Five Critical Key Moments in the Rollback of the Rights of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.

This time last year, organisations advocating for women's rights were preparing for a Trump presidency sequel. Few were prepared for. The torrent and swiftness of White House mandates coming out of the White House were seen as a calculated strategy to paralyze through overload. The tactic proved effective – there was bewilderment, fury, and fatigue as agencies hastened to address the shortfall left by a abrupt cessation of financial support. But that was just the beginning.

The Washington leadership has been the central catalyst, aided by vigorous campaigning by ultra-conservative groups exploiting the situation to strengthen global ties with sympathetic regimes.

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 gains in a variety of areas. This covers reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.

They achieve this through pressuring states, backing lawsuits, disparaging UN work to foster equity, propagating misinformation, and bankrolling sympathetic charities.

We examine five instances that influenced the welfare, autonomy, and survival of females globally.

USAID Dismantled

In March, a month and a half following a prominent humanitarian funder is its funds are blocked, causing turmoil around the world, a top American diplomat confirms that the lion's share of the institution's work will be scrapped. American foreign service officers, past leaders and humanitarian and health experts criticize the move, stating that lives will be lost. Rights defenders say that the demise of the agency is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and access to contraception and reproductive health services. Numerous groups say the impact on girls and women will be severe by shrinking assistance, especially in regions of instability. As the year ends, evidence indicates how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from illness, famine, inadequate obstetric services, and violence against women, with a far greater catastrophe looming. Another pair of leading funders follow with their own cuts. A director of a global justice organization says a choice to reduce international development funding is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.

Conservative Religious Groups Lobby at UN Women Meeting

In the same month, several faith-based advocacy networks meet in an high-end hotel in NYC for a two-day conference held concurrently with the UN's flagship gender equality meeting. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to counter the UN's progressive policies. They are in optimistic frame of mind as they welcome shifts in US policy on social issues and termination of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the world's top diplomat opens the global conference with a somber alert that “the poison of patriarchy” is back, after a study indicates that opponents of gender equality are actively undermining established norms on fundamental freedoms for women around the world.

Conferences on Traditional Values in Africa

Over the warmer months, a cluster of meetings in Africa themed around the traditional family and national sovereignty raises concerns among human rights defenders. In May, a head of state and partner open a significant conference to push back on what they label criminal foreign forces eroding traditional family values. A few days later, another regional summit on family values is held. Both events are participated in by leading American and European conservative activists, including presidents of prominent organizations. One speaker urges African NGOs to stand up to “international liberal agenda” of multilateral bodies. In June, a prominent church hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in an African nation, an event that pro-choice campaigners say has become an anti-LGBTQ, anti-gender platform. Campaigners note that the extent of foreign involvement has expanded considerably.

US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives

As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are running out of contraceptives, including post-rape care packages, the US announces in July plans to dispose of a vast stockpile of birth control held in a storage facility in Belgium. A leading family planning organization states that their destruction will deny countless females from family planning options, 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 “an intentional act of reproductive coercion”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “cruel and irresponsible”. NGOs offer to buy the contraceptives so they can be distributed to those in need, but the US refuses all offers. The situation remains unresolved as local authorities refuse to permit the destruction of viable medicines.

‘Global Gag Rule’ Expanded

Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which prohibits Washington's support for 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 January. The administration also reaffirmed membership in a pro-life declaration. But in October, the US announces it intends to broaden the scope of the policy to include sovereign states and UN agencies in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. More details on the policy's widened application are anticipated next year. A leader in global maternal health says broadening the policy will have “devastating consequences”. Pro-choice activists fear that new US aid packages being discussed with African nations will become contingent upon adopting the expanded global gag.