Five Critical Crucial Incidents in the Rollback of the Rights of Women and Girls in the Past Year.
A year ago, groups dedicated to gender equality were anticipating a new Trump administration. Few were prepared for. The flood and velocity of presidential directives issued from the White House were interpreted as a intentional maneuver to cause confusion and fear. This strategy had its intended impact – there was disarray, outrage, and weariness as organisations scrambled to fill the gap left by a sudden aid suspension. But this was only the precursor.
The US administration has been the primary force, bolstered by vigorous campaigning by religious fundamentalist networks seizing the opportunity to solidify transnational relationships with sympathetic regimes.
This opposition to progressive rights denotes an international coalition of policymakers, doctrinal establishments, and activist outfits as well as affluent financiers and clans that seek to undermine advances on numerous fronts. This encompasses reproductive choice, queer and transgender freedoms, diverse family models, and honest sex ed.
They achieve this through influencing policymakers, funding litigation, undermining global initiatives to advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.
We analyze five episodes that influenced the security, respect, and well-being of the female population.
USAID Dismantled
In the month of March, a month and a half following a major US aid agency is suspended, causing turmoil around the world, a senior US official announces that the lion's share of the organization's initiatives will be axed. American foreign service officers, former presidents and relief and public health authorities condemn the news, stating that people will die as a result. Activists say that the dismantling of this institution is greater than a budgetary issue, it is a brutal assault on fundamental freedoms and birth control and maternal healthcare. A multitude of agencies say females will bear the brunt by diminishing aid, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, evidence indicates how a significant mortality toll has been exacted from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with a far greater catastrophe looming. Another pair of leading funders initiate similar reductions. A leader of an international advocacy group says a move to cut foreign aid drastically is a gesture of alignment with another government's agenda.
Christian-Right Groups Raise Voices During UN Women Summit
In March, several Christian-right organisations meet in an upmarket New York hotel for a strategic summit held in parallel with the annual UN Women gathering. It is an opportunity to share tactics on how to counter the UN's progressive policies. They are in buoyant mood as they celebrate shifts in US policy on gender, diversity and abortion. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the global conference with a somber alert that “the poison of patriarchy” is resurgent, after a study indicates that opponents of gender equality are deliberately weakening established norms on key women’s rights issues around the world.
African ‘Family Values’ Conferences
Over the summer, a sequence of gatherings in Africa centered on the conventional household and state autonomy sparks alarm among rights advocates. In early May, a president and first lady open a major forum to push back on what they label overseas agendas corrupting societal morals. A soon after, another Pan-African conference on family values is held. Both events are attended by leading Western campaigners against gender ideology, including presidents of prominent organizations. One speaker urges African NGOs to stand up to “radical global social engineering” of international organizations. In the following month, a global faith group hosts a gathering about supporting traditional households in an African nation, an event that health activists say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Campaigners note that the level of external participation has increased markedly.
US Threat to Destroy Contraceptives
As medical centers in numerous African countries report they are facing shortages of birth control, including prophylaxis for assault victims, the US announces in midsummer plans to destroy a significant cache of reproductive health commodities held in a warehouse in Europe. A global sexual health network states that their incineration will prevent millions of women and girls from access to birth control, and lead to a public health crisis of unwanted pregnancies. The organization labels the plan an politically-motivated move “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a deliberate form of reproductive oppression”. A international emergency medical charity calls it “callous and reckless”. NGOs offer to buy the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US rejects each bid. The situation remains at a standstill as host nation officials are blocking usable products to be destroyed.
Broader Restrictions on Aid
Reinstating the Mexico City Policy, which halts US aid to groups that provide, advocate for or advise on abortion services overseas, is typical of certain US administrations. It came as no surprise when the policy was restored in the first month of the year. 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 national governments and international bodies in addition to NGOs, and to include DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) projects. Further specifics about the policy's widened application are expected in early 2026. A director of a major health partnership says widening the scope will have “catastrophic impacts”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that new US aid packages being arranged with states on the continent will become dependent on agreeing to the new, wider policy.
