Five Landmark Occurrences in the Rollback of the Freedoms of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.
In the previous year, feminist advocacy groups were preparing for a new Trump administration. Hardly anyone anticipated. The torrent and swiftness of presidential directives emanating from the White House were viewed as a intentional maneuver to cause confusion and fear. This strategy had its intended impact – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as networks struggled to plug the hole left by a freeze on international development funds. But this merely marked the opening act.
The US administration has been the central catalyst, supported by intense advocacy work by religious fundamentalist networks capitalizing on the climate to solidify transnational relationships with sympathetic regimes.
Often termed the anti-gender movement describes a worldwide alliance of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that aim to roll back gains in a variety of areas. This encompasses access to termination, gay and trans protections, alternative households, and factual sexual instruction.
They do this by pressuring states, backing lawsuits, disparaging UN work to foster equity, propagating misinformation, and bankrolling sympathetic charities.
We examine five moments that shaped the safety, dignity and lives of the female population.
USAID Dismantled
In March, a month and a half following a major US aid agency is halted, causing global disruption, a senior US official announces that a vast majority of the body's projects will be terminated. Career diplomats, ex-presidents and humanitarian and health experts decry the decision, cautioning that fatalities will ensue. Rights defenders say that the closure of the organization is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a vicious offensive against basic liberties and access to contraception and reproductive health services. Numerous groups say females will bear the brunt by reduced funding, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, data shows how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from sickness, hunger, poor pregnancy healthcare, and abuse targeting females, with many more millions at risk. Two other major donor nations initiate similar reductions. A head of a worldwide campaign network says a choice to reduce international development funding is a move to appease a political ally.
Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting
In March, several conservative religious groups meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a biannual gathering held in parallel with the UN's flagship gender equality meeting. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they applaud changes in American foreign policy on social issues and termination of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the UN secretary general opens the women’s summit with a grave caution that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is returning, after a report shows that anti-rights actors are deliberately weakening established norms on core aspects of gender equality around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the warmer months, a series of conferences in Africa themed around the conservative family structures and national independence triggers anxiety among equality campaigners. In early May, a president and first lady open a major forum to push back on what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A shortly thereafter, another regional summit on family values is held. Both events are graced by leading Western campaigners against gender ideology, including leaders of well-known groups. One speaker calls on African NGOs to push back against “international liberal agenda” of multilateral bodies. In the following month, a global faith group hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in an African nation, an event that reproductive rights advocates say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Advocates remark that the extent of foreign involvement has grown significantly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As clinics in sub-Saharan Africa report they are depleting their stocks of family planning supplies, including emergency kits for survivors of sexual violence, the US announces in July plans to destroy a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a European depot. A global sexual health network states that their elimination will deprive countless females from contraceptive supplies, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an ideological decision “about imposing an anti-rights agenda on the entire world” and “a calculated move to control fertility”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “callous and reckless”. Charities attempt to acquire the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US refuses all offers. The situation remains in deadlock as the regional government will not allow perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
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 commonplace under certain US administrations. It was widely expected when the ban was reimposed in the first month of the year. The administration also reaffirmed membership in a pro-life declaration. 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 anticipated next year. A leader in global maternal health says extending the reach will have “unimaginable effects”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being arranged with states on the continent will become contingent upon adopting the broadened restrictions.
