Five Major Crucial Incidents in the Erosion of the Rights of Females in the Year 2025.
In the previous year, organisations advocating for women's rights were anticipating a Trump presidency sequel. Scarcely anyone expected. The volume and speed of administrative decrees coming out of the White House were viewed as a calculated strategy to overwhelm and create panic. In many ways it worked – there was disarray, outrage, and weariness as agencies hastened to plug the hole left by a major funding freeze. But the situation was about to worsen.
The American government has been the key driver, complemented by relentless activism by deeply conservative factions using the moment to build worldwide connections with ideological partners.
The movement against gender equality denotes an international coalition of elected officials, faith-based bodies, non-governmental organisations as well as ultra-rich backers and donors that seek to undermine progress across a wide spectrum of issues. These include abortion, LGBTQ rights, trans rights, non-traditional family structures and comprehensive sexuality education.
They achieve this through pressuring states, backing lawsuits, disparaging UN work to promote fairness, circulating falsehoods, and resourcing aligned NGOs.
We analyze five moments that shaped the safety, dignity and lives of women and girls.
The Demise of a Major Aid Agency
In March, six weeks after a key American development organization is frozen, causing turmoil around the world, a senior US official states that a vast majority of the organization's initiatives will be axed. Career diplomats, ex-presidents and relief and public health authorities denounce the action, warning that mortality will increase. Human rights advocates say that the closure of the organization is more than a funding crisis, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and birth control and maternal healthcare. Many organisations say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by diminishing aid, especially in regions of instability. As the year ends, data shows how a tremendous loss of life has already occurred from sickness, hunger, poor pregnancy healthcare, and abuse targeting females, with many more millions at risk. Additional key contributing countries initiate similar reductions. A leader of an international advocacy group says a decision to slash billions in overseas assistance is a move to appease a political ally.
Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting
In the same month, several Christian-right organisations meet in an luxury Manhattan venue for a strategic summit held alongside the annual UN Women gathering. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to counter the UN's progressive policies. They are in high spirits as they celebrate changes in American foreign policy on LGBTQ issues, inclusion, and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the women’s summit with a grave caution that “the toxin of gendered hierarchy” is resurgent, after a study indicates that anti-rights actors are deliberately weakening established norms on fundamental freedoms for women around the world.
African ‘Family Values’ Conferences
Over the warmer months, a cluster of meetings in Africa focused on the traditional family and national sovereignty raises concerns among human rights defenders. In early May, a head of state and partner open a major forum to push back on what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A soon after, another continental gathering on family values is held. Both events are graced by leading US and European anti-rights figures, including leaders of well-known groups. One speaker urges African NGOs to stand up to “international liberal agenda” of global institutions. In June, a major religious institution hosts a family strengthening conference in West Africa, an event that pro-choice campaigners say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Campaigners note that the scale of their presence has increased markedly.
US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are depleting their stocks of family planning supplies, including post-rape care packages, the US announces in midsummer plans to incinerate a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a storage facility in Belgium. A global sexual health network states that their elimination will deprive millions of women and girls from contraceptive supplies, 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 prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “callous and reckless”. Aid groups propose purchasing the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains at a standstill as the regional government will not allow perfectly good supplies to be incinerated.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which halts US aid to groups that offer, promote, or give information about abortion services overseas, is commonplace under certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the policy was restored in January. The administration also signed onto a conservative consensus document. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to expand the global gag rule to include governments and multilateral organisations in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. Additional information regarding the expansion of the rule are likely forthcoming. A leader in global maternal health says widening the scope will have “devastating consequences”. Advocates for bodily autonomy fear that fresh American assistance deals being negotiated with countries in Africa will become dependent on agreeing to the expanded global gag.
