A Quintet of Crucial Incidents in the Challenge to the Freedoms of Women and Girls in the Year 2025.
A year ago, women’s rights organisations were bracing themselves for a second Trump term. Few were prepared for. The sheer number and rapid pace of administrative decrees coming out of the White House were interpreted as a premeditated approach to cause confusion and fear. The tactic proved effective – there was confusion, anger and exhaustion as networks struggled to address the shortfall left by a freeze on international development funds. But that was just the beginning.
The US administration has been the key driver, supported by fervent lobbying efforts by ultra-conservative groups using the moment to solidify transnational relationships with ideological partners.
The movement against gender equality refers to a global network of political leaders, religious institutions, civil society groups as well as wealthy philanthropists and dynasties that aim to roll back progress across a wide spectrum of issues. These include 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 advance equality, spreading disinformation, and funding non-profit organisations.
We examine five moments that impacted the protection, honor, and existence of females globally.
The Demise of a Major Aid Agency
In early spring, shortly after a major US aid agency is frozen, causing global disruption, a top American diplomat confirms that over eighty percent of the institution's work will be scrapped. American foreign service officers, past leaders and aid and medical specialists criticize the move, cautioning that mortality will increase. Activists say that the demise of the agency is more than a funding crisis, it is a savage attack on human rights and family planning and reproductive care. Numerous groups say women and girls will be disproportionately affected by diminishing aid, especially in conflict areas. As the year ends, data shows how hundreds of thousands of people have already died from disease, starvation, lack of access to maternal care and gender-based violence, with a far greater catastrophe looming. Two other major donor nations initiate similar reductions. A head of a worldwide campaign network 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 luxury Manhattan venue for a strategic summit held alongside the UN's flagship gender equality meeting. It is an chance to exchange strategies on how to defeat the UN’s “radical agenda”. They are in high spirits as they celebrate new Washington directives on gender, diversity and abortion. Meanwhile, the head of the United Nations opens the gender equality forum with a somber alert that “the venom of male dominance” is back, after a analysis demonstrates that anti-rights actors are systematically eroding established norms on key women’s rights issues around the world.
African ‘Family Values’ Conferences
Over the summer, a series of conferences in Africa centered on the traditional family and national sovereignty triggers anxiety among human rights defenders. In May, a head of state and partner open a significant conference to push back on what they label overseas agendas corrupting societal morals. A shortly thereafter, another Pan-African conference on conservative ethics is held. Both events are graced by leading Western campaigners against gender ideology, including presidents of prominent organizations. One speaker urges African NGOs to resist “worldwide progressive social restructuring” of multilateral bodies. In June, a major religious institution hosts a event focused on reinforcing families in the region, an event that pro-choice campaigners say has become a forum for opposing queer and trans rights. Advocates remark that the level of external participation has increased markedly.
American Plan to Burn Birth Control
As clinics in sub-Saharan Africa report they are depleting their stocks of family planning supplies, including post-rape care packages, the US announces in July plans to destroy a vast stockpile of birth control held in a storage facility in Belgium. A global sexual health network states that their incineration will prevent countless females from family planning options, and lead to a public health crisis of unwanted pregnancies. The organization labels the plan an dogmatic choice “about exporting a regressive policy worldwide” and “a calculated move to control fertility”. A prominent medical humanitarian organization calls it “heartless and dangerous”. Charities attempt to acquire the contraceptives so they can fulfill their original purpose, but the US refuses all offers. The situation remains unresolved as the regional government refuse to permit the destruction of viable medicines.
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 standard practice for certain US administrations. It was anticipated when the rule was reinstated in January. The administration also rejoined an international anti-abortion agreement. But in the autumn, the US announces it intends to extend the restrictions to include national governments and international bodies in addition to NGOs, and to encompass equity and inclusion initiatives. Further specifics about the expansion of the rule are expected in early 2026. A expert in child welfare says widening the scope will have “devastating consequences”. Reproductive justice campaigners fear that upcoming Washington funding agreements being discussed with African nations will become conditional on accepting the broadened restrictions.
