A Quintet of Crucial Incidents in the Assault on the Freedoms of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.
A year ago, groups dedicated to gender equality were steeling themselves against a new Trump administration. The ensuing chaos was largely unforeseen. The sheer number and rapid pace of executive orders coming out of the White House were seen as a deliberate tactic to cause confusion and fear. In many ways it worked – there was chaos, resentment, and burnout as agencies hastened to plug the hole left by a major funding freeze. But the situation was about to worsen.
The Washington leadership has been the main instigator, supported by intense advocacy work by far-right organisations capitalizing on the climate to forge international alliances with political allies.
This opposition to progressive rights refers to a global network of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as ultra-rich backers and donors that strive to weaken progress across a wide spectrum of issues. This covers pro-choice policies, equality for sexual minorities, gender identity recognition, and inclusive relationship teaching.
They achieve this through influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to push for parity, disseminating propaganda, and supporting ideologically-matched groups.
We review five junctures that shaped the welfare, autonomy, and survival of the female population.
The Demise of a Major Aid Agency
In early spring, six weeks after a prominent humanitarian funder is its funds are blocked, causing international chaos, a leading figure in the administration confirms that nearly all of the institution's work will be scrapped. US diplomats, ex-presidents and humanitarian and health experts condemn the news, predicting that lives will be lost. Activists say that the demise of the agency is not just a financial shortfall, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and family planning and reproductive care. Many organisations say females will bear the brunt by reduced funding, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, statistics reveal how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with many more millions at risk. Two other major donor nations follow with their own cuts. A director of a global justice organization says a choice to reduce international development funding is an attempt to placate a powerful partner.
Christian-Right Groups Raise Voices During UN Women Summit
In the same month, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a strategic summit held concurrently with 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 high spirits as they applaud new Washington directives on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the gender equality forum with a grave caution that “the venom of male dominance” is back, after a report shows that anti-rights actors are deliberately weakening longstanding consensus on fundamental freedoms for women around the world.
Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa
Over the summer, a cluster of meetings in Africa focused on the conventional household and state autonomy raises concerns among equality campaigners. In early May, a president and first lady open a significant conference to resist what they label external influences undermining local norms. A shortly thereafter, another regional summit 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 “international liberal agenda” of global institutions. In June, a global faith group hosts a family strengthening conference in an African nation, an event that pro-choice campaigners say has become an anti-LGBTQ, anti-gender platform. Campaigners note that the scale of their presence has increased markedly.
US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives
As health facilities across Africa report they are running out of contraceptives, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in July plans to incinerate a vast stockpile of birth control held in a storage facility in Belgium. A major reproductive health federation states that their incineration will prevent countless females from access to birth control, and lead to a surge in unplanned pregnancies and dangerous terminations. The organization labels the plan an dogmatic choice “about forcing a conservative worldview globally” and “a calculated move to control fertility”. 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 declines every proposal. The situation remains in deadlock as host nation officials will not allow perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
‘Global Gag Rule’ Expanded
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 came as no surprise when the rule was reinstated 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 broaden the scope of the policy to include national governments and international bodies in addition to NGOs, and to include DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) projects. Additional information regarding the policy's widened application are likely forthcoming. A leader in global maternal health says broadening the policy will have “catastrophic impacts”. Pro-choice activists fear that fresh American assistance deals being negotiated with countries in Africa will become dependent on agreeing to the expanded global gag.
