Five Major Landmark Occurrences in the Rollback of the Rights of Women and Girls in 2025.
This time last year, organisations advocating for women's rights were steeling themselves against a second Trump term. Few were prepared for. The volume and speed of White House mandates coming out of the White House were seen as a intentional maneuver to overwhelm and create panic. In many ways it worked – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as organisations scrambled to compensate for the loss left by a major funding freeze. But this merely marked the opening act.
The American government has been the primary force, aided by vigorous campaigning by deeply conservative factions exploiting the situation to forge international alliances with political allies.
This opposition to progressive rights refers to a global network of policymakers, doctrinal establishments, and activist outfits as well as affluent financiers and clans that strive to weaken gains in a variety of areas. This covers access to termination, gay and trans protections, alternative households, and factual sexual instruction.
They achieve this through pressuring states, backing lawsuits, disparaging UN work to advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.
We examine five episodes that shaped the safety, dignity and lives of the female population.
USAID Effectively Dismantled
In March, a month and a half following a major US aid agency is frozen, causing international chaos, a senior US official confirms that a vast majority of the organization's initiatives will be axed. American foreign service officers, former presidents and humanitarian and health experts denounce the action, stating that fatalities will ensue. Activists say that the dismantling of this institution is not just a financial shortfall, it is a savage attack on human rights and access to contraception and reproductive health services. A multitude of agencies say females will bear the brunt by shrinking assistance, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, statistics reveal how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from illness, famine, inadequate obstetric services, and violence against women, with many more millions at risk. Another pair of leading funders announce their own austerity measures. A leader of an international advocacy group says a decision to slash billions in overseas assistance is a move to appease a political ally.
Christian-Right Groups Raise Voices During UN Women Summit
In the same month, several Christian-right organisations meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a two-day conference held alongside the annual UN Women gathering. It is an forum to discuss methods on how to oppose what they term a UN overreach. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they applaud changes in American foreign policy on gender, diversity and abortion. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the women’s summit with a grave caution that “the poison of patriarchy” is returning, after a study indicates that anti-rights actors are systematically eroding historic agreements on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
Summits Promoting Conservative Norms
Over the summer, a sequence of gatherings in Africa themed around the traditional family and national sovereignty sparks alarm among equality campaigners. In the start of May, a head of state and partner open a major forum to push back on what they label overseas agendas corrupting societal morals. A soon after, another regional summit on family values is held. Both events are attended by leading American and European conservative activists, including heads of influential networks. One speaker exhorts African NGOs to resist “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of international organizations. In June, a major religious institution hosts a family strengthening conference in the region, an event that pro-choice campaigners say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Activists observe that the extent of foreign involvement has increased markedly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As medical centers in numerous African countries 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 incinerate a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A major reproductive health federation states that their destruction will deny a huge female population from family planning options, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “an intentional act of reproductive coercion”. A renowned doctors' group calls it “cruel and irresponsible”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can reach their intended destinations, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains in deadlock as local authorities refuse to permit the destruction of viable medicines.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Bringing back the anti-abortion funding ban, which halts US aid to groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is typical of certain US administrations. It came as no surprise when the rule was reinstated in the first month of the year. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to broaden the scope of the policy to include national governments and international bodies in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. More details on the broader enforcement are likely forthcoming. A leader in global maternal health says extending the reach will have “unimaginable effects”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being arranged with states on the continent will become conditional on accepting the expanded global gag.
