states that their destruction will deny 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 ideological decision “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “callous and reckless”. Charities attempt to acquire the contraceptives so they can reach their intended destinations, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains at a standstill as host nation officials are blocking perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
Widening of the Anti-Abortion Policy
Bringing back the anti-abortion funding ban, which prohibits Washington's support for 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 policy was restored in January. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include national governments and international bodies in addition to NGOs, and to cover diversity programmes. Additional information regarding the policy's widened application are anticipated next year. A director of a major health partnership says widening the scope will have “devastating consequences”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that fresh American assistance deals being arranged with states on the continent will become contingent upon adopting the new, wider policy.
