Five Critical Key Moments in the Rollback of the Rights of Women and Girls in This Past Year.
A year ago, women’s rights organisations were steeling themselves against a new Trump administration. Scarcely anyone expected. The volume and speed of administrative decrees issued from the White House were viewed as a deliberate tactic to cause confusion and fear. In many ways it worked – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as agencies hastened to compensate for the loss left by a major funding freeze. But that was just the beginning.
The Washington leadership has been the primary force, aided by relentless activism by deeply conservative factions using the moment to solidify transnational relationships with political allies.
The movement against gender equality describes a worldwide alliance of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as ultra-rich backers and donors that aim to roll back progress across a wide spectrum of issues. This covers access to termination, gay and trans protections, alternative households, and factual sexual instruction.
They do this by influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.
We analyze five junctures that affected the safety, dignity and lives of women and girls.
The Dismantling of USAID
In March, a month and a half following a key American development organization is its funds are blocked, causing turmoil around the world, a top American diplomat states that over eighty percent of the institution's work will be scrapped. US diplomats, former presidents and relief and public health authorities decry the decision, cautioning that people will die as a result. Activists 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. Many organisations say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by diminishing aid, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, data shows how a tremendous loss of life has already occurred from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with millions more to come. Another pair of leading funders announce their own austerity measures. A director of a global justice organization says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is a move to appease a political ally.
Faith-Based Activists Mobilize at UN Conference
In March, several conservative religious groups meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a strategic summit held alongside the UN's flagship gender equality meeting. It is an chance to exchange strategies on how to oppose what they term a UN overreach. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they celebrate new Washington directives on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the global conference with a somber alert that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is resurgent, after a study indicates that anti-rights actors are deliberately weakening longstanding consensus 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 conventional household and state autonomy sparks alarm among equality campaigners. In the start of May, a president and first lady open a large assembly to resist what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A soon after, another continental gathering 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 stand up to “international liberal agenda” of international organizations. In June, a major religious institution hosts a family strengthening conference in West Africa, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Activists observe that the extent of foreign involvement has expanded considerably.
US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives
As clinics in sub-Saharan Africa report they are depleting their stocks of family planning supplies, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in midsummer plans to destroy millions of dollars worth of contraceptives held in a storage facility in Belgium. A global sexual health network states that their destruction will deny a huge female population from access to birth control, 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 “heartless and dangerous”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can be distributed to those in need, but the US declines every proposal. The situation remains in deadlock as host nation officials are blocking the destruction of viable medicines.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
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 commonplace under certain US administrations. It was widely expected 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 sovereign states and UN agencies in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. Further specifics about the policy's widened application are expected in early 2026. A leader in global maternal health says broadening the policy will have “catastrophic impacts”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being arranged with states on the continent will become conditional on accepting the new, wider policy.
